TTS decoder losing sound

[ColinB]

I know nobody is going to be ablt to fix this but I thought I would put a post in just in case someone else has the same issue. 

I have a HST TTS decoder that was fitted to my HST dummy loco. All it is doing is supplying sound and lights. The loco TTS decoder failed on a hot day in the summer and I have been waiting for the mail from Hornby to send it back for repair. Anyway I haven't run the HST much since then. So I got it out on Friday and noticed the dummy had suddenly lost its sound, still does the lights. So I did the normal things checked speaker, changed speaker, rewired header, rewired speaker. So today I decided to have a play on the tester.

Would you believe it, initially no sound at all, if I turn off the DCC and then then it back on (pressing the error key on an Elite), one in 3 or so goes the sound works. Turn off the DCC and turn it on, sound disappears. Do it several times and occasionally the sound starts working and continues to work as long as I don't touch the "Error" key. Obviously this is not right and it is going to be going on a holiday to sunny Margate or Canterbury, probably when I get the mail to send its friend back. As it is on the tester I also checked that having no motor could cause an issue, but the motor works perfectly OK.

[96RAF]

Classic case Colin of needing to reset the TTS decoder.

Try that and see what effect.

[ColinB]

Yes, I tried that first. It seems to be a powerup issue, generally every 3rd or 4th time it works. I suspect one of those capacitors is not working properly, but who knows. It is also pretty distorted, but it could have always been like that, when you have two of them going, one drowns out the other. The thing that really concerns me is it was working ok  when I last used it about 2 months ago, that is why I have been checking all my other ones. Anyway, raised it with Hornby when I gave them a gentle reminder that I was still waiting for the loco one to be fixed (they gave me a return number in June, but told me to wait).It is probably that lead free solder, it is renowned for having bad joints, I know Ford had a ton of issues when they first used it in Focus instrument clusters.