legin

Thanks both. The wiper appears to be making good contact with the inside of the wheel and springs back against it well when pulled inwards by me. I should have said that I tested continuity with a multimeter between motor and wheel and there was good contact. But when I applied power to both the rim and back of the wheel with the loco in the cradle, neither the wheel nor motor turned. I agree that the first port of call should be to remove the rear wheels so that I can look closely at the plastic holes which carry the axle and maybe sand, lightly, the offending wheel as well. It appears to be brass. or some brass amalgam. Another thought is that I don't see how there can be any sort of short between wheel and motor, otherwise the front tender wheel would not turn either. The motor is connected directly to the 2 wipers by one single wire and the wiper assembly is one piece.

I wonder if someone is able to help me with what is probably a small problem. I have a Lima crab, bought new in 1986, but which has done little running. The loco ran exceptionally smoothly a week or two ago except that it would stall when the leading tender pickup wheel was on some of the dead frogs. The rear wheel was not therefore feeding power to the motor to keep the loco going. There is no problem at all with the loco itself (no Mazak problems) and there is continuity between the earth driving wheels and the tender itself. The loco is DC.. There is also continuity between the motor earth and the connection to the loco. The motor runs well in isolation when current is applied. However, when current is applied to the rear tender pickup wheel, the motor does not turn. It does, however, when current is applied to the front tender pickup wheel. The motor also runs when current is applied to the rear tender wheel wiper,and so that is connected. Both the rear pickup wheel and the wiper have been cleaned with isopropyl and the wiper is making good contact with the wheel. I am getting a continuity reading between motor and wheel, but none when I apply actual power, which I don't understand. I am not sure of the next step but think that the way forward is to detach the rear tender wheels from the chassis (once the driving cogs are removed from the motor) because those wheels are extremely stiff, despite oiling. The front wheels move freely. The wheel axles run in fully enclosed plastic holes and so will not come out without being removed from the axle. Will the wheels simply pull or twist off to get them out without breaking them. I assume that is the only way in which they can have been assembled in manufacturing. I can then give both the offending wheel and its wiper some sanding to see if that is the problem. I have a B2B gauge to reinstall them. I have looked through the Lima Crab forum posts but cannot see anything on this particular topic. Since the loco is in almost new condition, I would very much like to get it running properly and convert it to DCC, as all my other locos. And if anyone has any other ideas about what may be causing a problem other than this particular wheel, I would be very grateful to hear from them.

I am absolutely a convert to graphite which I started using about 2 months ago. My layout is DCC and although I had few stalling problems with larger locos, my 0-6-0 tanks would often stall on the points. All 22 points bar one are insulfrog, a legacy of a model railway from the mid 1980s and brought back to life 3 years ago. With the use of a 2B graphite stick, I hardly ever get a stall from the 3 tank engines and if I do, it is to do with one of the wheels not making contact with the rail because of slightly uneven points which I can do nothing about given their age, apart from replacing them. All my locos move more smoothly now and are particularly good at shunting speeds. However, one note of caution. Adhesion. I have had to remove the traction tyres on a loco drive Hornby 2Pbecause they were always coming off on 2nd radius ciurves and it started to slip badly with a modest load and no gradient. And the my old 4F, Airfix tender drive started to do the same. This must be the graphite and I cleaned it off the curves where slipping was occurring. The answer is to graphite points only and to allow the locos to spread it round the track, not to apply it to the whole of the track, After cleaning, I now have both engines working well although I did isopropyl the traction tyres on the 4F.. Prior to graphite, I used to thoroughly clean the track before each session, so dirt was not a problem but the graphite has made all the difference to running. I have not had to clean the track for 2 months now following the commencement of winter running.

Thanks a lot everyone. Since the decoders are hard wired and my capability ends at dismantling and servicing locos, I would have to have the Hornby decoders taken out and probably replaced by Lenz, which I know works on my one so-fitted loco. Having said that, I am just about happy with slow speeds for the unfitted goods trains, so maybe the freight only engines can be left alone. The Lenz decoders not only have a short protection but also they will replace them , I think within a year of purchase, if you blow them through your own idiocy. Unfortunately, it would cost about £200+ to do all the locos but I shall do it if all else fails. "All else" seems to mean 2 things if I have learned anything from what has been posted. 1. Decoders: Hornby decoders have limited scope when it comes to setting CVs. However, if the decoder will recognise CV29, turning the speed curve on or off is worth a try. CV 3 &4 are programmable according to Izzy, by looking at acceleration rates. I am presuming that we are talking about the Hornby decoders being able to be reset as well as the Zimos and CTs. Top speed cannot be limited on theses decoders which should be 8249s, but I never get beyond turning the knob past about 1/3 from stop anyway.. 2. EZ Command: This is fixed at 28SS. This maybe a bit of a punt, because my Lenz loco is ok, but maybe as has been said, it is an incompatibility issue between the decoders and the Hornby chips. The controller speed dial, I have just noticed, turns to about 1/4 to the hour from off for slow speeds and the when turning from that point to over 10 minutes to or 5 minutes to, nothing at all happens to the Hornby fitted locos., and then they lurch suddenly to a scale 25mph from about 10. Taking the controller to the shop and trying it with locos fitted with both Hornby and other chips might tell me something, though I expect it to perform well with locos with other chips as it does with my Lenz fitted one. Better still, try my locos with his Dynamis to try to eliminate the controller as the problem.. I know it might sound ridiculous to many people, but passenger trains travelling at scale 25 mph on my smallish but quite complex layout is just too fast and loping at 18-20 is just right., goods trains at 10-15.

Many thanks again for the replies. Sorry I have not replied sooner but I had not managed to get hold of the guy who fitted all 8 decoders. It's between 8 months and a year and a half since he fitted them but thinks that they are all Hornby decoders. And because they all perform broadly in the same manner, I think his memory must be correct. Because I have an EZ controller, I cannot read or reset the CV values but the guy who fitted them has a Dynamis which can of course. They have not been altered from default. Sir Topham -- thank you. I am with you on the speed steps and think that 28 should be perfectly ok for what I need, i.e. slow speeds, although at the moment, I am still getting the sudden acceleration jump from slow-about 10 mph on the worst locos-to 25 whichever of 28 or 128 steps are programmed.

Will do.

Thanks Sir Topham . Unfortunately, I am in South Devon and so a long way from Leicester although I was just up the M1 in Sheffield until 5 years ago, which would have been doable. If I have understood this correctly, are we saying that 128 speed steps gives finer control than 28 or 14? The "trial" loco I took to the model shop was changed from 28 to 128 but did not appear to make any difference. I will take the same engine in, one of the worst performers, and post the CV results. Andymsa -thanks also. Unfortunately, the chips are all hard wired in, including the new (ish) loco which is a Hornby railroad, so swapping them without a lot of trouble and expense is not really an option. However, as I said above, my newest loco was DCC ready and I put a Lenz chip in which performs perfectly on its default setting. This is why I don't think the controller is the issue.

Many thanks for the detailed replies, for which I am very grateful. Boiling them down, it looks like I shall have to identify the make of decoders first. My EZ command, as has been said, does not allow reading of the decoders, so I shall have to get someone, maybe the model shop, to look at CV values, starting with CV2 and CVs 5&6, and probably CV 3&4 as well. At least for some of the locos, setting CV5 to a max of 20 mph would stop them lurching to 25mph and so that would be a big improvement. The decoders themselves are, I hope, relatively new, having been fitted last year. And I am still rather dubious about it being the EZ command's fault, since my one Lenz fitted loco accelerates uniformly throughout the speed range.

I can see that there are over 2000 posts on DCC topics, so I am sure this must have been covered somewhere but I am unable to find it by using the correct search words unfortunately. I have 3 vintage locos, Airfix x 2 and Mainline, an R2098c 2P, and a new Hornby Jinty, all converted professionally to DCC, and all except the Jinty and Mainline class 4 with Ringfield or Ringfield type motors. Regrettably, I don't know what make of chip has been installed. , They are controlled by a Bachmann EZ controller. All will crawl at walking pace and up to a scale 10-12 mph or thereabouts. After that speed, 3 of them leap to approx. 25 mph instantaneously, whilst the 4th and 5th, including the JInty, will manage about 15 mph before taking off. No amount of fine control with the speed dial will stop this happening. My layout is relatively small and a scale speed of about 18-20 mph is about as fast as I want to go but I can't get it.. I have spoken with the fitter about this and his idea is that it may be the number of speed settings on the chip and these have been altered with a Dynamis from 28 to 128 but with no discernible difference. I doubt therefore if going down to 14 will make a difference either. I do not think that this is a problem with the controller since I have a Lenz fitted engine which accelerates smoothly throughout its range. I would be surprised also if it was to do with the locos since they have split chassis, can, and Ringfield motors between them. Is this likely to be a CV setting problem? All of the locos are operating on the chip default settings at the moment. They are however accelerating smoothly between 0 and 10-15mph depending on the loco, and above 25 mph. I am pretty new to DCC and so any help would be gratefully received.

I regularly push an Airfix autocoach with a Hornby Jinty through reverse curve points. I have 23 of these, some vintage 1980s Hornby dead frog, some new Peco insulfrogs and one Peco streamline live frog, all code 100. All except 2 are 2nd radius setrack. The autocoach, pushed, will go through all of them without derailment. even though it has the original wheels. (Some of the old points I have reduced the checkrail gap on.) Every point is screwed down flat, not pinned and this has made a big difference to 0-6-0 pickup. I have 3 0-6-0 tanks- a new Hornby Jinty, a 1970s model and a 1970s E2. I had enormous trouble with stalling on the insulfrogs and so I loosened the chassis baseplates little by little so that the wheels had more downward play in them, enabling more contact, but not so much as to affect contact with the pickups. This has made a huge difference to slow running over the points, which, by and large can now be negotiated without stalling. The new Hornby Jinty has pickups on all 6 wheels and therefore no traction tyres. I am running at present a loco drive 2P without one of its 2 traction tyres, which kept fouling on the curves. No ill effects so far-no derailing on any point and no shorting out of the DCC. So I think that running yours without traction tyres at all may well be ok. I presume, however, that your loco will not have pickups on the traction tyred wheels and so it may be necessary to try to connect some phosphor bronze strip to those wheels. Apart from the back to backs on the auto trailer, I would examine closely, the working of the couplings on the reverse curves. Most of my stock is vintage stuff from the 1980s, including the locos, and some of the goods wagons and coaches occasionally derail on the points when being pushed because of coupling incompatibility or buffer lock.. If you can do this slowly, after getting the points absolutely flat and maybe loosening the chassis plate somewhat, try running over the offending points as slowly as you can to see if this is the problem.