Life Like SD60M

[montyvox]

Good afternoon everyone-

I bought a Proto 2000/Life Like SD60M back in 2004 and I recently added a digitrax 8 pin decoder to it.

When I program it, it runs, but it runs at an amazingly slow speed compared to pretty much everything else.

Is this common or is there something wrong?

Thanks
Matt

[CIOR]

Yup, common. The gearing is off. Its that way with the SD60's.

You can mess around in the speed tables of the decoders, this is what most people did.

I ran several of my engines in consist to prevent issues.

[poweredby251]

Up until the SD-60's, their locos played nice with everyone else. After the low speed SD-60 came the infamous 'gearing of the month', where for quite a few models the speed was different on each release, and different than anything else out there, usually much faster. When Walthers took over P2K, one of the first things they did was set a standard gear ratio which all later releases seem to have followed, and which again plays nice with the others.

John

[CIOR]

I loved it when the SD45 came out and ran like a jack rabbit. I had initially hoped to play them with the SD60, but there was NO hope, not a bit of speed matching could seem to make it work.

[dtinut]

They make good dummies....which is what I did with my EL SD45 after trying several motors to see if a different motor would make any difference...it did NOT! Removal of the worm gear allows the truck to roll freely, so will use the motor and shafts for something else. I have enough powered units anyhow.

I did get a P2K SD45 frame and tank from someone who replaced theirs with another drive. I mated up a set of Atlas trucks I had leftover from a SD35, and it will become a NW SD45 drive - probably where the motor and shafts from the EL unit will end up. Many of the NW SD's have the triple clasp trucks, and these look close enough for me.

Regards,
Brian

[DRGW 5398]

That's interesting to hear, I have an older P2K SD60 and it runs fine with my units, Athearn, Atlas, etc...I use NCE decoders though, so that may be why.

I do agree about the SD45's, they do play nice with all the other locomotives!

[montyvox]

Thanks for the info guys, I appreciate it as always.

Jsut out of curiosity, how do you play around with the speed tables?

I have yet to figure that part out when it comes to DCC.

Thanks
Matt

[CIOR]

Matt, I use Decoder Pro to do this. I use to do it the old way, which took a TON of time and I've long forgotten how to do it. I suggest going with Decoder pro!

Jay, NO CLUE. I generally ran all my SD60's in groups together. Never worried about it. I did have a customer ask me about changing out the gears when they first came out, but he changed his mind and just ran them as sets.

I was able to run it with a buddies Athearn SD60, but he sold his off. It would run with other engines, but it was generally pulled along.
And I initially had NCE decoders in all my P2K stuff.

[montyvox]

Thanks Matt-

So basically I should pull the decoder out of the unit, then attach it to a USB port of some sorts and then update it using Decoder Pro to change the speed settings on it?

Sounds easy enough, but we'll see I guess.

Thanks
Matt

[CIOR]

I highly suggest using a buffer device no matter what you do.
Had a buddy that had a fault issue with the NCE system and his computer, caused major issues for him.
As a good buddy that is both a mr and computer guy said "each device you hook should be buffered!" good advice.

Plus it will allow you other options such as programming and other management tools via such free applications as JMRI.

If you want more info you can PM me and I can help you down that path.