BigT new to digital carrera 1/32 &1/24 all help wanted.

[BigT]

ya now i remember if i decide on pace car thats what i'll do so pace car dont get in the way in the pits.

[BigT]

Finally got some more track ordered, let’s hope my box doesn’t show up with half the stuff being back ordered .
:-)

[32lbKING]

You shouldn't have to worry about that. If I remember right their stock is usually real time on their website. The only thing I have noticed to not always be accurate is the "ships in 7-10 days" for some out of stock items. I think that is probably an issue with the distributer though.

[BigT]

Well I have had a few issues with the up to the minute in stock quote advertised on the website, just part of the Covid-19 I imagine. But I’ll be happy if it all gets here soon. Just want to get layout done and get racing :-)

[BigT]

Can anyone tell me what it means when you lose power and the CU has the last light to the right on? This has happened twice now while driving, no noise just lose power to track and accessories and one light on Cu is lit. Is it a over heat issue or some safety shut off designed into the CU?

[Rokon]

I haven't seen that. So does it stay in that state until you shut it down? Off and back on and it is back to normal? What was going on when this to happens?

[BigT]

Yes it stays that way until I cycle it off and on then it’s normal. I’ve never waited more then a minute for it to reset its self. I assume that the one light that remains on ( all the way to the right if your facing cu remains on ) must be a code of some kind. I’m thinking overheating? It’s only happened twice usually when I’m running 6 cars for quite awhile. My amps never seem to go above 2-3 that I’ve ever seen even with 6 cars. Just don’t want to burn anything up.

[Frogman]

How long is awhile BigT? 6 cars would be a big electrical draw, if it's hour it sounds like the CU is over heating. Has it ever happen with two cars for hours?

[BigT]

I’d say more then a hour. But I can say never with 1-4 cars for numerous hours. I normally run 50 lap races some 100 lap races so there’s alway 5-10 min between races and I’ve notched down voltage to 16-17 v at ps.

[dinglebery]

Do you have a Fluke multimeter that can measure Amperage? If you do, connect it in series to the power and see what it measures during your event, use the MIN MAX AVG mode. The MIN MAX AVG recording mode captures the minimum and maximum input values, and calculates a running average of all readings. When a new high or low is detected, the Meter beeps.

[BigT]

No I don’t , what I do know is I’m never above 5 amps because that’s what my fuse is and it’s never blown. Now I’m running a 7 amp fuse and it’s never blown either. Does anyone know how to get a hold of Bruce yingling ( sorry if I butchered the name) he seems to know a lot about these light codes on the CU.

[Wet Coast Racer]

Bruce visits SCI frequently and is a great contributor here.

You could send him a PM, but chances are that if you're having questions about this stuff, so are others (both SCI Members and guests). Which would make a discussion in a public forum like this much more useful.

[BigT]

That’s what I was thinking, hoping he’ll see this

[b.yingling]

I did see it, but unfortunately I have no absolute answer.

I see you say it happens when running six cars, and then you mention that you dialed the voltage *down* to 16 or 17 volts. Are they 1/24 cars? If they are 1/32 cars, you must be running full magnets at that voltage, or they'd be really difficult to drive. So either way, 6 heavy D124 cars or 6 magneted D132 cars has me leaning towards overheating as a good possibility.

Many people *do* run 6 D124 cars at 18 or more volts (although generally with reduced magnetic downforce), so even if it is an overheat situation, it's not typical.

[BigT]

Thanks Bruce , yes I run magnets I haven’t graduated to mag free racing yet but soon. It happened with 1/32 cars . My real question was the way only one light far right last light stays lit after everything else shuts down. You seem to know more about all these CU codes I thought you may know what that remaining light meant . It leads me to believe it’s some kind of code,but can’t find anything online or in forums. I’ll start running at a lower voltage and see if it happens anymore and loose some magnets :-)