Folks who have followed my column know that I have long dis-
cussed the use of stall current to safely size decoders. No, I’m
not backing down on my stand there, but let’s look at Mark’s
viewpoint, explained on his web site
Current generation HO and N scale locomotives are far more
efficient than those built as recently as a decade ago. Modern
locos rarely stall above one amp. Many stall well below one
amp. Most operate at a small fraction (1/4 or so) of an amp.
Modern decoders in all sizes can handle at least one amp on
a continuous basis and most have thermal protection to shut
themselves down before the internal temperatures get too high.
9: DecoderPro - CV 29 collects data (orange background)
from several tabs in DecoderPro – but it is the same data
for all decoders.
9
