Large Scale Central

Battery Powered LGB Mikado?

General Discussion
#1

I think I asked this question on the forum a year or two ago, but here goes again.

I love how well my LGB Mikado runs and its wonderful sound, but it is track powered and it is a pain to have to clean 300 feet of track every time I want to run it. Have any of you converted your Mikado to battery power? Did it run and sound just as well afterward as it did on track power? Did you do the conversion yourself, or is there someone out there who will do it for a price? I just know I’ll screw it up if I try to do it myself, and that is why I didn’t try to do it a couple years ago.

#2

I haven’t converted an LGB Mikado, but I have converted an LGB Mogul. I took the lazy man’s way out though. I put the receiver and sound module in a trailing car (could have put them in the tender) along with the battery.Then I disconnected the engine from the track pickups and ran the “input” wires from the engine to a connector on the rear of the engine, and on to the rear of the tender (second “ran” wouldn’t be required if the electronics and battery were put in the tender)

It runs and sounds just like track power, because the engine doesn’t know the difference!!! I have run this way happily for many many years.

Ed Headington

#3

One small niggle, no constant lighting, or smoke.

Greg

#4

I’ve done 2 of them. 1 was a complete gut with AW and Phoenix.

The other was done with just an AW board, using the loco’s sound and smoke.

I just wired the output from the receiver into the two wires on the back of the tender. You do have to remove the sliders and brushes in the motor block. You will not have “real time” horns, bells, etc. I imagine any receiver would work, providing it had enough amperage.

#5

I would think you could wire the AirWire board to trigger the sound board in the tender, although since I think it uses hall effect sensors to trigger bell and whistle, you might need a small circuit with a transistor. (and of course some more wires from the loco to the tender.

Greg

#6

I did a club member’s LGB Mallet which I use during our narrow gauge railway operations.

A trailing LGB American tender was used to hold the lithium-ion battery and Revolution receiver. Wires from the tender power the locomotive and the front headlight for constant, directional lighting.

Following Stan Cedarleaf’s instructions, wires were later run back from the small LGB circuit board for the horn and bell to the tender so they could be triggered by Revolution throttle.

The locomotive runs and sounds great.

There are articles on our club web site how to add an MU connector to a Mallet and turn the tender into a power and control car.

These articles could be used as a guide to do the Mikado.

#7

Here’s a video of our successfully converted an LGB Sumpter Valley to Battery R/C… It works wonderfully…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhLtDb9xT0A

So glad it worked for you. Paul…

#8

I did one for a friend many years ago. There is lots of room in the loco. I used Airwire and phoenix,both installed in the boiler. Battery,on/off and fuse in the tender. I know this was a very general description but it really is a fairly simple conversion. As for resusing the LGB sound,I don’t know.