Rapido Trains SW1200RS Operator's Manual - Operation – Dcc With Sound
10
SW1200RS destroyed by a 1300 or any other “train set” DC controller.
“Train set” DC controllers should not be used with sound-equipped
locomotives. Buy one less sound-equipped locomotive (from another
brand) and use the money to buy a proper controller instead.
The only lights that work in DC are the headlights, ditch lights (when equipped) and
number boards. You can’t turn on the class lights in DC. Some throttle manufacturers
produce special doo-dads which are meant to trigger the sounds in locomotives on DC
layouts. As we have no involvement in the development of those doo-dads, we have
absolutely no idea how they will affect your SW1200RS, for good or for ill. As always,
we’ll try to help you fix your SW1200RS if one of these doo-dads turns your locomotive’s
circuitry into something akin to burnt toast, but we can’t guarantee we’ll be able to.
It is usually at this point in the manual that Jason inserts a gentle dig at his fellow modellers
who won’t switch from DC to DCC. The rest of the staff have repeatedly reminded
him what happened the last time he did that. Something about being kidnapped by a
band of journeymen from the masons’ guild and being labelled a warlock. He still has
nightmares about it. As long as we can keep reminding him of this event, he’ll be nice
to DC modellers. However, Josh is the one writing this manual and he thinks DC is for
YIntaghs. Hab SoSlI’ Quch!
For those of you with ridged foreheads who are feeling deeply insulted, we are pleased
to inform you that Josh has now been sacked.
OPERATION – DCC WITH SOUND
We go to extreme lengths for accuracy, in sounds as well as in looks. Our sound decoders
are LokSound Select decoders by ESU, programmed with sounds we recorded from…
erm… a GMD-1. The prime mover is the same. The hood is the same. The exhaust stacks
are the same. It sounds the same. So you can rest assured that the sounds are bang-on
accurate. We have upgraded the decoder to include ESU’s Full Throttle.
As we do for all of our sound decoders, we recorded the prime mover under load – it
was hauling loaded grain hoppers. Locomotives sound a lot different when they are
working. If you have decoders from other manufacturers in your locomotives you might
want to check out the available line of Rapido decoders on our web site. All of our
decoder sounds were recorded under load and we simply can’t stand decoders that
don’t have this feature.
More detailed decoder instructions, including all sorts of weird CV settings we don’t
understand, can be found in the ESU Loksound Select decoder manual. This is available
for download on the SW1200RS page in the Support section of our web site.