Power Draw Spectrum H16-44 and F7/8

[McCullough]

Both of these engines seem to require excess current to run. Each time I power up these engines with my NCE Power Pro the CP6 Circuit Protector lights up. I run other engines with no problem on the same system. Each engine is DCC equipt with an NCE D13SR decoder. Both of the engines in question are of 90's vintage as are most of my engines.

[Jim Banner]

Any time a locomotive starts drawing excess power, I immediately think of excessive mechanical drag.  Additional lighting in the locomotive or in the passenger cars it is pulling, power hungry lighting, etc. can also cause problems but these usually show up right after you install a decoder.  If excessive current draw sneaks up later on, it is usually excess drag.  The most common cause of excess drag is lack of lubrication.  The second most common cause is dust/dirt/lint/pet hair wrapped around shafts or axles.  Running on regular track (as opposed to based track like E-Z Track) with the track on a rug can cause all sorts of problems.  Is it possible that you or a previous owner has done something like this?

I have a couple of 1990's H16-44's and have no problems with them.  One is featured in the article linked to below.  One other possibility with these locomotives is that the decoder installer did not get the pickup rings sitting on the bottoms of the split frame halves when he/she reassembled the locomotive.  The article talks about this under Reassembly.  You may also find the article useful when it comes to taking the locomotive apart for lubrication.

http://members.shaw.ca/sask.rail/dcc/tmaster/tmaster.html

Jim

[McCullough]

Thanks again Jim. The trainmaster has been apart a few times and was supposed to have been clean last trip to the hobby shop, Mmmmm! Guess I'll have to pull it apart again and see if things are better when I put it back together.