# Manual Notching



## zr1rob (May 27, 2020)

to clarify, on American diesels from the beginning to maybe even now, there are 8 positions for the throttle. The sound of the engine when the throttle is moved to one position from another is distinct stepwise loudness increase/decrease.

I use RailPro and mostly run diesels. My trains are long, up to 30 cars with 3% grades - I love watching real and models show off their power to get the trains over the grade. 

RailPro has great sounds incorporated in their control modules. But the default is Automatic Notching. Thus, the locos only will provide sounds equivalent to the throttle position pre programmed, and I never heard the sound of a diesel in Run 8 because the throttle rarely gets above 30%, so it sounds like it's in Run 3 even though the real equivalent would be a very loud Run8. 

So I tried the Manual Notching setting, and it means you actually have to up/down select the Notch setting you want, even though the throttle is moved up or down as before. What a difference. With a 2.5" speaker cranked up all the way in double headed SD45's the sound is incredible in Run8. You can hear the pounding engine and screaming generator sounds while the train is crawling up grade. Try it yourself.


----------

