I’m in the process of salvaging an old steam locomotive my dad brought back from California back in the 70’s.
I beleive it’s a Roundhouse Kit as I remember him putting it together.
This thing never ran right from the start, but I have found the reason why.
The lead wire from the tender to the motor was causing a short.
It looks to be about 22 gauge wire & my question is would I be able to get away with using 18 gauge wire to connect the power to the motor from the tender?
Yes you can. While I have never expereinced an MDC steamer, I have rewired many a brass steamer for DCC using 18 gauge wire. Just one word of cuation. Use stranded wire as it is more flexible and will be less liable to break on you when you get it running properly. Oh and another piece of advice. Just for good measure, insulate all connections with a piece of scotche tape or liquid wire insulation to prevent the possibility of a short.
Gordon, you could get by with smaller wire - just look at the size of the wire in the motor windings, its tiny and all that motor current flows through it. A few years ago, I needed small flexible (read “stranded”) wire and was not close to a hobby shop. The hardware store was no help either. I went to Radio Shack and just “poked around”. I found an earpiece extension cord, used for those small earplug speakers, that is about #28 wire, two conductor, and 10 feet of it, with terminations, for about $5.00. I cut the terminations off and have used that wire for years. Its black, so going from tender to engine, it looks like a service hose. Try it. Going with larger wire, especially when it is not needed, is just asking for problems. Make sure you use a good solder and get a good hot iron to make the connections.