Grandson has shown a little interest in doing some scenery work on a layout of his own.
His father’s and uncle’s old Bachmann diesel locos (late 70’s) are still around and tonight I got one of them to run roughly, the other to light up.
I’d let him use some of my current locos, but he has a heavy hand on the throttle, also a bit of dropsy. I think the older locos will take the learning process better. They are already trained.
What I would like to do is give them a lube and see if they will run reliably. The one I have the shell off is a 6 axle, the small motor sits on one of the trucks. The other is a 4 axle, same set up. It appears that there are two ears that hold the truck to the frame. I tried pushing them in to release it, no luck. I tend to be cautious, as I often work on my farm equipment and have been known to snap bolts. I try to not be quite so heavy handed with the mini world.
Also, where do I put oil and lube. I see what looks like one end of a shaft on the motor, but that’s the only place I can see, without removing the truck, that remotely looks like a place to lube or oil.
The instructions that came with the locos are long gone and I don’t have any similar locos with instructions.
If I remember right on how I used to do it, you had to twist the truck / motor assembly to one side or the other, to get the tabs as lined up as possible and gently pry one side out, which then lets the other side drop through. I’d have to go and dig out my scrap box to double check. I still have a few of these, in pieces. Some of them, I think, used to have a plastic “snap ring” kind of thing, that you pried off, and the assembly would drop through the frame. I think they call these “pancake” motors. The side frames and the bottom cover is one piece, and after prying that off, you can see the gears, which you can do without removing the assembly from the frame. As far as the motor, about all you can do is try and clean the disc shaped armature, and make sure the brushes are making good contact. The other truck has the wheel wipers that pick up the power. The side frames and bottom come off the same way as the powered truck, so you can remove the axles and clean the wipers. I’m headed for bed right now, but first thing in the am, if you haven’t gotten any other help, I’ll dig out what I have a check it out. I might even have a couple of instruction sheets.
the rear truck you need a small phillips head screwdriver to remove the holding tab, then the truck with motor comes down & out. from there, a couple more self-evident screws will open the motor asy for you to tinker.
These are the same trains I had as a youth. I’ve kept the shells and added modern chassis to keep them running for another generation, and I suggest you do the same!
No luck finding an instruction sheet, but they didn’t show a lot anyway. After double checking, most of mine are Life Like, some AHM, and early Lionel. They all had the same basic pancake type motor. As a previous poster mentioned, look for a screw that removes a small “lug”, on the side of the motor, that will allow the truck / motor assembly drop out of the frame. If it doesn’t have that, then you have to gently pry one side at a time, to get the motor free from the “L” shaped lugs, that are part of the frame. Be careful of the tiny springs that hold the brushes in place, if you take off the metal tabs that the wires are soldered to. I improved the starting speed of a Life Like motor by nipping off part of the spring. It seemed like there was a lot of spring packed into a small hole, to hold the brushes in place. When you pry off the side frames / truck bottom cover assembly ( one piece), you’ll see the gears, and be able to remove the two wheel sets, and turn the motor with the gears, and then clean, and re-lube them. I don’t think I would put any lube on the end of the motor shaft that you can see, as it might work it’s way into the armature, and windings.
As I mentioned earlier, the other truck comes apart the same way, and you will be able to remove the wheel sets, and inspect and clean the brass wipers that make contact with the wheels, and supply power.
If I can think of anything else, I’ll chime in. Good luck!
Richard, usually when those “cheaper” pancakes crap out they’re mostly toast. If you don’t have any luck in getting them to run half decent, look to older Athearn Blue Box engines. They can really take a beating. Decent runners, simple mechanism, few fragile details, have rugged wire handrails. This is what my 3 kids ran, and developed respect for “their” own engines. I still have all 3 of them almost 20 years later, pull them out and run them and give 'em a lube. Then back to storage so they can have them for their “kids”
Any of the “basic” 4 axle, geeps, switchers would be a great choice.
With Jim’s diagrams, Smith Sr. & Mike’s descriptions I may have a shot at this. However, little things like to run away from me, whether they hide or not, I often have no clue where them flew from.
Bob, yes, if I had gotten them out more often, run and serviced, they’d be in better shape. Of course I didn’t find out from Grandma, that he any interest, until I got back from a train show last weekend. Plenty of possibilities there. Odd thing is he didn’t show any interest when he ran the train less than a week before. He’s a thumb wiggler, so I don’t know how long interest will last with something that takes over a minute to dry and doesn’t have a video screen. I will have to get him to a train show to see if he likes the computer generated train rides that I have seen at some of them. (Including last weekend.)