I described the way I determined the problem. I placed a stationary steamer on a powered track and turned on the bell. I would tip the loco so the wheels on one side and then the other were off the track and then did the same with the tender. The only time the bell went silent was when I tipped the right side tender wheels off the track. That tells me that the only electrical pick up on the right side is through the tender wheels, not through the driver wheels. If you can come up with another explanation other than that, I’d be glad to hear it. The fact this happens with four different models of BLI steamers indicates to me it is not an uncommon problem. I don’t have a stalling problem with my BLI Hudsons because they pick up power from the drivers on both sides. I also don’t have a stalling problem with the Pennsy Mountain because that is equipped with wipers on both the front and rear tender trucks so even if the front truck is over dead rail, the rear truck maintains electrical pick up. I don’t know why they didn’t do that with all their steamers. If they had, I could live with their dead driver wheels.
Hey, John, I just went back and re-read the entire thread, and I focused on this particular reply from you. OK, I get what you are saying about the driver wheels, which intensifies my question.
Are you saying that all four of those problem locomotives have no power pickups on the right side drivers? Or, are you saying that the right side driver pickups are not working to bring power up from the rails, through the driver wheels, to the decoders?
I’m sure the tender has two sided pick up. When I did my bell test, when I tipped the left side drivers off the track, the bell kept clanging indicating it was still getting left side pick up from the tender.
I think Ed is on the right track. When I started the OP, I remembered the previous thread but not the specifics and was hoping to get steered in the right direction before looking under the hood. It seems it’s probably not a design flaw but a workmanship problem which is why it seems to be a sporadic problem. I thought I had resolved the problem with my K4 about ten years ago but the problem returned so I decided to give the Keep Alives a try. Unfortunately I couldn’t find definitive instructions on where to solder it and feared frying the decoder if I picked the wrong place. I’m hoping my decoder is the same one Ed applied his to because it looks pretty definitive. It also looks like the diagram on the BLI website. I just won’t know until I open up my K4 whether I have the same generation Paragon as Ed. The K4 was one of my earliest locos I purchased with factory sound so I am guessing it is about 15 years old. If that works out, I might consider Keep Alives for all the problem locos but first I think I will try the other fix Ed suggested.
Yes, that is the model I have, right down to the 1361 road number. Unfortunately the decoder is different than the one Ed posted a picture of so I am still at a loss as to where to attach the Keep Alive. From the article, it appears it is supposed to get electrical pick up from drivers on both sides so the fact man doesn’t would appear to be from the quality of the assembly rather than a design flaw.
I did discover one curious thing. Like my Pennsy M1B Mountain, it has wipers on both front and year truck of the tender. It should get power from both so I’m not sure why it stalls on insulated frogs when my M1B does not.
I located the original box and it indicates it is a QSI decoder. I’m going to do a google search to see if I can find instructions for attaching the Keep Alive. I already did one search and this is typical of the instructions I find for installing a Keep Alive:
"You will need to find the rectifier bridge or the 4 rectifier diodes. Then you will need to decipher where you have rectified DC track voltage on the board. Also, you may look for the “function common” or “Blue wire pin”. This is where the posi
So, it looks a lot more like a defect, an “old age/corrossion”, or a “crud build up” issue, not a design error…
Don’t get me wrong, some BLI designs were indeed flawed. (Reed switch for chuff sensor on the Mikado’s?[D)])
But it appears that, as designed, the K4 is supposedly all wheel pick-up on the loco drivers, and outside axles (1st and 4th axles I would guess) on the tender trucks.
Interestingly, the other linked thread, a post further down listed a series of tests that one could perform, and would have shown quickly the defect is somewhere inside the locomotive itself, while tether, and tender are fine.
As is the actual design itself. While that particular design wasn’t a problem, the execution by the factory (or even parts supplier issues? Supplied incorrect screws, for instance…) are what was lacking in these units.
I would attempt to repair them myself before sending (for a fee) to BLI. Seems a simple fix, and the same fix might even work on them all, as they all have the same symptoms. Good project for the cold/wet days ahead for most. (Up north anyways.)
And I would fix the driver pick-up issue before resorting to a keep alive. [2c]
The wipers on the axles are only picking up from one wheel, the other is insulated, of course. 12 wheels on mant of my BLI tenders and only four pick up electricity.
Keep in mind, too, that traction tires are nothing but big insulators. So a 2-8-2 might only have three drivers actually collecting current from each rail.
OK, that makes sense. So I’m guessing the front truck has the right hand pickup and the rear truck has the left side pick up. When the front right wheels hit dead rail and there is no pick up from the right side driver, the loco stalls.
I already had the K4 disassembled so I’m going to check out the fixes you suggested. If that works, I can do the same on the other problem locos. Maybe it won’t be necessary to buy Keep Alives for them, especially since I can’t find instructions on where to wire them.
I think you’re right. When I started the thread, I thought it was a design flaw because all four of the locos I mentioned had dead right hand drivers. I hadn’t considered the possibility it was a recurring problem with the assembly. The oldest BLI steamers in my fleet are the three Hudsons I bought from Trainworld for the bargain basement price of $130. They have no issues. I’m wondering if they were assembled before these problems started to occur with their assembly. Since we can’t prove the pandemic started in a Wuhan lab, I doubt we’ll ever get confirmation