Heljan Class 33 problem

[hoover50008]

Hi

 

I have experienced a problem with a Heljan 33 one minute it ran fine, it ran up the layout ok then changed direction to come back and next it is totally dead apart from the lights.

 

It is running on 12v DC.

 

Has anyone else experienced similar problems please.

 

E

[SRman]

Is the motor buzzing or humming?

I'll assume it is not, in which case I would check the feed wires from the PCB to the motor brushes.

 

Power is obviously getting from the wheels and pickups to the lights, so that eliminates the track feed and connections from that side to the PCB as being the culprits. This means that if power is not getting to the motor, one of the wires to the brushes may possibly have broken or come adrift from the little plugs Heljan use.

 

There may be other causes but that's where I would start.

[hoover50008]

Is the motor buzzing or humming?

 

I'll assume it is not, in which case I would check the feed wires from the PCB to the motor brushes.

 

Power is obviously getting from the wheels and pickups to the lights, so that eliminates the track feed and connections from that side to the PCB as being the culprits. This means that if power is not getting to the motor, one of the wires to the brushes may possibly have broken or come adrift from the little plugs Heljan use.

 

There may be other causes but that's where I would start.

Hi

 

It looks like the circuit board has gone down for some reason maybe a dry joint as it did spark in to life when I touched it but has now died again.

 

Thanks

 

E

[gromit323]

Hi.

 

New to  RMweb so here is my first 2p worth.

 

Exactly the same thing happened to my original class 15.

On the pcb where the DCC socket is two components that look like electronic resistors - thin tubular lump on a wire each end, these were one open circuit and one short circuit when it packed up. I can only assume they are protective fuses for the Dopey Command Control (DCC) system. I shorted the open circuit one out by soldering a wire across it only for the other one to go shortly after when the motor burnt out.

 

The guy at Howes (the UK agents for Heljan warranty claims and repairs) was in despair when I contacted them he swapped my chassis for the only other one he had in the country with no prospect of any more from Heljan. Try the shorting trick or send it back to Howes if it is still in warranty.

 

Regards John

[Dagworth]

Hi.

 

New to  RMweb so here is my first 2p worth.

 

Exactly the same thing happened to my original class 15.

On the pcb where the DCC socket is two components that look like electronic resistors - thin tubular lump on a wire each end, these were one open circuit and one short circuit when it packed up. I can only assume they are protective fuses for the Dopey Command Control (DCC) system. I shorted the open circuit one out by soldering a wire across it only for the other one to go shortly after when the motor burnt out.

 

The guy at Howes (the UK agents for Heljan warranty claims and repairs) was in despair when I contacted them he swapped my chassis for the only other one he had in the country with no prospect of any more from Heljan. Try the shorting trick or send it back to Howes if it is still in warranty.

 

Regards John

No, they're not fuses, they're chokes and are part of the radio-frequency noise suppression along with the capacitors.

 

No need to try to run down DCC, they are only there for non DCC usage, DCC doesn't need that level of noise suppression as the decoder does the same job.

 

Andi

[thaddeus]

Wouldnt shorting out the suprression capacitors cause all sorts of damage? surely its just safer to remove them if your using dcc.

[SRman]

Wouldnt shorting out the suprression capacitors cause all sorts of damage? surely its just safer to remove them if your using dcc.

 

Definitely. Shorting out the capacitors would cause problems. Bypassing the chokes would not, either for DC or DCC.

[hoover50008]

For what it's worth it doesn't work on DCC either.

 

E