Ho 4-8-2 Heavy Mountain C&O

[Brandon40500]

It is straight DC. When it is on the track and power is applied it moves slowly I don't see any headlights working and smoke is coming from the rear of the boiler from underneath. The wheels are all aligned properly for power pickup so it isn't that. Any ideas on what to do?

[Brandon40500]

Shes fixed. IDK how but I took it apart again and reassembled it and this time problems solved. Very strange.

[jward]

That smoke was most likely from an overloaded motor. You're lucky you didn't fry it. Rule of thumb, if you have to give a locomotive full power to get it to move, don't try to run it until you find out why it's binding up. You got lucky. Whatever was causing the bind probably dropped out of the gears when you too it apart.

[trainman203]

The rods and valve gear could've become catawampus also and jammed up.  no one knows anymore how they are supposed to look when properly aligned so it's not hard to understand how that could happen.

[Terry Toenges]

Anyone with a heavy mountain could take pics and post them.

[Len]

Here's the left side. Right side should be offset 90 degress (quartered) from this.



Len

[Terry Toenges]

I guess if you have the left side lined up, the right side would automatically be lined up too to assemble it.

[trainman203]

The trick is getting the eccentric crank on the main driver 15° ahead of the axle. In the picture it's set extremely behind the axle which is not generally prototypical. I used to know why some cranks were set forward and some behind, but I can't remember anymore.