Hello
I have this Paragon 2 Hybrid Dreyfus 4-6-4. And when it's front 2 driving wheels hit the isolated frog, it stops. I have a Digitrax system and it usually beeps when it shorts but it doesn't when this happens. I have Shinohara #8 Code 83 with insulated frogs This is the only engine that does it. No other BLI that I have does it nor does any other brand engines for that matter. Once the front driving wheels touch, it stops. I then push it slowly forward and as soon as the FRONT 2 DRIVING wheels pass the frog it starts up again. I also checked and the wheels are in gauge. As I said before If the track was not properly lined right, an engine would enter the turnout and the driving wheels would touch the frog and the Digitrax would encounter the short. When this happens the track is still live. If the engine is going fast enough, it will stop and then start back up again. The engine kind of reboots itself then continues. I hope the problem is with the engine and not the track because no other engine does this. If the problem is the track, would anyone be interested in a slightly used Paragon 2 Dreyfus?
Joe C
Joe C,
Sounds to me that the tender,is not picking up power from the rails,loose plug,or wires in the tender,somewhere..
Cheers,
Frank
I have the exact same thing on a BLI pacific I just got., however it only happens on one Atlas #6 when going forward and another Atlas #6 when backing up. E mailed BLI and they were not a lot of help. As my loco has no problem on the other 34 atlas #6's, i believe it is a combo of the loco and those two turnouts. still fooling around with it, no positive solution yet.
My bet is that this one loco is unhappy with your track at that spot. When all else if just peachy, and you get a new loco that for some reason doesn't make it around your main where the other 16 locos do, then it's the loco, but also the track. Something about how it rides on this section causes the power to go intermittent. I suspect that one too many wheels gets lifted for a bit, you nudge it along, and the one needed wheel/wiper combo finds power again...it restarts and off it goes.
If you were to wet any glued ballast, let it soften, then run the loco in the normal manner until it stalls, then place a small needle file or something under the rails in a several places and nudge it up , or use a bamboo skewer to press down on one rail starting behind the tender and gingerly working your way under it and on up toward the drivers, you may find the loco sputtering back to life. That will be proof of my theory.
The trick then is to fix the defect with as little adjustment of the rail height as it takes to make the loco work without compromising it for one or more of the others. So far, that nightmare has never happened to me, but I have had to redo or improve my tracks for a new loco plenty of times. I have never failed once I set about to do it.
Crandell