I was hoping some one here coud shed some light on why some of my MTH Proto 1 steamers have puffing smoke while others just have a steady stream of smoke?
Kev
Can't stop working on the railroad!
I admit to knowing nothing about the innards of this particular manufacturer's locomotives. However based upon my knowledge of other model locomotives, it would seem that just about any smoking mechanism is going to involve a piston or bellows that perodically injects air into the smoke chamber to get the puff effect. This is where you would want to start.
It could be the "puffer" itself is not working for some reason. Such a mechanism will either be run directly off of the main drive train, or it will have it's own motor. If it appears to be working then It could be a torn bellows, or an air leak somewhere in the mechanism. It could be something as simple as the air inlet from the puffer into the smoke chamber is clogged up. It should not be that hard to troubleshoot.
I have figured out what is wrong with my brain! On the left side nothing works right, and on the right side there is nothing left!
My Rail-King Big Boy's smoke generator has a miniature motor-driven fan that blows continuously and is obviously not intended to puff.
Bob Nelson
I have some modern Lionel units and they have a fan driven smoke unit that seems to operate by a timed mechanism driven by the wheel speed. They only smoke when the wheels turn.
I must say they smoke much better than any of the post war units that use the old piston setup.
I also have Lionel diesels that smoke steadily even though they use fan driven units too.
MTH has been the industry leader for smoke. Railking PS1 engines usually have a fan driven smoke unit. It does not puff as the smoke is expelled by a fan that blows it out continuously.Higher end Premier MTH locomotives introduced computer controlled fans. On these engines a circuit board pulses the fan to produce a puffing smoke. I thought these models were not introduced until PS2 came out. Maybe your engine is a Premier series with an upgraded smoke control.
All my Steamers from MTH are definitely Rail King models. I did notice that the ones that puff have the striped band on the motor with an eye to read it so I figure this is how it puffs.
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