Solderign flexible wire to each of those little bushings should work. The issue I've heard is that the palstic part of the truck needs to be filed down a bit because the bushings end up sitting on plastic and not touching the metal sideframe pieces. That's my next step, sicne it still is a little cranky - but that will come later, I picked up another one on eBay for $20 in a road name I didn;t want and swapped the shells, the second one runs perfectly without Any extra wires. Definitely some QC issues with those. I'm going to try the filing idea on the other chassis and if it runs as good as the other one I'll repaint that shell.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
I tried all that stuff and still had problems , darn thing would just stop . lights on , but would stop for a second or so, then take off again. Flnally sent it back the Athearn and they replaced everything except the shell . It now runs great. Someone here posted the same deal and that there was a problem with some RS3's. Just thought
Hal
rrinker Plug into the 9 pin connector - all done. No need to modify anything. Although mine had poor pickup and I replaced the wires from the trucks and also added a wire on the side that transfers power through the bolster to make it MUCH more reliable. --Randy
Plug into the 9 pin connector - all done. No need to modify anything. Although mine had poor pickup and I replaced the wires from the trucks and also added a wire on the side that transfers power through the bolster to make it MUCH more reliable.
I also hard wired the trucks and soldered the connections to the light board and cleaned up the paint from the sideframes where the axle bushings rest. It does make a BIG difference. I'm still not happy with the fit of the square axle bushings in the side frames. The left and right frames seem to be spread too far apart and allow the bushing to slip out of the slot. I tried bending the frames inward, but they seem a bit too springy for this to work. I came up with the bright idea of adding a couple of KD fiber washers to shim the bushings towards the axle end, but when I went to reassemble the truck I realized that the washers were of too large a radius. So I'm back at the drawing board. My next idea is to use a small piece of 22 gauge solid wire and wrap it around the axle, maybe soldering it to the bushing to keep it in place. We'll see how it goes.
cacole As long as you don't remove the Athearn light board from the model there is no reason to change the bulbs, since they are 1.5 Volt types with adequate resistors and diodes on the board to regulate their voltage and current. Adding a decoder to an Athearn quick plug still uses the Athearn light board.
As long as you don't remove the Athearn light board from the model there is no reason to change the bulbs, since they are 1.5 Volt types with adequate resistors and diodes on the board to regulate their voltage and current.
Adding a decoder to an Athearn quick plug still uses the Athearn light board.
Thanks - this is just what I needed to hear!
I have a Athearn RS3 , ATH94123, which is a labeled as a RTR unit. The box says DCC Quick Plug equipped. I just plugged a TCS 9 pin decoder into the socket and everything including the lights works just fine. It looks like according to the Athearn web site the RS3's from 2005 on have this Quick Plug.
Hope this helps
Quick question for the group - Should I worry about swirching out the Athearn light bulbs if I upgrade the RTR RS-3 to DCC? I don't want to melt the shell, but I don't know if, since the model is "DCC Ready", Athearn had the foresight to install low voltage incandescents. If there is no need to worry, I'll move along to my next project and leave well enough alone.
Thanks
EDIT - I should mention that I am keeping the light board and plugging in a 9 PIN Digitrax DH163