I could use some help using a new ESU #54679 smoke generator. There are is no paperwork (not even in German) in the box or even available on ESU’s web site. They say that it hooks up to LokSound or SUSI but I would like to use it with an Airwire G3 decoder. I was hoping to use the G3 decoder terminals 9 and 10. If that can’t work then I see how I can isolate the fan and heater and run “direct smoke” using an axle reed switch to power the fan but I don’t know the voltages recommended for the ESU and I don’t want to smoke it pre-maturely. Any help would be appreciated.

I also have a Harbor Models smoke Generator that would fit into the engine that I could use with this Airwire G3 decoder if that would work. HF says that their unit draws approx. 2 amps at their recommended 12v input voltage and the G3 terminal 9 is rated for 3 amps. I know this big smoker is a power hog but if it would work I could always add a relay to the elite #4 light driver at terminal 8 to turn it off and on from the remote. Any thoughts on that one would also be greatly appreciated.

I have the harbor model smoke unit in my Bman K27 ,the amp draw on full power is less than 1 1/2 amp!

Do you want the smoke to “pulse”?

Are you hooking up chuff contacts to your loco?

Are you using a sound card?

Greg

Hi, Greg As soon as I started this smoke project I went to Greg’s website (very helpful in the past) because I knew you covered many smokers, but this ESU unit is pretty new. I would like it to “pulse”. The engine that it is going into is an Accucraft Mikado EBT. I have installed the Airwire G3 with the Phoenix P8 sound board. I power it with an 18.5 volt, 8400mAh lithium ion battery. The engine came with one speed trigger that is now connected across the trigger terminals (1 and 2) of the P8. I thought of powering the ESU smoker heater directly and but wasn’t sure if I could find a way to pulse the fan and if I could I didn’t know what the max. voltage rating is of the fan motor. I know that the Harbor Models unit rating is 12 volts. I believe that I could hook that one up to the G3 smoke outputs 9 an 10 but I wasn’t sure how to drop the voltage to 12v and I didn’t think that it would pulse. Any ideas? Thanks

Thanks, Manfred. That’s good to know about the Harbor Models (I almost typed Harbor Freight) smoker. Is your K27 running on track power or battery? And is the blower on all the time or is it pulsed separately? On the bench I tried to pulse it. I found that it can work that way but because the blower is a blower and not a fan blade it acts like a flywheel which allows the smoke output to ramp up and down but not really pulse. The unit is rated at 12 volts and at that it puts out an impressive plume. I lowered the voltage down to 8 volts and it still smoked quite well without sputtering. I then cranked it back up to 12 volts and slowly pulsed the blower and that seemed to work rather well. The problem would be to figure out how to get that slower pulse off the engine. The HM unit does sound like an option but I’d really like to get the ESU unit working on it. Especially since I already own it.

I believe the ESU has a logic level input to “pulse” and you can tie it in to the same “trigger” you are using on the Phoenix, you just need the phoenix and the smoke unit triggers each connected to a diode and then to the chuff switch mechanism (assuming it goes to ground).

You will need to see if the ESU will pulse when grounded or it needs a positive trigger, it might be configurable, I was unable to find a manual for it online.

On the harbor models unit, I believe Manfred separated the wires for the fan motor from the heater, the fan motor might need a little “kicker” diode to protect things, and probably draws a bit too much current to wire directly to the chuff switch in the loco.

Greg

Greg, thanks for the info. I’m thinking that without a manual for the ESU I’m s.o.l… I also was unable to find a manual for it and have no way of knowing which pins to use and what voltages it needs. Phoenix does call their P8 pin 1 the “trigger ground” but that’s about as far as I can go with it. It looks like the HF unit will be the way to go. It’s big but it will fit. What size “kicker” diode would you recommend for the motor?

Whoops There I go again. I meant the HM unit.

It might not be as simple as a diode, need to see how much current it draws.

A 3 amp fast (schottky) 100v should be fine, but you may be drawing too much current.

I’d go with the ESU, you will be able to find the information… email them…

also, easier to deal with the low voltage logic input…

the P8 triggers to ground for sure…

just get the info on the ESU, we’ll help you with the hookup.

Greg

There is a manual for the ESU smoke unit online.

It is in German, but does have wiring pictures for ESU, Massoth, and Zimo MX695.

And there is a CV list as this unit can be controlled from the SUSI bus.

Colour | Assignment

Black | GND (ground)
Grey | SUSI DATA
Blue | SUSI CLK
Red | U + (power supply)
Yellow | AUX1 (only for LokSound XL V4.0)
Green | Wheel sensor input

http://www.esu.eu/download/betriebsanleitungen/zubehoer/

ESU SUSI bus settings for smoke unit CV Value Description 900 151 MFG ESU 901 0 Version 902 1 Function key 903 175 Stop temp 904 190 Drive temp 905 210 accel temp 906 180 coast temp 907 30 Stop air 908 80 Drive air 909 120 accel air 910 40 coast air 911 3 Accel threshold 912 3 coast threshold 913 20 Minimum length pulse 914 80 Maximum length pulse 915 50 Trigger length pulse

From the link, I forgot to mention manual to download is rauch…

Thanks Greg and Dan. I’ll see what more I can find out and will let you know.

Mark

Now, with this information provided by Dan, hook your power to the red and black. then try touching the green to ground and see if it pulses the fan…

if it does not, it might only pulse at plus voltage. Clearly the green wire can go to ground, but would want to check max positive voltage… from the diagrams on page 6, you see the output pins on the XL v4.0 decoder the green wire goes to, so you can go to THAT manual and see how that output ranges and you will have your answer for the green wire.

Also note the diesel/steam/zylinderdampf jumper on page 4… my guess the zylinderdampf (cylinder steam) is the setting for enabling the green wire to control the fan…

have to use the 900 range CV’s to program, CV 915 is of interest.

I have provided a bit more complete CV translation below

CV Description Factory value
900 Manufacturer ID 151
901 version number 0
902 function key to turn the smoke generator 1
903 Stop state - temperature 175
904 State Drive - Temperature 190
905 state Acceleration - Temperature 210
906 state Coast - Temperature 180
907 state stop - Fan speed 30
908 state drive - Fan speed 80
909 state Acceleration - Fan speed 120
910 state Coast - Fan speed 40
911 threshold transition Drive <=> Acceleration 3
912 threshold transition Drive <=> Coast 3
913 Minimum duration of a steam burst 20
914 Maximum duration of a steam burst 80
915 duration of the bursts of steam relative to trigger pulses cylinder steam 50

Thanks again Dan and Greg. I’ll dive into it as soon as I can with the info you both provided and will report my results.

On the pulsing, if you look at CV 915, it references duration of the “bursts of steam” and “cylinder steam”, so I do believe that ties into the jumper setting for “cylinder steam”, be sure you try that or I believe the green wire won’t pulse the fan.

Regards, Greg

Ok, here’s where I am so far (thanks again for all the help on this). I have 19.8v from the G3 output terminals where I connected the ESU smoker red to the G3 #10 (+) and the black to #9 (-). To find the input for the green, as you recommended, I went to the LokSound XL V4.0 decoder manual, where the green is connected to Aux 2 which they say runs at about track voltage minus 1.5v. I see also that the yellow is connected to the decoder Aux 1 which runs the same as Aux 1. Page 6 shows only use of the blk, red, green and yellow wires, nothing with the grey or blue. To the ground (-) I tried all combinations of green, intermitant green, yellow, int yellow, same with both green and yel together all with the jumper on zylinderdampf (cylinder steam) and dampf (steam). With all of the combinations usually nothing happened but on all combination sometimes I would get smoke and fan at the same time.So I know that the heater and fan are ok but I have no control. So far as the CV’s go, I can see how they could control the LokSound decoder but as far as I understand it the Airwire G3 output for the smoker is either on or off. Or are you thinking there is a DCC signal sent to the smoker in the green/yellow wires? Since the wiring diagram for the LokSound decoder shows them going to Aux 1 and Aux 2 which are lighting outputs I assumed (we both know what that can do)that there was no signal through them. what do you think?

OK, first I would caution you to NOT “try all combinations”…

Stick to the power and the green…

Now leave power hooked up (straight DC) and then try the green to positive.

(you did set the jumper?)

hopefully you get fan and smoke…

This would be the simplest mode of operation.

But you are maybe getting confused by jumping to the “next” level, where you are using the “smoke output” of the G3 (#9)… that is cool, BUT you now need to turn the smoke on I believe… make sure you understand the operation of the G3…

Also, the “top” level of integration is to use it as a DCC device, connect to the DCC booster outputs of the G3, but then you will not have sync with your chuff switch, or maybe you can if you also hook up the green wire BUT it appears that the green wire needs a positive voltage to spin the fan, and now you need some electronics to convert your chuff switch from going to ground to going to positive.

So, you need to “pick a path” unless you want to learn all about all 3 implemention methods.

The point here is you need to decide a path, and then try the specifics for that path, not just connect wires and see what happens…

Greg

hey, my 3,000th post… do I get a Kewpie doll?

There must be a control chip in the ESU unit as the grey and blue wires are the SUSI bus and I would expect these to be 5 volt signals.

I still do not have mine working on the SUSI bus.

Hey, Dan I played with my ESU for a while longer but had no worthwhile results. I separated the heater and blower wires and was able to get the unit to produce smoke (actually not too bad) but I ended up going with the Harbor Models unit. It is quite large but since I had plenty of room (it went into a 1:20.3 Accucraft EBT 12), and it produces massive amounts of smoke, I decided to use it. I used the Airwire G3 elite #4 driver to power a relay (from Radio Shack…got that just in time). I installed a separate 11.1 v lithium ion battery to power the smoke unit (again I had plenty of room). It looks awesome.