The light stopped working so I got under the hood and wiggled it and it lit for a bit then went out again. Not sure what to do, what am I looking for? From what I see everything looks ok, nothing broken that I can tell. Thanks
Bruce
Sometimes a filament fails, and then recontacts again when a bulb is wiggled. And then finally fails again soon after. Permanently. You can check that with a VOM. Or maybe more wiggling.
More likely is a bad contact. If wiggling the bulb helps, then that's probably where the bad contact is. If it's a springy piece of metal, like in many bulb sockets, you can sometimes bend it back out for a better contact. Do whatever it takes to improve the contacts.
Ed
Along with what Ed mentions, I have all GP's and SD's yellow box, no RS11's, but I think the light set up would be pretty close in all of them.
See if this matches to what you have. The bulb is held by a brass clip that wraps around it, thats the "-" (neg) side, and there should be a wire solderd to the bottom tip of the bulb, that's the "+" side. Make sure the brass clip is clean, and check to see if the wire is attached to the end.
If all of that is in place, and tracing the wiring back through the harness doesn't reveal any breaks, or loose solder joints, I'd say the bulb is burnt out.
Not sure about a replacement. You'd have to double check the voltage. I don't see any resistors along the way, in any of the locos I have, so maybe it's a 12v. ? incandesent bulb, and something comparable in size can be found.
OR, maybe swap it our with the bulb on the rear, until you find something.
Mike.
My You Tube
If you go to HOSeeker.com, click on product literature/Atlas there is one model of an Atlas RS11 that has a bulb located centrally on the circuit board with 2 light pipes, there is another that has two bulbs. The single bulb model references a diagram and text which is not included. The Atlas bulbs on Ebay don't list the number for the bulbs they are selling.
Atlas has a parts page but a revision of their webpages killed all the relevant links. One model was made in Japan, the other does not say. However a call to them might tell you what kind of bulb you need, if they no longer stock them.
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
i have been messing with the loco for a couple of hours now and have got it working again but I notice that when I had the body off the light would work and when the body was put back on it would not work. It is the version of the bulb in the center of the loco and I bent it into a different position and it seems to be working now. Any thoughts on this?
The wires are only trapped by the long brass wires running along the sides of the plastic board to the ends were the truck pickups slip on. They are either not making contact, or the wire to the bulb are broken inside. Best bet is to just replace it instead of fooling with it. Any similar size 14V bulb will work fine - the original is probably 12V but unless you run mostly slow speed, the 14V bulb will last longer and give a nicer glow. There's nothing special about the bulb, it just has to fit in the space between the two light pipes.
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
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