# Advanced Consisting and CV22



## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

Trying to program my consists so the front light is illuminated on the lead unit when going forward and the rear light is illuminated on the trailing unit when travelling in reverse.CV22 should be set to 01 on the lead unit and to 02 on the trailing unit.But it doesn't work for me. One consist of two locos both have NCE decoders, One consist both have Atlas dual-mode factory decoders,and the third consist both have Digitrax decoders.All are non-sound.Have tried programming on the main and the programming track both with no success.Both front lights are on going forward and both rear lights are on going in reverse on all three consists.These are HO scale.Any ideas where I have gone astray?Thanks


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## DonR (Oct 18, 2012)

I have the Bachmann EZ controller with no ability
to set individual CVs. However, I have 2 DCC
2 loco back to back consists where the lead loco headlight is on
going forward and the trailing loco headlight is on
backing. The trick is to set the headlights to on
going forward on both, then tell the trailing loco it is going forward when it actually is backing. See your decoder manual.

Don


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

DonR said:


> I have the Bachmann EZ controller with no ability
> to set individual CVs. However, I have 2 DCC
> 2 loco back to back consists where the lead loco headlight is on
> going forward and the trailing loco headlight is on
> ...


With that setup don't you have one light lit on each loco at the same time?The idea of CV22 programming is to only have one light on at a time.That would be only the front light on the lead unit going forward and the rearmost light on the back unit on going in reverse.If there is a third loco in the middle it would have all of its lights off at all times.


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## DonR (Oct 18, 2012)

No. When the headlight of the lead loco in the consist
is gosing forward the headlight will be on. The headlight of the back-to-back trailing
loco will be on when the consist is backing. Unfortunately,
however, both lead loco and rear light of trailing
are on going forward, the rear loco
head light is on when backing but so is the back light
of the lead loco. My guess is there's a CV setting that
would turn off the lead back up or the trailing headlight.

Don


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

DonR said:


> No. When the headlight of the lead loco in the consist
> is gosing forward the headlight will be on. The headlight of the back-to-back trailing
> loco will be on when the consist is backing. Unfortunately,
> however, both lead loco and rear light of trailing
> ...


Right.That's what CV22 is supposed to do.It allows you to program it so that only the front light works on the lead loco going forward and all other headlights are off on both locos.When going in reverse only the rearmost headlight is on on the trailing unit and all other headlights are off.That is my problem.When CV22 is programmed to a value of 1 on the lead unit and 2 on the trailing unit I still get the result of one headlight on on each unit at all times.


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## CTValleyRR (Jul 26, 2014)

rickbz28 said:


> Right.That's what CV22 is supposed to do.It allows you to program it so that only the front light works on the lead loco going forward and all other headlights are off on both locos.When going in reverse only the rearmost headlight is on on the trailing unit and all other headlights are off.That is my problem.When CV22 is programmed to a value of 1 on the lead unit and 2 on the trailing unit I still get the result of one headlight on on each unit at all times.


Try flipping the "forward" and "reverse" directions on the rear loco, so that "forward" is in same direction as the desired headlight setting, and set both light values to "1".


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

CTValleyRR said:


> Try flipping the "forward" and "reverse" directions on the rear loco, so that "forward" is in same direction as the desired headlight setting, and set both light values to "1".


That was one of my first attempts to solve the problem without any success.Did a decoder reset today on both NCE equipped locos and started all over again with the same results as before.Concentrating on getting these straightened out first and will worry about the Atlas equipped consist and the Digitrax consist later.Watched the video for this on MRVP and all Dana did was program CV22 to 1 on the lead and to 2 on the trailing and it worked correctly for him.Have a call in to Tony"s Train Xchange to see what their suggestions are.


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## JerryH (Nov 18, 2012)

The difference may be in weather the actual consisting is done in the decoders or in the command system. It appears that you are doing it in the decoders. Some systems can handle consisting in different ways to make things easier, different, or for some special feature.


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

JerryH said:


> The difference may be in weather the actual consisting is done in the decoders or in the command system. It appears that you are doing it in the decoders. Some systems can handle consisting in different ways to make things easier, different, or for some special feature.


Yes the consisting is being done in the decoders themselves.I can turn the lights on and off in consist but they don't seem to want to take the CV22 programming like they should.


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## JerryH (Nov 18, 2012)

Can you read back CV22 or are you trusting it to be set while programming?


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

On the lead CV19 reads 14 which is my consist number.CV21 reads 0 and CV22 reads 1. On the traling unit CV19 reads 14,CV21 is 0 and CV22 is 2.Just like they are all supposed to be.


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## JerryH (Nov 18, 2012)

That "should" work then, you would think. Let us know what the experts say if they solve it.


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

JerryH said:


> That "should" work then, you would think. Let us know what the experts say if they solve it.


You are right that should work,but doesn't for some reason.I will definitely update when I get the solution.Thanks for the trying to help.


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## deedub35 (Jan 29, 2014)

Thread revival - was a solution found for this issue? I was experimenting with univeral and advanced consisting last night for a bit. Read a little online last night. Will try again today.


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

Still no solution. Tony's never returned my call and I haven't really had much time to mess with it.Might try resetting both decoders and start over again today.


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## deedub35 (Jan 29, 2014)

I have 2 GP38-2s I'm going to play around with tonight facing opposite directions. Both have Digitrax decoders and I have the zephyr. 

I spent some time speed matching them last night by tinkering with CVs 2, 5, and 6. They are matched as close as they will get.

From what I have been reading I will try the following ...

Loco 1
CV 19 to 38 (consist address)
CV 21 leave at 0 (decoders just have forward/reverse lights no other functions)
CV 22 to 3 (forward/reverse lights controlled by consist address)
CV 57 to 102 (back EMF to remain active when using advanced consisting)

Loco 2
CV 19 to 166 (consist address 38 + 128 because loco is facing the other way)
CV 21 leave at 0
CV 22 to 3
CV 57 to 102

We'll see what happens. I just want the forward/reverse lights to behave the way I want. It's not happening with universal consisting right now.


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## deedub35 (Jan 29, 2014)

So I got it to work.

I started off with the settings in the previous post but no go. I read some more and went with these settings ...

Loco 1
CV 19 to 38 (consist address)
CV 21 leave at 0 (decoders just have forward/reverse lights no other functions)
CV 22 to 1 (forward lights controlled by consist address)
CV 57 to 102 (back EMF to remain active when using advanced consisting)

Loco 2
CV 19 to 166 (consist address 38 + 128 because loco is facing the other way)
CV 21 leave at 0
CV 22 to 2 (reverse lights controlled by consist address)
CV 57 to 102

Lights weren't working the way they should have so I read some more and found the solution.

On the Digitrax Zephyr I changed OpSw 17 from CLOSED to THROWN and then it all went good. When it is CLOSED "automatic advanced decoder assisted consists are disabled".

I even went to one step further and speed matched a third loco that has sound and put that in between for a 3 loco consist. Everything works like a charm - from the top consist address the headlight on the lead loco works as it should - on going forward, the headlight on the last loco works as it should - on going backwards (as it is facing backwards), all other lights are off, and all the sounds and mute work as they should.

A good evening session.


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## rickbz28 (Jan 10, 2016)

Glad to hear you got your consist lighting working correctly.Except for CV 19 and your back emf settings that is exactly what I started with that didn't work for me. I'll give you a run down of the motive power,the decoders used and the settings that finally got it to work.
Locomotives:
Athearn GP60M ex Santa Fe patched to BNSF 142
Athearn GP60B ex Santa Fe patched to BNSF 326
Both equipped with NCE D13SRJ decoders in the Athearn factory 9 pin plug.
MRC Prodigy Advance System with Wireless Add On Throttles.

Lead GP60M 142
CV 19 to 14 consist address
CV 21 to 0
CV 22 to 1
CV 33 to 1
CV 34 to 1

Trail GP60B 326
CV 19 to 14
CV 21 to 0
CV 22 to 1
CV 33 to 2
CV 34 to 2

After resetting both decoders and unsuccessfully programming again to the settings you used I did more reading on ncedcc.com. They showed using CV 33 and 34 for some of the lighting effects and after some trial and error I finally hit on a combination that worked. Shouldn't have been that difficult in my opinion but at least they work correctly now.With those two squared away it's now time to get to work on the two Atlas Dash 8 engines with factory dual mode decoders. Those are not as sophisticated as newer decoders are so it may never work but I'll put in some time and see.


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