Well...................it works now, and I'm really not sure why ! First, I had the 308 error again, when it was running fine when I turned the system off a few hours before (without the lights though) I removed the fuel tank, and I could read the decoder....Apparently, the way the fuel tank + shell is reinstalled is giving some issues Anyway, when I was able to properly read the decoder (with fuel tank and shell on), I took a look at the Function mapping tab in decoder pro I just read the values, and wrote again the value from the sheet (without changing anything)....And all of the sudden, the lights are functioning again Weird, very weird......!!!!
Hmmm....are the frames halves possibly intermittently touching each other in the fuel tank area with everything installed? I've seen this with some other brand locos, but not Atlas. Are these particular locos from older LL tooling?
I will have to check: maybe take it apart (I'm becoming an expert at this) and put some Kapton tape, who knows I don't think it's an old version manufactured with old LL tooling though....!
I had a brand new SD60 (1 of 2) make the same squealing noise. Problem : The loco would operate OK in reverse. Then changing to forwards it would be ok at very low speed without any cars attached. As speed increased or attaching 3 Microtrains cars the noise would start and the loco would noticeably slow. What I found : Inside the flywheels there is a hexagonal hole where the drive shafts attach. The drive shafts have a hexagonal end which fits inside the flywheel ------------ by an extremely short amount. As the motor starts to turn the worm gears first pull themselves along the gear on the bogie for a very short distance. The end play in the motor also allows the the motor shaft and the flywheels to move until that short amount of play is also taken up. The lengths in the drive shafts are not consistent. I pulled 3 SD60's apart and found total length of the drive shafts varied by .040". The result: When the loco moves in a particular direction the motor & flywheels engage slightly better with one drive shaft and slightly worse with the other. My noisy loco was just unfortunate to have 2 of the slightly shorter drive shafts installed. The drive was actually disengaging from one flywheel and drive shaft. The Fix (It's not too bad either) : At the end of the drive shafts there are teflon washers between the outer bearing block and the worm gear. Place more teflon washers between the bearing blocks and the worm gears at both ends. I could add 2 to each end of mine, making a total of 3 washers each. It will make installing the worm gears a little harder and if you can't assemble it there is probably too many. The motor / drive shaft assembly still needs to be able to turn freely. The teflon washers are available from Atlas as a spare part, I happened to have some from a dead loco I purchased earlier
Those flywheels are not massive enough nor do they spin rapidly enough to require "Balancing" so what those blue things are doing there is anybody's guess. Also, I have never seen a flywheel with that groove machined around the axis, that has got to be "Aftermarket".
If the groove had been filled with something like lead, or tungsten or depleted uranium or osmium then I might see the point of it.
They do balance the motor /(flywheels) I believe I saw them do it in the ScaleTrains video and I believe it was even blue around the 21 minute mark https://youtube.com/watch?v=WoxtnAYGwrc
Yes, they are doing it at the factory. And actually, there IS enough flywheel speed at higher locomotive speeds to require balancing for smoothest operation. How many of us have had locos that perform satisfactorily at slow speeds but buzz or vibrate at higher speeds? I know I have. And, regardless of speed or the presence of flywheels, a balanced spinning assembly is ALWAYS desirable compared to an unbalanced assembly. Less force required to overcome the unequal weights leaves more for smooth rotation, even at very slow speeds. Doug
