New American won't run

[LastManOut]

I bought a new 8 wheeler <30 days ago.  It ran fine then.  I disassembled it, and painted and detailed it, reassembled it and it worked fine.  A second tear down to glue some broken pieces and back on.  It ran okay, but would seem to drag then pull again. Now it will not work at all.

The track is clean.  I lubed it per owner's manual after the first 15 minutes of testing it out of the box.  Testing with power lead directly to the drivers produces nothing.

An inspection under the cover between the drivers the only thing out of order was an extra cover screw stuck to the motor.

Anyone have any suggestions?

[Loco Bill Canelos]

I'm not sure but these may have a noise supression circuit attached to the motor.  I know my mogul did.  Turned out that when I derailed the engine, I blew out the board.  Others had symtoms similar to yours.   I tested the unit by bypassing the circuit board and the motor ran fine. I carefully removed the noise supression board and connecte the leads directly to the motor leads.  This worked perfectly and the loco has run perfectly ever since and that was four years ago.

See if there is a round printed circuit board over the motor on your unit, if so test by bypasssing it. If the motor works the board is fried.  The board is for noise supression to satisfy the FCC and has no other use.

Again It has been many years since I have seen the inside of a 4-4-0, so, I am not sure if it has this board, but it is worth checking. 

[Old John]

Jon D. Miller had a string 6 - 8 months ago addressing how the circuit board on his 4-4-0 was fried and had pictures showing how he removed the board and rewired every, try that thread or E-mail Jon directly, He was a great help to me with this......

[Jon D. Miller]

Here's the link, with pictures, that explains the noise suppresion PCB and its removal.

http://www.grblogs.com/index.php/2007/11/01/fried-bachmann-pcb?blog=4#more238

One of the "Enthusiastic Children"

JD

[LastManOut]

My fix was to remove the circuit boards and wire in new incandescent lights including a cab light.  I runs fine now but using track voltage for the lights may not have been the best way to power them.

I did call Bachman Customer Service back in March for a better "Service Manual/Owner's Manual" with wiring diagrams, parts list with screw sizes, etc and a few replacement parts for missing and broken doo-dads.  I am still waiting for a response or my shipment to arrive.  All must be on that slow boat.