Rapido Trains FP9A Product Manualline - Sound Volume Settings
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F9 – NUMBER BOARDS: These should generally be left on, unless the locomotive
is shut down in the yard. We’ve kept the number board function separate from the
headlight because a) you don’t want a lit headlight on a trailing unit, and b) often the
headlight is turned off during station stops. In both of these situations, the number boards
remain illuminated.
F10 – CLASS LIGHTS: The class lights are the little lights above the number boards.
In normal scheduled passenger service, these lights should be turned off. We all like
to turn them on because they look pretty, but for prototypical operation they should be
off most of the time. The white class lights are used when the train is running as an
unscheduled train. This would rarely be used in passenger service, but both CN and
CP ran their FP9As in freight service on occasion. At those times you’ll want the white
class lights turned on. The green class lights mean that there is a second section of the
same train following. These were used frequently during the high seasons in the 1950s
and 1960s but were rarely used after that. We did not include red class lights. These
are only used when the locomotive is pushing a train in push-pull configuration. The
only place this would have been used in Canada is Canadian Pacific’s Montreal-Rigaud
commuter line, which normally had FP7As assigned rather than FP9As. The three of you
modelling this line can make your own red lights.
SOUND VOLUME SETTINGS
The sound volumes on your decoder have been pre-set at the factory to levels that we
found comfortable on our test tracks. This is considerably quieter than what you are
probably used to when first turning on a sound-equipped locomotive, because we feel
that most locomotive models are set to ABSURDLY LOUD out of the box.
Sound levels are very much a matter of personal taste (especially if you are going deaf
like we are), and what sounds great in one layout environment may sound too loud or
too soft in another. Fortunately all sound levels can be easily adjusted to best suit your
own requirements and we recommend that you experiment with different settings if you
don’t care for the default levels.
To set the volume levels go into the program mode on your DCC system (refer to your
system’s manual for instructions on how to do this as each system is slightly different);
enter the desired CV number; then enter the desired levels (0-255 in all cases). Note
that this can be done either on a programming track or on the main (ops mode) if your
DCC system supports programming on the main.
We strongly recommend that you keep notes on which settings you have changed and
which values were used. If you ever need to do a reset on the decoder (see “Factory
Reset” below) then having good notes will allow you to easily re-enter any changes that
you might want to keep.