I say unusual because I don’t remember it being brought up here before, but… I don’t see EVERY post.
I have a P2K GP-30, dcc and sound, came in a grey box, purchased about 3 years ago if I remember correctly. Smoothest running little engine around, crawls at speed step one. The other day, all of a sudden, it developed a loud… how can I describe this… kind of screeching noise. The first thing I thought of was the gear problem even though the noise wasn’t like what you guys said this is the way it normally sounds… ie. thumping sound. Any way, contacted Walther’s for some new gear/axle combos, they’re on backorder, send them to me when you get them. A friend mentioned he had some, bring it by we’ll replace them, quick easy fix, and we’ll put in a little bit of Lubells grease also. Did that, didn’t help. Hmmmm… maybe the worm gear needs lubrication, took it home and got the shell off and saw that most of the inside is a huge metal weight. Unscrewed it from the bottom and tried to lift it off, no dice. There’s an orange wire coming from beneath the decoder, down the side, disappears in the chassis. The weight had to be lifted straight up for a ways to clear a couple of locating tabs on the frame and the wire prevents this.
See photo.
Contacted Walther’s and was told that I’d probably have to cut that wire, and maybe the red one to get to the worm gear then solder them back together. Not the best design, they admitted. This, I thought, might be a little above my skill set, what would they charge to do this?. Price started at $50 plus $10 return shipping.
So… ! That’s the problem and I’m betting (I always lose bets!) no one else has ever had this particular P2K problem… [;)]
I’ve had the “screeching” sound on a set of p2k HO E units. I did the usual “lube & tune” and it seemed to help a bit, but the screech was really still there. After questioning the folks on this Forum, I realized there was a lube point I missed (I can’t explain how, other than like yours it was “buried”), which was an end support/bearing for the motor “axle”. I did a further disassembly, hit the spot with some Labelle, and all was fine.
Regarding your situation, I suggest you can fix it yourself - assuming you have a low watt soldering iron. I would remove the board, and decide if it is easiest to desolder the wire from the board, or to cut it in the middle. I think it would be easier to cut that wire, lube your loco, and then splice in a wire to reconnect the orange wire. I would put a piece of “spagetti” on the wire (BEFORE soldering of course - learn from my mistake), and you should be back in business.
If you are uncomfortable doing that, perhaps the LHS would do it for you for a lot less money.
The orange wire is feeding power to the bottom brush of the motor and is soldered on the bottom to a bronze strip. If you have a soldering iron it would be easiest to unsolder and resolder the top of the wire from the circuit board. Everyone should learn to perform simple soldering chores such as this instead of having to pay someone.
You probably don’t need to go to such extremes to cure the screeching noise, though – it’s no doubt a dry bearing either on the motor shaft but most likely at the worm gear shaft at either end of the drive train. You should be able to reach these with the tip of a LaBelle 107 spout to apply a small amount of lubricant.
Can you remove the fuel tank beneath the motor? On my P2K GP9s, the fuel tank pulls off (it’s held on by friction and some sticky stuff) and that exposes a couple of screws which hold the weight to the frame. After that, it’s a pretty lift-off.
Jacon it is easy work. I would even say that there is probably enough wire slack that if you just removed the board and undid the weight screws you should be able to move the weight enough to get the the motor bearings. I had a non sound ad non decoder gp-30 the wires were tight but there was enough slack to get to the bearings.
Mike
P.S. It is not a $25.00 job It is all of a 5 min job. I would be hard pressed to charge $10.00. But I have faith you can handle it.
You can just about see the first lube point behind the flywheel. You should be able to get to it with the tip off the Labelle oil bottle. Other point looks to be behind the speaker, try pulling it and see if you can get to the bushing. Might look at pulling a truck as well, see if you can get the tip in that way.
I would cut the wire in the center. I hate hard wiring decoders because of the small wires, hard to cut and handle. Harbor freight sells a small wire cutter that will handle the small wires for $3.95. That and a third hand (alligator clips with arms and a magnifying glass on a stand) from Harbor Freight has me helped a lot.
If you still don’t want to do it your self, PM me and I will be happy to fix it.
I’d like to know what P2K was on when they designed those units. They’re simply a pain to take apart. I actually ran into the same problem when working on my E7 and E8 units. Not the noise, since the worm gears on those are easy–they’re much like an Athearn hood unit drive. No, I was swapping the Mars light circuitry from the E7 to the '8, and like you said, it’s a pain. I found that the easiest to remove the fuel tank, undo the 4 screws securing the weight, and then lift everything off the chassis. With that done, you can easily unclip the motor wires (be careful with the springs and brushes–they’ll fall out!) Lube the bearings, then put everything back together. At least with that method, you don’t have to worry about cutting and reattaching wires. Not so, if you’re moving circuit boards from one unit to another!
I’ve taken a low-nosed version of one of those apart when the rear truck’s worm cover popped loose.
If I remeber right, the orange wire was attached to one of those plugs than can just be pulled out. Then when that was loosened and the screws underneath the frame (2 under the tank, one at each end in front of the trucks) for the weight were loosened It was just enought wiggle room to stick a screwdriver in there to re-seat the worm cover.
Crandell, there is a recess in the frame to prevent the flywheel from hitting the chassis. Sometimes the flywheel can hit that or the chassis since it’s pretty tight in there.
I appreciate eveyone taking the time to read this and make suggestions. Everything about this unit, and I mean everything, is pretty tight with NO wiggle room. Getting that metal chasis weight off without either removing the decoder or cutting the wire is out of the question. Plastic tabs, coming up from the frame, keep the weight in an exact position. I can see that’s necessary because of the cutout area in the frame for the flywheel to sit in, leaving about an 1/8" space on either end. Don’t know what’s behind the 2 speakers, haven’t tried to remove them yet. So, I can try removing the decoder first and see if that helps and if it doesn’t I’ll probably cut the orange wire first, then if necessary, the red one. Then try splicing them back together.
Oh boy. Any way it goes, I need to do something.
I can touch the flywheel shaft with the tip of the Labelle 108 oil to apply some there but I’m not sure if I’d be hurting or helping.
Thanks,
Jarrell
[quote user=“jacon12”]
I say unusual because I don’t remember it being brought up here before, but… I don’t see EVERY post.
I have a P2K GP-30, dcc and sound, came in a grey box, purchased about 3 years ago if I remember correctly. Smoothest running little engine around, crawls at speed step one. The other day, all of a sudden, it developed a loud… how can I describe this… kind of screeching noise. The first thing I thought of was the gear problem even though the noise wasn’t like what you guys said this is the way it normally sounds… ie. thumping sound. Any way, contacted Walther’s for some new gear/axle combos, they’re on backorder, send them to me when you get them. A friend mentioned he had some, bring it by we’ll replace them, quick easy fix, and we’ll put in a little bit of Lubells grease also.
It’s a touchy job - and you have to pretty much unplug EVERY wire. Take lots of pictures so you can get it all back in the right place. At first it might seem like they pretty much fall back to near where they need to plug in, but when you straighten them to pull the weight off, they won’t anymore. It might look daunting, but if you do one wire at a time and document it, it really isn’t that big a deal.
Thanks Randy, I really hadn’t looked that closely to see how the wires are connected to the decoder. I’ll take the shell off and, hopefully, they plug in and are not soldered. That would make things a little easier in some respects.
