The continuing saga of a Rapido B36-7 install...

[CPRail]

Reference the previous conversation: https://rpug.pdc.ca/index.php/topic,1626.msg11488.html#msg11488

I finally got all the gyralite wires sorted, tagged, cut, soldered, resistors installed, and tested that power was flowing as advertised. Huzzah! Time to put the shell on and lets get lit!

NOPE!
Went nuts for a bit trouble shooting until I realized my loose install (I don't do a tight taping until everything is confirmed to be working) was pushing the shell up just a enough so the two boards wouldn't make a connection, thus no gyralites. Once I figured that out, we have gyralites.

Now for the really weird part...I get gyralites front and rear at the same time! I suspect it's because Rapido made the gyralites directional:

F13 Gyralite (Southern Pacific only)
We know we’ve already said that SP really had this fascination with twinkly lights,
and the Gyralite certainly qualifies as pretty high up on the twinkly scale. Yes we
probably just made such a thing up, and yes we probably wish more railroads
used Gyralites, because who doesn’t like more lights? Press F13 to enable it and
press it again to disable it. It’s also directional so you don’t have to worry about the
headlight and Gyralite being on at opposing ends of the locomotive.

Oh yeah, the rear gyralites are also WAAAY brighter than the front.

So the question is, do I just cut the wires for the rear gyralite? Or is there a way to wire it up to be independent of the front one?

[G8B4Life]

This is almost a 1 year install!

While Rapido did indeed set the model up for directional Gyra-lites this was done with the function mapping within the decoder; the actual LED's front and rear were connected to two different outputs. How did you connect them up; you should have had a separate harness wire to each X10, X11 and  X12 (presuming you wired up the emergency light as well).

If you did use separate wires I'd check for a solder bridge where you soldered the wires on. Also, I don't recall if this is a thing or not but if there is a dual Gyra-Lite Light Effect for RP, don't use that one.

- Tim

[CPRail]

Yeah, fussy installs are not my favourite things, so I get easily swayed into more exciting things...and sometimes life and "adulting" just gets in the way.

But she's been sitting there taunting me, so let's get 'er done by the end of the year!

I'll write down what went where in the next couple of days - there were seperate wires to each X wire. I am using the Gyra Dual Sync function. Wonder if that is the case.  More in the next few days.

Hmmm, now that the LM-3S-21 has been released, I wonder...

[G8B4Life]

I am using the Gyra Dual Sync function. Wonder if that is the case.

100% that will be the case. Your controlling 2 Gyra-Lites at the same time with that function. You need the single Gyra-Lite function and a button each for the front and rear Gyra-Lites.

- Tim

[CPRail]

Well, son of a....

It's almost too easy.