motor comes loose again

[overall]

You might remember I had trouble with a can motor coming loose on a K-line E 8. Well it happened again, but this time to my Lionel NYC SD-80 MAC. Can anybody tell me what is the deal with motors coming loose in these modern engines? This particular engine had performed well up until recently. It began to make the squeling noise. I finally turned it upside down and tried turning the wheels on the lead truck with my fingers. They did turn which told me that the motor was loose on that truck. Are the mounting screws not tightened down to begin with? Is there some vibration that backs those screws out? Are there torgue forces at work trying to back those screws out?The engine was a very smooth runner. I should note that I have other brands with can motors that have not experienced this problem. My MTH, Williams and Weaver products have yet to display this problem. While we are on this subject, I would like to suggest that someone bring out a comprehensive book about these new chinese import engines with exploded detailed drawings and detailed maintenance instructions. I have the K Line book about post war trains and another book about the trains made during the LTI era, but there is not to my knowledge a book like that about the trains being sold today. Maybe Kalmbach would take this on as a project?It takes a lot of guts to take screw driver in hand and tear into a $300.00 piece of equipment with nothing at all to go by.
Oh well, I took the engine back to the dealer where I bought it to get this problem resolved.

Thanks for lettong me vent.

George

George

[3railguy]

Is there lock washers on the fasteners? Add those if not. RC car guys use Locktite Blue compound that you coat on the threads. RC shops sell a brand like it specifically for small fastners. Locktight Blue is medium strength that allows you to remove fastners with screwdrivers or wrenches. I've even used it to hold fastners in partially stripped threaded holes and it works. Stay away from Locktight Red. That's the strong stuff requires heat to remove the fastner.

[MartyE]

This is a common problem for these types of motors. I had an SD90 and SD80 mac as well as a SD40-2 all have the same issue. What I did was get a little clear finger nail polish on the threads and it holds quite nicely. Lionel know this is a problem. I and another gentleman mentioned it to Todd Wagner a couple years back.

BTW Lionel does have pdf files of a lot of their equipment on line. Drawings are pretty decent.

[daan]

There is only one solution to get it right, remove the motor, clean the threats of any grease with degreaser and use locktite (or nailpolish, second hardening glue, works the same) and fasten the screws. Every can motor has this problem, the threats are made into the can and its only a few mm thick. So your engine is held in place on 2 holes with probably 2 or 3 threats for the screw to hold. When driving at one speed in one direction, nothing is wrong. When shunting, braking, derailments etc, so every time the engine has a change of speed, the weight of the train puts it's energy mostly on these tiny screwholes. You won't have a big problem when the wheels can put their energy in turning the motor, but in the most modern drivetrains a wormwheel is used, which normally only works when the motor drives the wheels and not the other way round. (Some Lionel postwar engines also have worms in it, but they have multiple windings and allow the wheels to turn the motor.)
Because of the sudden blocking of the drivetrain the energy pushes against the worm and tries to move the motor down or up, which has to be blocked by those tiny screwholes. They therefor bend a bit and the screw gets loose.
The solution is a multiple threaded wormwheel, allowing both way's turning of the motor, flywheels or a bigger and better enginemounting. In the meantime help yourself with locktite..

[overall]

Thanks to everyone for the replies. I took the engine back to the dealer this time so I hope they use the nail poli***o hold the motor down as all of you have said. I had not thought of the Lionel PDF files. That is a good idea and I will explore that further. I hesitate to go into this new equipment. I'm afraid I will mess up some of the electronics and end up with more problems. I guess I need to start doing it more and get some experience at it.

George

[daan]

start with easy things, like all of it there is a lot of murphy's law involved, specially if you take apart an expensive engine..

[3railguy]

It's them sloppy Chinees tolerances. I learned this last night installing new wheel bearings on my real life pick-up truck. One of the races would not slide on the spindle properly. I miced the inside diameter and it was like .0025 smaller than the race for the other spindle. The bearings were stamped "made in China".

[Anonymous]

Maybe the motors want to leave you! They want to make dummys out of the locos.[:D][;)]