By Peter De Keles

Author  Bio A $250 sound card comes with high expectations. So how would you feel about a $10 system for your diesel? Read about what was good enough for me.

When you spend a chunk of change on a Phoenix sound card, your expectations are deservedly high. And by all of the comments I have seen, you get a very good sound system for your Motive Power. Those who have spent less money on other systems sometimes express disappointment. What would you expect from a $10 sound system? Not much? Well, read about my project and see if $10 fills your sound needs.

My Aristo-Craft SD45 has become a test bed for my different projects. Revolution, ditch lights and now a sound system. Not having any money in the budget for a sound card I decided to use what I had. The SD45 has a speaker built-in and I found a 2GB mp3 player at Big Lots for $5.

After gaining access to the inside, the first step was to take the wires for the speaker and extend them to the top access panel of the SD45. It's just a matter of adding wires or removing the current wires and solder new, longer ones to the speaker.

I ran the wires up through a hole that I created just above the words "Sound Volume". If you push on that area, you will feel the hole that is already there. I ran an Xacto knife around the hole edge to remove the thin plastic covering.

You now need to add a 1/8" stereo plug to the wires. In my electrical box I have extra plugs. The cost of buying a plug is part of the $10 budget. Strip the ends and since we are only using one speaker, you can put the left and right wires together and connect them to the red speaker wire. The ground wire goes to the black speaker wire.

The mp3 player I found has the memory built in and is recharged by plugging it into USB port on your computer. There are mp3 players that use batteries but they may not fit inside the hatch.

As far as installation that's it. You are now free to add whatever sounds you would like to your player. I downloaded various sounds from different websites. There are many free sites, so unless you are looking for a specific sound; you won't need to spend any money on them.

From the various sounds I found, I mixed them all into one file. There are 6 different tracks mixed down to one . When you listen to the sound on your computer it may seem loud. Outside, combining the sound with the ambient outdoor noise, the noise from the electrical motors, car wheel noise and the single, unpowered speaker of your engine, it is a very subdued sound.

I made 2 movies for you to watch and listen. The first one is of various run-bys; the second one is an on-board ride behind my SD45. See what you think. The videos are also a little teaser for my article on the ditch light installation using the Velleman kit.

$10 sound system

Enjoyed your article and videos very much. Your directions were simple and to the point for those of us with limited abilities with sound cards, etc. Gary Tebo

Gary Tebo - 04/13/2012 - 14:39

Sound System

Peter, Not bad for $10. I really liked your railroad. Probably the only way I will ever see it. Looks great. Thanks, Noel

Noel Widdifield - 04/13/2012 - 15:13

Video

Peter, Great looking and great idea. Thanks, Gary

Gary Condry - 04/13/2012 - 19:07

mp3 sound

Would I to know how the sound was activated ? As looking at the video , looks as if the player was just turned on and left running

Raymond - 04/13/2012 - 22:20

Sound mixing

Peter, how about some more info on web sites and how you mixed the sound clips. Thanks John

John B Pedersen - 04/14/2012 - 19:01

Sound

Yes the player is turned on and runs until I'm done. It never plays the same sound at the same place on the layout so its very random. John, I will make a list of the web sites I found the sounds at. I used Sony Vegas to mix the sounds. It's a high end program. Let me investigate some Freeware or Shareware options.

Peter De Keles - 04/16/2012 - 08:36

$10 Sound

Very ingenious. It sounds good. Your railroad looks good too.

Bill Ness - 04/16/2012 - 13:48

Sound

Thanks Peter, will look forward to it, John

John B Pedersen - 04/16/2012 - 17:51

Thanks

That'd be a great option for an Eggliner!

Karen Darling - 04/20/2012 - 13:24

Sound

Thanks for sharing that Peter, what a great idea. I could get sound in a whole fleet of locos relatively quickly then maybe upgrade one or two to an expensive controllable sound card for activating random whistles and stuff for added realism. Your railroad looks good too!

Jerry Madsen - 04/20/2012 - 19:17

sound

Some info on wed sites for sounds would be great

Rick Bostaph - 04/21/2012 - 08:55

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