Virginian 737
Virginian 737

It’s been a long time since there was an update on this blog, but at last, here it is.

My first American steam loco! Although not ecxactly suited for the timesaver layout, still a great machine to look at. And now also a great machine to listen at.

The model is dcc-ready. It is suited with a 8 pin NMRA plug and plenty of space in the tender. As I have good experience with Soundtraxx decoders I ordered a Soundtraxx Tsunami Heavy Steam decoder, together with a speaker and a 8-pin connector.

To place the speaker in the tender I had to remove the coal load. Fortunally the load is easy to remove. I placed the speaker on a piece of styreen which replaces the coal load. The tender becomes a great sound box this way.

Next I soldered the 8-pin plug to the decoder wires and the I connect the speaker wires from the decoder to the speaker. The decoder was fitted with a piece of double sided sticky tape.

I placed the speaker in the tender and I covered the speaker with a piece of cloth to prevent the coal to drop on the speaker. Next little rubber marbles from an artificial turf soccer field where used as a coal load.

The rubber marbles are fixed with wood glue diluted with water (not to much to prevent dripping in)

In a next post I will explain the CV settings I’ve made to the Tsunami to make it sound the way I like.