I have 3 n-scale RS-3's. The ran great for about the first 3 hours. Now they make a grinding noise. I have disassembled them at least twice each and they run okay for about 30 minutes and then start making the loud noise again. I have been on the phone with Atlas and I even sent one in for repair, but so far the problem persists. Does anyone have a solution?
Can you post a video? It might have pice up a small piece of ballast in the motor or gears. Could be gear noise. Have you tried to Beardenize them ( ie remove inner bearing blocks closest to the flywheels)?
You may want to disassemble the mechnism, take a photo before removing anything, and examine the inner areas of the two halves for any signs of rubbing. As the mechanism runs it tends to heat up and some expansion occurs plus there is a little run in run out on the drive shafts. The area the flywheels are in should have enough room the accomodate that happening. While everything is apart time to apply a little LaBelles oil sparingly to all the areas. I have had one and only one that I had to take a Dremel to the area mentioned to smooth out some rough areas where the flywheels rotated.
WCRR, In your OP, you mention having sent one to Atlas for repair, and later say "but the problem still persists"- but I am a little unclear- have they returned that particular locomotive and it still has a problem? Did it run OK for a while and then fail again, or did it run rough right out of the box? Any note from Atlas on what they fixed? Also (sorry for all the questions, but I have many Atlas locos and have never encountered the sort of problem you are experiencing)- were all 3 locos purchased from the same vendor at the same time, or are they from several sources? And are they recent Atlas production, or "new old stock" that might have been on the shelf for a while before you bought them?
I'd remove the motor and run it independently. One of my N Scale Atlas C-628 motors makes an intermittent noise which some might call "grinding", though to my ears, it's a squeal. I've tried a drip of oil on the bearing surfaces to no avail; it will not be deterred.
I do not have the Atlas RS-3, but I ran into an issue when I disassembled one of my MP15DC's to clean and lubricate it. When I re-assembled the locomotive and ran it, it ran worse than before cleaning. Upon careful examination, I found I had placed the two drive shaft end bearings in backwards. The drive shaft was no longer level, causing binding and excess noise. Flipping the two end bearings solved my problem. I don't know if this could be your problem? Something else I found, the exposed axle gears on the trucks should not be on the same side of the locomotive. My locomotive seemed to preform a little better when the truck under the cab had the exposed gears on the fireman side of the locomotive and the other truck had it's exposed gears on the engineer's side of the locomotive. Again, just throwing out ideas, none of these may fix your issue, but one may help?
One piece of information is missing and that is whether this is an early Atlas/Kato RS-3 or the later version which has the flywheels.
