Review of BLI E7 and Hudson with Upgrade Chip
by Larry Maier
There are four major impressive features Larry talks about that make the upgrade a good investment.
- BEMF and Regulated Throttle Control (RTC)
- Sound of Power which is a load responsive exhaust
- Sound of Power volume control operated by your throttle speed control
- Download capability for other or future software revisions.
QSI has announced an upgrade program for all engines that include QSI decoder/sound units. These include Atlas Gold, Broadway Limited, and Proto 2000 series engines. While the upgrade has many new features and improvements, you may not want to spend the money on an upgrade just to vary the ditch light strobe time or some other subtle function. Since hobby funds are often limited, the real question is whether there is any noticeable improvement in performance or operation after the upgrade on which it is worth spending valuable hobby dollars. In my opinion, the answer to this question is a solid “Yes!”.
As you may be aware, there has been some legal action within the model train industry over the use of back emf (bemf) to control engine speed (for those interested, emf stands for electromotive force and relates to the fact that a spinning motor can also be used as a generator with the generated voltage proportional to motor speed). For several years, Qsi has not incorporated bemf controls because of potential patent litigation. QSI has come up with a new concept that they call Regulated Throttle Control (RTC). This technology allows QSI equipped systems to use the bemf in a manner that results in very prototypical operation. According to QSI, this technology has been available in the DC mode of operation right along, but the change here is that they have figured out how to incorporate it into the DCC operating mode.
I upgraded an early Hudson and an E7 and test ran them to see how they performed with RTC. The short answer is that the low speed performance is excellent. In my mind, the price of the upgrade is completely justified by this improvement alone. Prior to the upgrade, neither unit would run at speed step 1. Increasing the speed step slowly until the unit just started to move resulted in less than ideal low speed movement (this is relative, remember I have seen the RTC in action). After upgrading the software in each engine, I re-ran the low speed test. Both units immediately started to move on speed step 1. No jerk or surge, they just started to move. The overall impression in both cases is simply that the train is moving slowly and smoothly.
The RTC function also does an excellent job of simulating real train momentum. Other speed control techniques simply hold the engine speed at a fixed value. This is actually unrealistic because most train engines don’t have “cruise control” and the momentum of the train will affect the train speed going up and down grades. When an RTC controlled engine starts to climb a grade, there is no change in speed. As more and more of the train enters the grade, RTC starts slowing down the train, simulating the affects of increasing train inertia. As the train slows, the chuff rate of the steam engine (for example) decreases. The decoder can be set so as the inertia load increases, the engine sounds become more labored. I found this simulation of train inertia to be quite convincing. The key factor here is you actually don’t notice the RTC effect occurring because the engine seems to be behaving “normally”.
In order to give a quantitative assessment of the low speed operation, I set up a 36” straight section of my layout as a timed course. I used the same 11 car train on both engines. I clocked the E7 at a scale 1.69 MPH and the Hudson at an even slower 1.02 MPH. This is very impressive low speed operation, particularly since the impression when watching the train go by is that you are trackside and the train is just barely moving. To help calibrate these numbers, the Hudson took almost 3 minutes to move through the 36” speed trap.
The upgrade is very easy to accomplish, and can be done either by the user or by one of a group of authorized upgrade dealers. If you elect to do the upgrade yourself, the first step is to open up your engine and expose the QSI decoder. For both the Hudson and the E7, the memory that is upgraded is sitting directly on the top of the decoder. Refer to the two pictures below to specifically identify the memory that is replaced in the upgrade.
The new memory is ESD sensitive (ESD is the static discharge you may sometimes experience when you shuffle across a carpet and then touch a light switch), so you must take some simple precautions. First, do not remove the memory from its protective package until you are ready to actually install it. Second, make sure that there are no static charges on you by touching the engine chassis, the memory package, and the screw terminal of a light switch (or socket) mounting plate. This will ground you, the engine, and the memory and make sure that you are all at the same electrical potential. Now, remove the old memory from its socket. This is best done using a removal tool (available from your upgrade dealer) that slips into the two open slots in the memory socket. Two tabs on the tool grab underneath the memory chip. You then squeeze the two arms of the tool together. The squeezing action allows the tool to seat on the edge of the socket and the tabs under the chip engage the chip and lift it out. You are now ready to install the new chip. Carefully remove it from its package. Examine the chip carefully. You will see three corners are square, and one corner is chopped off leaving a diagonal edge. Align the diagonal corner with the matching corner of the socket (see pictures for the specific location) and level the chip so it is sitting on top of the socket with all four edges aligned with the socket edges. Gently push straight down on the center of the memory chip until it is seated in the socket. That’s it,… your engine is upgraded. Before replacing the shell, place the upgraded engine on the track, turn on track power, and sent a command to address 3. The engine should give three short signals from the horn or whistle. This indicates that the engine has found the new memory and has recognized the upgrade. Restore the shell and you are ready to go. At this stage, the engine is essentially restored to factory defaults, so you will need to program the engine address that you want and any other configuration data that you desire.
