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Centralia/Intermountain coach lighting problems

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  • Member since
    July 2003
  • From: Sierra Vista, Arizona
  • 13,757 posts
Posted by cacole on Tuesday, July 27, 2010 5:32 PM

Use a stronger magnet.  Sometimes those magnetic wands are too weak.  Keep a couple of spare refrigerator magnets handy.

  • Member since
    March 2009
  • 802 posts
Posted by rjake4454 on Tuesday, July 27, 2010 10:26 AM

rrinker

 Can you remove the roof to look at the lighting circuit? If it uses a reed switch it can be very picky about the exact orientation of the magnet - the QSI decoders with the reed switch reset act like this too. If you bring the magnet near with the roof off so you cna see the reed switch (a glass oval with a pair of leaf contacts in it) you can see the leaves come together or move apart when the magnet is properly aligned. Of course after a 4 foot fall it might be shattered and no longer workable, but probbaly not. The circuit is probably "close the contacts once, lights on, close them again, lights off" and the fall banged them together so the lights went on and now you're back to the same position as before, the magnet is not activating the contacts so it won't turn off.

                               --Randy

 

Thanks, that seems plausible. Tonight I will see how to take the roof off. Unfortunately the instructions with the car are pretty terrible. They tell you how to assemble the magnetic wand, and thats about it. The Kato cars instructions were pretty clear on how to remove the roof, hopefully the intermountain ones work by the same mechanism.

  • Member since
    February 2002
  • From: Reading, PA
  • 30,002 posts
Posted by rrinker on Tuesday, July 27, 2010 8:06 AM

 Can you remove the roof to look at the lighting circuit? If it uses a reed switch it can be very picky about the exact orientation of the magnet - the QSI decoders with the reed switch reset act like this too. If you bring the magnet near with the roof off so you cna see the reed switch (a glass oval with a pair of leaf contacts in it) you can see the leaves come together or move apart when the magnet is properly aligned. Of course after a 4 foot fall it might be shattered and no longer workable, but probbaly not. The circuit is probably "close the contacts once, lights on, close them again, lights off" and the fall banged them together so the lights went on and now you're back to the same position as before, the magnet is not activating the contacts so it won't turn off.

                               --Randy

 


Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's

 

Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.

  • Member since
    March 2009
  • 802 posts
Posted by rjake4454 on Monday, July 26, 2010 8:22 PM

Strangest twist of luck, my brother's cat knocked the car off the table, it took a fall of about 4 ft. When my brother picked up the car (luckily not a scratch or nick on it), he noticed the LED is on. But now it won't turn off when I put the wand over it...

I'm very happy with how the light looks, its a subtle prototypical glow, but I guess the battery won't last long now..

  • Member since
    March 2009
  • 802 posts
Centralia/Intermountain coach lighting problems
Posted by rjake4454 on Monday, July 26, 2010 6:55 PM

I just bought one of these n scale beauties today and assembled the wand as shown in the instructions. I was expecting this to be as simple as operating Rapido cars in HO, but no matter how many times I wave the wand's magnet over the part of the coah as indicated, the light will not turn on. I pulled out the plastic safety, insulating strip as instructed.

What am I doing wrong?Confused

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