so recently I was fixing my lionel ho polar express because the wires that hook up the tender to the engine broke off. I spent forever making sure the wires didnt touch each other and then I had to make sure they didnt come off again. My only remaining problem it to try to get the engine to stop jolting. I have also had one nightmare of a fix with a kato early version sd40-2 its board blew out and I had to skower the internet to fine the replacement because kato discontinued the part. I eventually found one but I havent ordered it. Have any of you guys done repairs on engines that drove you nuts?
GN24Have any of you guys done repairs on engines that drove you nuts?
I don't need anything to drive me nuts...it's already just a short walk.
The worst one for me was doing a "dead rail" installation for a friend who is absolutely dead-set against DCC...I'm pretty sure that he wasn't aware that "dead rail" utilises DCC.I wasn't too difficult to convert his ancient Mantua Pacific into a Hudson and paint it.....
...but trying to cram the decoder board and battery into the Bachmann "long" USRA tender, along with all the wiring for lights and operation was a bit of an ordeal ...
...while the wires from the tender to the motor and lights were merely a minor nuisance...
Despite my recomendation that he replace the open-frame motor with a can motor, he was confident that it wouldn't be necessary....until I informed him that it would likely drain the battery rather quickly.
The real difficulties came when it was time to programme the decoder. I did make some advances, but was quickly overwhelmed by not only the terminology, but also by the "press-this-button/flip that switch, etc., etc.I struggled with this for at least a couple of weeks, with some help from one of my friend's acquaintances, who's seriously invested in dead rail, but I finally suggested that I would deliver the loco, ready to be programmed by his more competent acquaintance.
The only thing more irksome might be the way this Forum makes it difficult to offer a response, as it's well-past the time to upgrade or eliminate this site completely. I've spent almost two hours trying to compose this response.
Wayne
Oh I've had my share of nightmares for sure. My worst was an HOn3 inside frame 2-8-2. It worked when I bought it, but the drivers buckled up and I never managed to get the counterweights to remain at the right quartering. Thank god I had paid a very low price for it. It's sitting on my shelf, waiting for an ultimate attempt to get fixed. My other nightmare is my 2 truck climax (Bachmann), that broke after 60 minutes of running. I have the NWSL replacement gears, but I have not yet been successful installing them. Luckily, I have more victories than failures. My two 18 ton Shays (a Katsumi with seized gears and a Keystone kit) were real hair pullers, but I managed to get both of them working.
The good news is that what doesn't kill you in this hobby makes you stronger!
Simon
Most frustrating repairs in my experience was finding shorts and binds in steam locomotives, dealing with MTH locos with DCC, and taking apart proto 2000 steam (Life like put screws behind smokebox fronts, under hidden firebox panels, inside steam domes...for no reason).
My top three are:
1. replacing one of those snap on drawbars in a proto 2000 berkshire. You literally have to take apart the entire loco to get to the drawbar, then you had to take the spring and hook one end over the plastic drawbar piece, fish it through the hole in the frame (while being tensioned) with a needle, and hook it over a spot in the frame to give the drawbar that centering action. I cant explain it without pictures, but the common repair (which might I mention the PLASTIC drawbar is one of the most common things to break on a proto loco) was needlessly difficult. 2. dealing with zinc pest on brass loco wheels (and gearboxes). Not only will it just destroy the wheel but also its expanding property ruins the insulation on wheels and shorts out the loco. As soon as I see signs of zinc pest I sell that sh!t off instantly. Its irrepairable. 3. I bought a used PFM brass steamer with by far the worst binds Ive ever seen. After hours of diagnosing, I concluded with two MAJOR faults:
a) the rectangular cutout in the frame which is meant to hold the bearings was slightly warped, causing the bearing to sit at a slight angle, not parallel with the other bearing to which the axle sit across, causing a LOT of resistance in the axle's ability to spin. b) for some reason, no matter how well I would try to quarter the engine, it would JUST not work! Turns out, the rods were replaced with some presumably made for a different loco or manufacturer. With rods that were just SLIGHTLY too short (and holes too big causing some play), it would jam the wheels up completely. Anyways enough rambling but I've had my fair share of frustration.
Charles
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Modeling the PRR & NYC in HO
Youtube Channel: www.youtube.com/@trainman440
Instagram (where I share projects!): https://www.instagram.com/trainman440
First off dead rail dose not have to be DCC. Next item, brass shays, a real pain even in DC.
My most frustrating ones: A Athearn Genesis SD60M that had a defective board. The style got changed, so the part number changed. The one I got fits only one way, and it's backwards.... So the locomotive will run backwards. Even when you reverse the motor polarity. Lights are also flipped, so front comes on when the unit is backing up, and vise versa.
A BLI 2-8-2 Mikado, where the illadvised reed switch was used as a chuff sensor.... It's blown 3 times, and now she sits in my "round too it" area. This time I wil replace all the electronics with a new sound decoder with a proper chuff sensor.
Ricky W.
HO scale Proto-freelancer.
My Railroad rules:
1: It's my railroad, my rules.
2: It's for having fun and enjoyment.
3: Any objections, consult above rules.
My gripe is finding simple instructions for installing the Keep Alives for my BLI K-4 Pacific and SW7 switcher. I've googled several times and invariably I find an explanation for determining which wire goes where and they might as well be written in Chinese because they use terms I am unfamiliar with.
www.members.optusnet.com.au/mainnorth/alive.htm
I wish I could find instructions for dummies that explain in a simple and fool proof way which wire goes where. If I have to guess, I'm afraid I'll fry my decoder. I've done that more than once and with sound decoders, that gets expensive in a hurry. I found this which tells about somebody who did what I am afraid of doing.
BLI Keep Alive Coming Soon (trainorders.com)
I did find the following thread from 2016 which deals with the same problem I have with my switchers and if it works out, I might not need to install the Keep Alive.
BLI/Paragon HO SW7 - Model Railroader Magazine - Model Railroading, Model Trains, Reviews, Track Plans, and Forums
rrebellFirst off dead rail dose not have to be DCC.
Maybe not, but the conversion kit that my friend bought is for DCC and wireless control.I think that his goal is to avoid track cleaning, but it seems like a lot of expense (over $400.00) to avoid a relatively simple task.
doctorwayne The only thing more irksome might be the way this Forum makes it difficult to offer a response, as it's well-past the time to upgrade or eliminate this site completely. I've spent almost two hours trying to compose this response.
Rich
Alton Junction
I've got a motor from a recent-release Atlas GP38 that needs to have one of the motor leads replaced (one on the bottom in the pic).
With most other motors, you can at least "get to" the connection point with the motor to re-solder the new wire in.
But not on this motor. There seems to be no way to remove the plastic "collar", which as far as I can tell is a single plastic piece, with the flywheel pressed on to hold everything in place.
It might be possible to get some kind of "puller" and pull off the flywheel, remove the collar, and do the repair that way. More than I'm going to do.
So this engine looks like it's doomed to sit in my "out of service" box forever...
richhotrainWayne, what is occurring to make the posting of a reply so difficult and time consuming for you?
I am not sure this behavior, which I don't observe when using a 'normal' browser with the forums, will be fixed in stage 3. It would be nice if it were. I note that Quora quietly keeps an 'undo buffer' of everything you type so that regardless of the rest of the squirrely interface you don't lose anything you've typed -- I would like to see this as an option for text composition.
I actually have not had any very difficult repairs on HO scale locomotives.
For two decades I ran my layouts with only four locomotives. Right before the most recent layout came down, my Spectrum 2-8-0 was damaged and will not run now. I have not tried to repair it yet.
Four locomotives running fine for 20 years is a pretty good track record.
-Kevin
Living the dream.
The one I had that drove me the craziest was an Athearn BB SD40-2. For the longest time, I could the bare drive (no shell) to run just fine. But the moment I put the shell on it, it would throw the overload on my power pack. After a bit of grumbling (I don't use foul langauge.) and help from these same Forums, I found that the light bracket was getting pushed down in such a way that it was shorting out to the truck pickups. What I finally did was to put a thin (.010" or .020" thick) piece of styrene on the back of the bracket to insulate it when it compresses down. That solved the problem. (Not that the engine gets used real often. For my era, my prototype railroad only had a few of them.)
Mentioning Forum grumbles, mine is a confusing one. The only device that I can log in with is my tablet and only in the Chrome browser. Tried doing it on my phone and the house desktop. Both hang on the login screen. I even tried installing Chrome on the desktop. Still didn't work. Annoying but workable.
Overmod richhotrain Wayne, what is occurring to make the posting of a reply so difficult and time consuming for you? If it's like what happens to me... he types a few paragraphs and the site randomly 'reloads' and destroys everything he has typed without warning. At times I have less than 5 minutes between these and have to type paragraph by paragraph, going back into 'edit post' repeatedly. (This is its own pain as you can't see the original post when editing yours...)
richhotrain Wayne, what is occurring to make the posting of a reply so difficult and time consuming for you?
If it's like what happens to me... he types a few paragraphs and the site randomly 'reloads' and destroys everything he has typed without warning. At times I have less than 5 minutes between these and have to type paragraph by paragraph, going back into 'edit post' repeatedly. (This is its own pain as you can't see the original post when editing yours...)
This software does not save "drafts". You can lose 10 minutes of keystrokes in an instant and without warning.
Overmod I am not sure this behavior, which I don't observe when using a 'normal' browser with the forums, will be fixed in stage 3. It would be nice if it were. I note that Quora quietly keeps an 'undo buffer' of everything you type so that regardless of the rest of the squirrely interface you don't lose anything you've typed -- I would like to see this as an option for text composition.
I can't say that I've had any repairs that were incredibly frustrating, but I've had a few that were irritating at least.
I've been working on a Broadway Limited UP 4-8-2 that was getting a decoder upgrade from Paragon to TCS. The smoke unit in that one would run its fan despite both the CV and the physical switch under the cab being in 'off' positions and it would whine with every quarter turn of the wheel, so I ended up ripping the thing out and putting an iPhone speaker where the smoke unit was. Trying to get the boiler weight out without destroying the shell was also a challenge.
Then it was figuring out the wiring of the BLI connection so I could just wire up a decoder buddy in the tender. This took some hunting on the internet for a diagram to tell me what the heck the wires were.
Then the LED would flicker horribly or turn off completely, so I ended up removing the small PC board and it's mounted LED and hard wiring in a fresh LED, set into a styrene rod that was glued to the back of the smokebox door - no more flickering LED. This flickering also happens on my BLI 4-12-2, so that will have to be addressed once that decoder also gets ripped out.
Then I come to find out that despite the smoothness of performance, the TCS decoder's intense BEMF algorithim causes 3-pole motors to buzz, and BLI used 3-poles in this Paragon2 model (and buzz it did!), so the new 21-pin WOWSound decoder I bought for it is now going into a different model and the 4-8-2 will either get a Tsunami2 or a Loksound, decoders were I can actually adjust the BEMF intensity (that being said, I really like TCS otherwise). I tried it with a Tsunami2 and it was very quiet and smooth with no adjusting, so I may go with one of those.
So it's just one thing after another. Once I think I'm almost done, I have to stop and order another something to continue or open it back up to make an adjustment. I actually enjoy the wiring and setting up locomotives and figuring out speaker arrangements, it's like a little electronic puzzle, but this 4-8-2 has just been 'one more thing' for a few weeks, and I'd like to move on to another!
The Backshops - A blog dedicated to modeling projects
OvermodIf it's like what happens to me... he types a few paragraphs and the site randomly 'reloads' and destroys everything he has typed without warning. At times I have less than 5 minutes between these and have to type paragraph by paragraph, going back into 'edit post' repeatedly. (This is its own pain as you can't see the original post when editing yours...)
I've been on the forum for several years, using two different browsers and a different computer, and I've never had this happen, even once.
I wonder what the difference may be?
York1 John
If I plan on doing a rather lengthy post..i will type it in Word or other similar program
then whens it ready to post here...copy, past , post
dbduckIf I plan on doing a rather lengthy post..I will type it in Word or other similar program
It can be clunky to cut and paste either from Notepad or some other iOS app that saves and formats text: I think very few people use small-factor devices for serious text entry, let alone word-processing editing.
If Wayne is using a computer and having this problem... he might need a different browser, or ISP, or have some wack configuration setting for page refresh.
That pretty-much sums it up. However, I'm also experiencing delays on photobucket, when hunting for photos to illustrate a topic.If that site doesn't improve by my next renewal date in August, I'll be closing-up shop there, and then there will be little need to post here, either.
Athearn Genesis Mikado from 1999! Such a beautifully made loco, runs as quiet and smooth as silk. But the repairs needed new out of the box were infamous. Flimsy internal wiring that broke almost immediately, that stiff umbilical sleeve, more weight needed everywhere, boiler removal a tricky nightmare, and then the driveshaft coupling snapped on mine--luckily Athearn supplied me a new one at no cost. Can't complain really, the repair experience was invaluable. BTW there are numerous posts on the forum and the web about the repairs needed, me included. All the time I put into this loco was well worth it, it's a gorgeous machine. -Rob
Mister Mikado Athearn Genesis Mikado from 1999! Such a beautifully made loco, runs as quiet and smooth as silk. But the repairs needed new out of the box were infamous. Flimsy internal wiring that broke almost immediately, that stiff umbilical sleeve, more weight needed everywhere, boiler removal a tricky nightmare, and then the driveshaft coupling snapped on mine--luckily Athearn supplied me a new one at no cost. Can't complain really, the repair experience was invaluable. BTW there are numerous posts on the forum and the web about the repairs needed, me included. All the time I put into this loco was well worth it, it's a gorgeous machine. -Rob
I had my Genesis Mikado sitting on the shelf for about 15 years before I finally got around to putting in a WOW Sound decoder. Mine was undecorated and required the assembly of the handgrab all the way around the boiler. For some reason I didn't want to take that on but it turned out to be much easier than I thought. Mine runs well although I don't like some of the factory defaults on the decoder and have adjusted several of the CVs. I'm not a fan of momentum and would rather use my touch on the throttle to gradually start and stop my trains. I haven't run into any of the problems you mentioned but I haven't been running the loco for very long so maybe they will crop up.
Overmod It can be clunky to cut and paste either from Notepad or some other iOS app that saves and formats text:
It can be clunky to cut and paste either from Notepad or some other iOS app that saves and formats text:
doctorwayne However, I'm also experiencing delays on photobucket, when hunting for photos to illustrate a topic. If that site doesn't improve by my next renewal date in August, I'll be closing-up shop there, and then there will be little need to post here, either. Wayne
However, I'm also experiencing delays on photobucket, when hunting for photos to illustrate a topic.
If that site doesn't improve by my next renewal date in August, I'll be closing-up shop there, and then there will be little need to post here, either.
On the matter of leaving this forum, I have begged you countless times not to do that. You are one of the pillars of stability on this slowly disintegrating forum. So, stop it.
I changed to Fickr eons ago and never regretted it. About our old threads, both Google and the search function on this site are pretty bad at finding them, so why not just go on a fresh start with a new hosting site for the pictures, and new contributions as new posts come in. This forum would be 10 notches lower without doc Wayne...
imgur.com always works for me and it's free. The forums don't like their pasting codes so I just back click on the image I uploaded and pick "copy image link" then the forum insert image box accepts that. Also I make the image 800 X 600. -Rob
Here's my experence with a mechanical issue:
Two months ago, I ordered an Athearn GP60B #347 "Warbonnet" on ebay. It arrived in four days. I then took #347 and two Athearn Genesis SD75M's (226 & 207) to one of our locomotive camps to make sure there were no bugs and each locomotive ran as intented. The two SD75M's were fine, but when i tried consisting #347 behind them, it started groaning in forward. I took it home that night and dissassebled it the following day to find the issue, I realized that the front truck was somehow stiff and power was not being driven to it. this resulted in me carefully removing the truck from the locomotive/taking the truck apart serveral times/rearranging the gears, but the wheels reamined stuck and only started to move if I pushed down really hard on it. I put the broken truck aside and carfully boxed up the locomotive. Later I found a a pair of replacement Athearn Silver Bloomberg Truck sets for GP60' on ebay which I purchased. The new set will replace the other truck. I may even remove the driveshafts, reattach the truck and turn #347 into a dummy.
It seems this locomotive had a potential flaw that went undetected by the factory or the previous owner did something to it.