back wheels not spinning, it is powered up

[xman08]

just got my son a Rail Chief set for Christmas and the back set of wheels r locked. the front wheel set is spinning on the track and is even moving the train very slow, but when i look ground level i can see the front spinning and back is just locked dragging. Is the engine broke or is there something i could do to loosen the wheels? i do have the train under power (i know they don't turn by hand). Any info would be great bcuz my son can't wait until he can couple the other cars to the engine.

[Desertdweller]

It sounds to me like there may be a piece of foreign matter stuck between the teeth on a gear.  Try running the loco in reverse and see if the jam is where you can pick it out with a needle.  You might be able to rotate the gears to where you can get at them by turning the motor armature with your fingers.

If you can't see or get at the cause, you will need to take the truck apart or send the loco in for repair.  There should be an exploded drawing with your instructions.  I find it helps to disassemble things like that in a shallow flat-bottomed baking pan so parts don't get lost.

I'm sorry your are running into trouble right at the start.  If you bought your set at a local store, see if they will let you exchange it (better to do that before tearing it apart).

Les

[xman08]

i had it running for about 2 hours after i turned the gears back and forth a few times. idk what i did, but it was running good then it just locked up again. i'm thinking it may just be a bad gear or something. i'll see if i can take it apart depending how complicated it looks. it's gonn go back anyway bcuz i don't wanna keep messing with it. i could see if it was older, but i just got it out of the box and it was stuck. idk much about it, but it seems like a good set. could it be something i'm doing wrong??? like not railing it in the right direction. then again i must have taken it off and put it back on over 100 times already haha. he got a boat load of other toys and of course the train is the only thing he wants to play with lol

[Doneldon]

xman-

I suggest that you not take the mechanism apart. You LHS may decline to help if the loco has been
disassembled and I believe you will forfeit your Bachmann limited lifetime warranty.
                                                                                                                                  -- D

[xman08]

yeah i'm not gonna take that thing apart haha...i looked at the diagram and i'm not getting into it. just feel horrible, my son was so anxious to get his first model train and i get him one and i have to pick one that doesn't work proper. seems like those back gears just are not catching. i could spin the wheel back and forth a little (about 1/8 of an inch and the gears do turn, but when it's under power they don't move.

[Doneldon]

xman-

Don't be so hard on yourself. There will be a certain percentage of questionable units from any manufacturing process and no one can tell which ones are the bad ones. If someone could tell, the units would get fixed and the consumer would never experience the frustration you and your son are experiencing. So none of this is your fault. And I can assure you that your son will forget all about the frustration when you get the trains moving, and he'll think you're a genius.

That minimal movement in your drive wheels is exactly what you should see. There's a little slop in every drive train and the eighth inch is just about what you can expect.
                                       -- D

[jward]

it seems to me that the most likely cause of this problem is a drive shaft has popped out of place.

if the problem were a gear bind strong enough to keep the wheels from turning, or grit in the gears, then it would stop the motor and all wheels from turning as well. that is, unless the drive shaft is not connected to one of the trucks. then it would do exactly what yours is doing now. the truck connected to the motor would turn, but the worm gear on the other truck would prevent it from turning. the play you see in the wheels is due to the gears having a little bit of play in them, the worm gear at the top of the truck is not turning.

if the drive shaft has disconnected from the truck but not the motor, you should hear a loud grinding noise from inside the loco. if it's disconnected from the motor you won't hear this noise.

[rogertra]

Or it's suffering from "Split Gear Syndrome".

However, unless you are an experienced modeller and are comfortable taking models apart and repairing them yourself, take it back from where you bought it and let them fix it or replace it.  Sadly, with Chinese so called "Quality Control", these things happen more often these days than when they were made at home.

[Ken G Price]

If you had the track and engine on a carpet or carpeted floor then you may have gotten fibers in the gears.

[GG1onFordsDTandI]

xman-

I suggest that you not take the mechanism apart. You LHS may decline to help if the loco has been
disassembled and I believe you will forfeit your Bachmann limited lifetime warranty.
                                                                                                                                -- D

Forfeit of warranty? I think they will cover all but the things you break or destroy while doing a disassembly. Other wise sending new gears to us to fix gearing problems, replacement couplers for bad ones, motors, or even disassembly to lube an engine would be a no-no. I think the "limited" lifetime warranty is a basis to deny idiotic warranty requests made by people who are truly at fault themselves, rather than Bachmann. My disassembled N gauge F-7 had a motor swap done, but was new with receipt. Clarification from the Yardmaster would be great.

[xman08]

i wasn't getting into taking it apart when it's the first train we owned. i looked at the disassembly diagram and said...NO!!! lol. i just took it back and got a new one, so my son could finally play with it. in the future when we get more engines i will get into the technical side of it. i did find a new hobby which was highly influenced my my 5 year old who was born with the love of trains lol. i'm sure everyone knows of the excitement in setting up a new layout which we have ahead of us.

thanks everyone for ur input...i'm sure i'll be back on here asking about something else very soon haha