I recently purchased a Spectrum HO 4-6-0 with 53 " drivers off E-bay but new in a sealed box. I have a number of Spectrum locos and have always been very happy with their performance but this loco is very unsafisfactory. It has a problem with electrical pick up that necessitates wriggling it on the track to start it running again after which it will travel anything from a few inches to a tens of feet until it stops again. Second problem is its poor pulling power- it struggles to pull two MDC 34 ft coaches up a 2% grade.
What are other modellers experience with this loco? Are there any modifications needed to improve it’s reliability and what can be done to improve its tractive effort. I love the look of the loco but it does not meet my expectations to run light engine ll the time!!
Mine pull a pair of the 34’ Overton Shorties up a 5% grade. They run well too, but I tested them at the LHS before buying them, and had to turn down nearly half of the ones tested. One didn’t run, one didn’t have a working headlight, and one waddled like a duck.
I’ve scraped thick crud off the tender’s conducting wheels on at least one new from the box 4-6-0, so take a hard look at your wheels.
Bachman has lousy quality control, but seems to try to fix problems brought to their attention. Check the wheels, initiate the resolution process and in the future, try to test drive Bachmans before buying them.
I haven’t had one apart, but there’s room between the main beam and the boiler, forward, cab floor and ceiling, room for a toolbox or two on the walkways, and the stack is hollow.
I’d look into your electrical problems first, because a lot of your pulling power seems to be lost there, and because some of these tips for adding weight may void the warranty.
The tender trucks each only pick up power from one rail, so adding additional contacts will help with the stalling problem. I did that to mine and it worked wonders. Now all the tender wheels get power.
I don’t have a picture handy but it was pretty simple. I got a small strip of thin phosphor-bronze (brass would probably work, too) cut about as wide as the wheel tread and long enough to touch both wheels. I drilled a small hole in the center and then mounted it with a small (probably 00-90) screw to the cross beam on the top of the tender truck, positioned so that the wiper makes contact with the wheels that were previously unused. After that it’s just a matter of soldering a small wire to the contact and attaching it to the appropriate wires inside the tender.
I didn’t add any weight. I did have to re-quarter the drivers to make it run smoothly, but that’s another story…
You can also remove the spring that pushes down the pilot wheels. I did that on mine and the pulling power double. I can now get 4 cars up a 4.5% grade.
Also be sure to check how much slack is in the cable between the loco and tender. This cable sometimes has too much and as a result actually raises the tender front off of the rails. Pu***he extra slack back into the tender. The symptoms you describe fit my 4-6-0 to a tee. I lessened the slack and haven’t had any trouble since.
I just fininshed redoing one for our local museum and pulling power is an issue, a huge one, I can pull about 4 cars plus a van up a grade and around a curve. Not nearly as good as my 4-8-2 but…
Anyway I had this one apart. There is a geared belt drive with a small motor above drivingthe shaft below. Motor looks N scalish it is so small. The only room in the boiler that I found for weight was where the circuit board and LED were for the front headlight. We also had problems with the power pickup but it was twofold and yours sounds like ours was. Something in the tender went wonky and melted/bubbled the insulation inside. I don’t think the board was working very good. The other problem was the wipers on the drive wheels of the loco were not touching all the drivers and going around a curve, it would stall (remember the tender wasn’t working great). Dirty wheels really amplified these problems.
The museum is using DC so I yanked the board and rewired the tender so that only two wires were being used to supply power from the tender to the motor. The rest is just for DCC conversion. (power from loco going back, combining with tender power, through the board and back to power the motor. The other wires were for the headlight which we eliminated) I added 3/4 oz to the tender to make sure that it stayed on the rails touching.
Main problems
Tender too light
Too many wires hanging too low and bad place to have them arranged (a horizontal recepticle would have been better than the vertical)
Power power pickup and distribution on both pieces
Hi All- thanks for the collective advice. After reading all the suggestions I think I will strip it and carry out all the mods. It is a nicely detailed model spoilt by poor mechanical/electrics.
Cheers