Glad you found the problem. To bad you had a problem.

Oh, also what ACY wrote. It is to broad.

Quote from: incognito on January 18, 2011, 08:53:13 PM
Thank you very much.  I have never cleaned a loco before.  Can I do the same for the cars?  they don't slip along the track but roll only 15" or so before stopping.
My other rolling stock zips along.

I would make sure that there are no hair or lint wrapped around the axles or bits of debris in the gears of the power car or engines. It does not take much to slow down performance. As ACY said a good cleaning and lubing should also be done.

Good luck and have fun.
Ken

I know that some Atlas and Bachmann Spectrum engines come with decoders installed. Most of the others have to have a separately bought decoder put in them. You will just need to look on line to find which engines a retailer has in stock that have a decoder in them.

I can not give you any brands or rail roads names as what a retailer has in stock will very from week to week. My self I have UP, Missouri Pacific and Southern Pacific.

Some of mine came with decoders and others I had to buy the decoder and install it my self.
I have N-scale, but for all practical purposes the engines are the same. Of my engines the KATO are the easiest to install decoders in. I have no Bachmann at this time, but a 44 ton switcher may very well be in my future as a switcher at the mine site. Even though they were a little before my modeling era I only have good about them. As well as the prices are very reasonable.

Good luck and have fun.

 Does reprogramming them also mean setting them back to the factory settings first? I find that I must do this when I have had the same thing happen. It is setting cv8 to #8 on my Digitrax system, but I believe this cv should be the same.

I then reprogram the engine number and any of the other cv settings that I had. I write these down for all of my engines as I do them so I redo them.

Jim,
I believe you have come up with the most likely reasons why these things happen here and in other forums.
It is a little bit discerning when I have gone back to reread a post that I thought had some points of interest and found it gone.

As you can see there are many answers to even simple questions.

My take on this subject is that if you are going to use a Bright Boy then you might as well use some 800 grit or finer sand paper. You must still use the rubbing alcohol to clean off the loose stuff that the paper loosened. The alcohol may be enough on its own though. so do it first as the sand paper or BB is only for those places that have something stuck that still causes stalling at that point. You do not need to press very hard as you only want to remove gunk, not track.

For the wheels I put a piece of coffee filter or paper towel over a section of track. Wet it with some isopropyl alcohol then put one set of wheels on the cleaner while holding the other wheels on the track so that they spin. When no more black comes off reverse the engine and do it again. Putting track on carpet is not a good idea as Bob stated.

I used the link Hunt gave,went to the WS site. This looks like a great way to learn many of the skills you will need to have a good looking layout. Nothing like this was available when I first started with N-scale in 1978.

After I went and added the proper weight to each car the amount of derails dropped immensely. For me adding metal wheels are a big help for smooth operation. Then I could start to get at the switch and track problems. I have most of those fixed. 

As you have found there is a lot of engineering involved in getting the perfect layout. But the more you do it the more you learn, and the easier it gets.

Have you checked the wheel gauge on the cars? If not you need to do so to eliminate or confirm that this is or is not a problem. Putting wheels in gauge is a lot less expensive then replacing switches. Also low flange thinner wheels ride better through turnouts them deep flange wheels.
If you do not have a NMRA gauge you really should get one.

 Yes, check the gears for hair and debris in the gear teeth. This is something that many people over look.  

I check and clean my engines gears about three times a year.
Though I check them any time I feel that one of them is not running as smooth as it should.

As my two gp40's are also N-Scale, I highly agree with simkon. So much better the simkon  way.

As for trying to put a decoder in a engine not made for it  (destroyed two decoders and one motor on some older engines) my experience says do not even bother unless you know what you are doing. I have 2 of the Bachmann GP40's and they work well on DC, but I would never bother to convert.them for my DCC layout. Just to much effort, and one mistake and poof. You will be far happier just spending the extra money and getting a good brand of decoder ready or decoder installed engine.  Bachmann makes some really fine steam and diesel with decoder installed.   

Most of my decoder installed engines I found on line for under $100.00.

Ken Price

Yes, it will. though on like DCC you can only run one engine at a time.

I have 10 florescent strips, each with 2 F4 tubes over my layout and have no problems with my Didgitrax radio system. If using florescent tubes, get the bright sun output ones.
They cost more, but the difference is amazing. I did not at first and wasted money that could have went for the brighter tubes.

Ken