Today, I recieved a nice set of PW 2333s from a hobby shop on eBay. The said they replaced the horn and it works, so they say.
When I put the D Cell in and tried the horn, it didnt work. Trying whether it was in nuetural, reverse, forward, or full power the horn would not work. So, I took of the shell to make sure the solder joints on the relay were good. They were. I also checked and made sure the relay was able to touch both plates and nothing was stuck. Nothing was. When I put it on the track (by now I thought it might be the CW80 I am using) when I pressed the horn button and the relay plates touched, but, NO horn.
Can anybody give me and more reccomendations before I contact the seller or buy a new relay and/or horn?
Thanks,
Grayson
I wouild definitely try it with a different transformer; take it to your hobby shop if you do not have another. CW-80’s have a delay in their circuits that might affect a PW horn.
NH Chris
Try this. Put the battery in as you normally would, close the cover tightly and then turn the locomotive upside down. The relay contacts will close by gravity and the horn should sound. If it doesn’t, then maybe the horn itself is not working. Try the adjusting nut on the horn (turn in VERY SMALL increments). Sometimes that will bring the horn to life. If neither of these things work, then maybe the problem IS with your transformer.
I’ve often had trouble with a thin layer of oxidation imparing the electrical contact enough to cause the horn not work.
Take a business card, and spray on it a thick layer of some sort of electrical contact cleaner(I like CRC QD). Place the card between the relay contacts, close them by hand, and rub the card back and forth.
If that doesn’t get the horn working(by manually closing the relay contacts) repeat with a piece of fine sandpaper.
You might also need to give the sandpaper treatment to the battery door, the top of the battery box, and the poles of the battery itself.
Ben, I had posted this on OGR as well and one of they guys there said that I should place the batter on top of the horn (- touching the horn) and using a jumper wire touch the + of the batterty and the solder joint on the relay. When I did this, the horn did work. So, it must be the relay contacts.
Also, on the relay there is a wire soldered to the e unit. The wiring diagram I have does not show a wire going from the relay to the e unit. Whats the wire for?
Grayson,
Here’s a picture of the wiring for a 2023, which should be close enough to the 2333 to give you an idea. On this one, there definitely is a wire from the relay to the e-unit.
Grayson,
I think you need a copy of the Greenberg Manual. Not that anyone here is opposed to helping, God knows they’ve helped me enough over the past year, but it would make like a little easier on you.
The F3 horns just like the ALCO horns are a finicky bunch. Try everything suggested, including cleaning the relay contacts and all with CRC QD or something similar, and see if you can get a hold of the witing diagram to help. Check the Olsen’s library, they might have it posted there.
My F3’s horn was a pain to get adjusted.
Mike
Actually, I just found out my problem with the wiring.
Mike - The manual I have is the Greenberg repair manual.
Ben, there are 2 wiring diagrams. A wiring and a pictorial diagram of wiring. The pictorial version does show a wire going from the relay to the e unit.
I will clean the contacts and see what happens.
Ben…I’ve got a 2031, so the 2023 diagram is a big help to me, same issue, non-functioning horn…my train store guy told me he didn’t have the parts, to buy a horn and the relay, and bring it back in, he’d install. But the diagram you provided blew up nicely and it looks like installation is fairly easy.
Thanks,
Jack
The wiring diagram shows that the pickup assembly is connected to a terminal on the e-unit. Another wire goes from that terminal to the horn relay’s coil. The other end of the coil is grounded to the locomotive frame by a ring lug on one of the relay bracket’s mounting screws.
The low-voltage DC circuit is very simple: One side of the horn is grounded to the locomotive frame. The other side of the horn goes to the fixed contact of the horn relay. The armature and frame of the horn relay are connected to the positive terminal of the D cell. The negative terminal of the D cell is grounded to the locomotive frame. If this circuit is intact, you should be able to get it to blow by closing the relay with your finger.
…Unless the relay frame is grounded to the locomotive frame, in which case it will put a short circuit across the D cell. So be sure that it is not grounded!
Grayson,
I was about to walk out the door when I wrote my previous response, and didn’t have a chance to pull out either of my service manuals.
The diagram on pg. 173 of the Greenburg’s manual(pg. 215 of K-line) does indeed show the wire from the e-unit to the relay. The difference, however, is that this diagram illustrates the wire connecting directly to the relay coil, and not to one of the wafers on the side of the relay.
In any case, however, given that you say the horn works when connected directly, I’m almost positive it will work once the contacts are cleaned.
Problem solved. No installation was between the horn bracked and the frame. I cut some thin cardboard from the Kodak picture envelopes and put it under the bracked. When I touched the horn wire to the bracked, Voila!, the horn worked. Thanks for yalls help.
And to think I went and bought a new relay on ebay for $25 and my problem the whole time was the installation? [;)]
Grayson…great thread for a lot of us. And you got it done without replacing parts. Thanks to your patience and the help of all the contributors sticking with it until the problem was solved. So it came down to a missing insulation piece between the horn brackey and the frame. Got me and probably a lot of others thinking if our horn problems with old postwar might due to a poor or deteriorating 50+ year old insulation piece.
Thanks.
Jack