Echo Valley Express 2-6-0 Not Responding

[Biggie Cheese]

I've been wanting to ask this for a long time, considering that the problem has existed for a long time. I laid my DCC & Sound 2-6-0 From the Echo Valley Express set on my table, and it sat there for a few months. I went to go run it again, and it wasn't doing the things it should. No sound and barely any movement. I think I just need to dust the engine and oil it again, but I feel like that wouldn't solve the sound problems giving that they're inside the tender. I want to run it again, and preferably really soon. What should I do to get it working again?

EDIT: I forgot to mention that it runs on the older DCC module. The new one was announced right after I got the set.

[jward]

I know this doesn't help much but you said it runs on your older controller. Why not go back to that since it works? All of your other DCC locomotives should work on that one as well.

[Biggie Cheese]

That's the thing. It's my only controller. That's my only DCC engine. I would upgrade it but... you know... It's kinda expensive. The problem is in the engine, anyway. Not the controller. The controller's fine.

[Terry Toenges]

Has your track been laying on a table for months and, if so, have you cleaned it?

[trainman203]

Clean EVERYTHING, surgical clean.  EVERY point of electrical contact, that means the wipers on the inside face of the drivers with a thin piece of cardboard, then blow it out with a keyboard air can. Clean the wipers of the axles on the tender trucks with isopropyl alcohol. Spin the drivers on a paper towel laid over the rail.  People are always surprised to learn that these little trains need maintenance and cleaning.  Even if it's not the problem, they need all of this more often than you think.

Then, you say the controller is fine. It ran another "module" properly? Which must mean another loop of track or something.   So it might be the connection to the new track is defective?  The rail joiners are loose?

And you are "oiling" the engine ?  Where? How much?  What kind of oil?  I have one of those moguls just like your train set engine and it came with too much oil in it already, needed to clean it out.  So there's a very big chance that there's so much oil in it now that it's compromising your electrical contacts.

One thing I can say, is that these engines don't like to sit around forever without being run. I have the opposite problem you have, I have over 50 locomotives but only run a few of them most of the time.  I have to get all the others out at least a couple of times a year just to run a little bit to keep them limber.

There's so many places and things that can go wrong. I'm sure I missed something. Try all the stuff above, I know it's a lot, and report back what you find.

[Biggie Cheese]

When I say another DCC module, I mean the older version of the Digital Command Center. The one without all the lights and three pages and all the other cool stuff I wish I had.

Has your track been laying on a table for months and, if so, have you cleaned it?

Yes, Yes it has. No I have not cleaned it as I never really used it after my last loco started to smell like battery acid. All of my engines now have something wrong with them, so I'm looking for a new one at a good price.

Clean EVERYTHING, surgical clean.  EVERY point of electrical contact, that means the wipers on the inside face of the drivers with a thin piece of cardboard, then blow it out with a keyboard air can. Clean the wipers of the axles on the tender trucks with isopropyl alcohol. Spin the drivers on a paper towel laid over the rail.  People are always surprised to learn that these little trains need maintenance and cleaning.  Even if it's not the problem, they need all of this more often than you think.

Then, you say the controller is fine. It ran another "module" properly? Which must mean another loop of track or something.  So it might be the connection to the new track is defective?  The rail joiners are loose?

And you are "oiling" the engine ?  Where? How much?  What kind of oil?  I have one of those moguls just like your train set engine and it came with too much oil in it already, needed to clean it out.  So there's a very big chance that there's so much oil in it now that it's compromising your electrical contacts.

One thing I can say, is that these engines don't like to sit around forever without being run. I have the opposite problem you have, I have over 50 locomotives but only run a few of them most of the time.  I have to get all the others out at least a couple of times a year just to run a little bit to keep them limber.

There's so many places and things that can go wrong. I'm sure I missed something. Try all the stuff above, I know it's a lot, and report back what you find.

I don't really do a lot of "Take it apart, do something with a wire, put it back together" stuff. I'm a moron at those things. I would need to take it to someone if that was the case...

[Terry Toenges]

Track gets dirty just sitting there. If I don't run my trains for a few months, I have to clean the track or they won't make it all the way around the loops.

[trainman203]

There are different thresholds of pain for doing the work that delicate HO scale models always require. 

I will clean track and make minor adjustments for trackwork as required.  I will build Accurail kits which take a certain amount of finesse. I will make minor adjustments on locomotive mechanisms that don't require any disassembly.  But I will not do any wiring of any kind.  I pay people to do DCC and sound installations in my locomotives.  Nor will I do any paint and decal work, not so much that I don't want to but rather because I don't have a good place to do the paint work itself.

None of this changes the fact that these HO trains will always require this and that to be adjusted and fixed, they're just too small and delicate, unlike the bulletproof boilerplate indestructible Lionel trains of 70 years ago.  Man, the things we did to those trains, and they just kept right on a-chugging.

[Tenwheeler01]

It may be my imagination but I think that idle track gets dirty faster then active track.  Run trains everyday for months now issues let them set for month...have to clean everything. 

[willis]

Hi, Biggie
i am confused
you said engine ran with old module?
what does that mean ?

 you are saying you have the same DCC system that engine ran correctly with , is that correct ?