Blunami - Common Questions Answered

This could be HUGE for model railroading in the future! Let’s talk big picture!! Thanks for the video!

The ease of programming alone is worth it.

14:22 what I like is for my home layout using the phone saves me buying radio throttles so the fascia of the layout presents clean and it’s one less dangling cord and unattractive plug. Your point about offsetting throttle cost is wise and it’s easy to do the math on money saved in throttles. I’m really enjoying learning about these Blunami decoders. I completely failed to realise and appreciate how amazing these are and how much thinking has happened here (I’m already a Tsunami2 fan!).

I'm really enjoying Blunami. I have four engines using Blunami now and plan to upgrade a fifth. All O Scale Deadrail.

Thanks George, great you did take time to answer these questions!

George, good talk! In my opinion, one of the biggest advantages of Blunami is running with battery power (deadrail). I have made it to a few model train meets where I have to drive 3.5 to 4 hours get there. Only to find one or more of the DCC modular club layouts are having a nightmare because something is not allowing the DCC system to work. Nobody is running trains while a few are troubleshooting. I have seen layouts that were down for a whole day. That is except the modeler who has a Blunami equipped loco with battery power. It runs while the "team" is under the layout trying to figure out what went wrong.

I never thought I would be interested in something like this but honestly as easy as it is to program on a phone makes it worth it. That's pretty much the only thing I use the app for is to get the locomotive set up with sound profiles and adjustments and then I just use my DCC system to control it. Allows me to dive more into the world of sounds without having to go crazy with computers and programmers. But like they say if all else fails and your DCC system goes down you could still run your locomotive on a DC lay out with just the app that's pretty damn cool. Well worth the money. I think a lot of people are just trying to avoid this type of stuff and keep it old school, I was one of those guys but trust me this is awesome engineering.

George we got thank you there are lots of us that are running 3 rail O scale and have started putting your boards in our engines. We found this is a great upgrade for our older equipment. It is got better sound quality than MTH and Lionel Legacy. We hope that you see this as an opportunity to take advantage of this market. Most of us have been putting in a bridge a rectifier in to use these boards on our AC powered layouts. Thank you Harry Henning from Henning's Trains

So far I only have one Blunami but I like it very much. It is in a Atlas O RS1 using battery power and I have not had any issues. It is so easy to program the decoder and the changes are very fast.

I'm going to be implementing this decoder in a lionel 3 tail O scale AC-9 locomotive. This I going to be absolutely AMAZING to have for running at train shows. No more using a beat up controller, vying for the legacy base or dealing with lionel or mth's crappy wifi. All I need is a rectifier and I'm in business!

This was very helpful. Thank you

As someone that used to work in the tech industry, I’m sure you guys have gotten much worse questions than some of the ones that you’ve mentioned here! And even some of these make me bang my head on the wall. Folks see a new technology they don’t understand, and think it’s way more complicated than it actually is, or they just start making up stories about it cause they don’t understand it. Takes a lot of patience working in customer service sometimes.

I love the idea, but just curious, is it possible to add your own custom sounds to the decoder.

George, good job on explaining how to transition from your NCE (DCC) throttle to the Blunami App. But I think the video would benefit from continuing to explain how to transition from control via the Blunami App back to your NCE (DCC) throttle. In my experience, I have had to power down the engine in order to transition from the app back to my DCC throttle. That said, I find the Blunami app a much simpler tool by which to program my decoders.

I would love a mode in the app that would allow you to customize and lock the device on the throttle screen. I operate a display at shows that allows kids to run a HO train using a DC throttle mounted on the outside of our layout. The display is 3 loops of track, the DC outer loop for the kids and the inner two loops are DCC. If the app had a mode where I could remove the reverse switch and lock the throttle screen on the device (without access to settings) using a passcode I would be able to mount a tablet to the outside of our display and let the kids run a train with sound for the first time.

so what you are saying is you could bring those 2 loco's over to my place, turn on my NCE system and you could run those 2 trains, and not have to enter them into my system?

You say all you need for the Blunami is track power. Is that ac or DC and how many amps for two ho scale on my small switching layout.

I placed a 4408 in a used mallet I purchased. The two motors run at different speeds. I am sure it is not due to your decoder and more likely aging drives. I cannot find replacement motors. Can I install a second decoder for the second motor and run them double heading to get them to match speeds better?

How do you swap out a Tsunami2 for a Blunami? Is there a table you can access which tells you which one to buy (upgrade too)?

I have 2 g scale dash 9’s each equipped with the 4408 decoder. I’d like to run both engines together in a consist. I have a usa trains tp10 for power supply. How do I run 2 locos together with the app?