Author Topic: BLI steam decoder issue?  (Read 581 times)

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ATSF_Ron

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BLI steam decoder issue?
« on: November 13, 2023, 07:11:09 PM »
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Has anyone had this issue come up?  I have several BLI paragon4 mikados.  None of them have ever done this.  I swap back and forth between DC and DCC, as I have several great running DC locos I don't wish to convert or are a pain to convert to DCC.  I was running one of my Key brass locos alongside a BLI Mike and they were fine in DC.  Then I decided to do some running in DCC only with my BLI loco only.  All was fine.  I did NOT make any CV changes during this session.  This morning I switched back to DC and my paragon4 Mike will not move.  It'll power up, make sounds, and the headlight comes on.  No movement whatsoever.  I went back to DCC.  All was fine again.  DC? Nope.  Other than a hard reset, has anyone encountered a solution to this?  It's not a huge deal to do a reset, just an inconvenience.  I modified overall volume and the whistle, bell, and chuff volumes as I don't care for the factory settings.  It just seems like a random issue that popped up out of nowhere.  Is this a typical BLI decoder thing?  None of my other BLI steamers have done this.

Sdynamo

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Re: BLI steam decoder issue?
« Reply #1 on: November 14, 2023, 06:39:16 PM »
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I've not run into the DC vs DCC problem, but I've had plenty of BLI locos make noise and not move.  So far resetting the decoder to factory values has been the only fix I've found.

ATSF_Ron

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Re: BLI steam decoder issue?
« Reply #2 on: November 15, 2023, 05:05:43 PM »
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Sdynamo, I figured that's what I would have to do.  It worked.  And of course, now I don't recall/can't find instructions on how to change the loco back to its long address...I've looked at both the BLI P4 directions and my DCC system's directions.  Not finding it.  It's really annoying when the memory starts failing, lol!

peteski

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Re: BLI steam decoder issue?
« Reply #3 on: November 15, 2023, 05:10:58 PM »
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Ron, with a DCC decoder, any brand of DCC system should be able to program the address into the decoder (same way you would configure address in any other brand decoder).  But having said that, BLI decoders can be problematic when writing CV values to them on certain DCC systems.

I believe these models come from the factory with a default short address of 3. Just like most other factory-DCC-equipped models.  So at some point you had to program the long address into the decoder. How did you do it originally?
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ATSF_Ron

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Re: BLI steam decoder issue?
« Reply #4 on: November 15, 2023, 10:26:37 PM »
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Peteski, that’s my problem! I don’t remember. But I DO remember that it was easy. 🤣🤣🤣

peteski

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Re: BLI steam decoder issue?
« Reply #5 on: November 15, 2023, 10:32:34 PM »
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Peteski, that’s my problem! I don’t remember. But I DO remember that it was easy. 🤣🤣🤣

Well Ron, try to change the address the same way you do it for all your DCC locos. If it was easy, then probably on the programming track of your DCC system.
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