Frustrating, because the loco has very little run time. What are my options? I'm much more familiar with Kato mechanisms--will a Kato F unit drive fit easily into this shell? I guess i will check with intermountain and see if they will swap the motor out for me and the cost. I usually try to fix everything myself, but I've not messed with this mechanism before. I'd be very tempted to install the Kato mechanism into this shell if it will fit.. Jeff C
I have never had to replace an IM motor, but have replaced several bad Kato motors with broken wires!
I probably will contact them. The funny thing is that I just ordered an IM F7b this morning to go with my Wabash F7a. I have had to replace bad Kato motors, but generally I've had good luck with Kato and Atlas drives. I've also had good luck repairing them when they need work, which is why I'm wondering about swapping out the mechanism. If Kato made a Wabash F7 I'd buy one in a second, but they don't, so IM is the only option. I've painted a Kato engine in the Wabash blue scheme, but the blue, white and gray scheme is a bit intimidating for me right now. Jeff C
Jeff, Nobody answered your question, so let me tell you yes you can put KATO motor and drive shafts in the IM mechanism. I am completing that very mod on two of their F-3's from a purchase I made last summer. I will not go into any details regarding why I am doing this mod. It is not a drop in situation by any stretch of the imagination. First off, all you can get from KATO parts are for their DCC ready mechanisms. Their flywheels are a larger diameter than what IM uses, so I had to mill out the frames, a tad, so the flywheels would not rub on the frame halves. Dremel handled that rather easily. The IM drive shafts will not fit into the KATO flywheels, so I bought Kato drive shafts and used them. Other than that, it is fairly straight forward. I have not completed this because, to the credit of IM, they sent me two brand new mechanisms that did not have the problem I had experienced with my original purchased units. Carl
He didn't ask if he could put a Kato motor in the IM mechanism. He asked if he could use a complete Kato mechanism with the IM shell. That's something I don't know and would never want to do. When I do a motor swap I do it the easy way, I just pull the flywheels off the Kato motor install them on a Scale Speed Atlas Motor. This way you can use all the original loco's parts.
And he didn't ask about a Scale Speed Atlas Motors either. I'd just contact Intermountain. They have been very good to me over the years and I've heard of others who have had good dealing with them as well. They might just tell you to send the chassis to them and they will more than likely replace it or fix it. I had a buddy who bought a used Amtrak set of F7's off the bay that turned out to be trashed. We contacted them about acquiring some repair parts and they said to just send them back to them. They wound up giving him two new chassis and shipped them back for free! They are a good company to deal with.
Really! The OP also didn't ask about a Kato motor. The post was to let people know you can remove flywheels from a motor and install them on the replacement even if it is a different brand of motor, making the swap very easy!
Jeff C., I must apologize to you for not reading your original post that well and mucking up your thread. However, my post confirmed my perception of another posters personality. Carl
No, problem, everybody. I think I will contact IM on Tuesday--I've been too busy this week. I just purchased a IM Wabash B-unit to go with my F7a and my late scheme Kato F7 I'd previously painted. Hopefully this motor failure was nothing more than an anomaly. Jeff C
jeff, That is the best thing to do. As I said earlier, IM just came through for me on two units I purchased last June. It took nearly a year but hey they did the right thing. I would be curious to know what the mechanism you have looks like inside. The two I had that were screwed up were so full of white grease, it was on the gear towers, the worm and bearings and yes it had even found its way to the motor windings and commutator. Looked like someone used an automobile grease gun on it. I soaked the entire mechanism, including motor, in 90% alky for a few hours and then cleaned it up. Ran fairly well but not as it should. I was happy with IM on their settlement. Carl
I'm just sort of curious... only because I may not have a real idea of what a motor failure might entail... I've had motor failures which involved cogging due to a broken magnet... but it sort of ran. I've had motor failure due to a bad contact with the commutator... which is the only one brand new from the manufacturer which would not run at all. That fix was easy... Are you telling me that you can get models that DON'T run at all... or are just not performing as expected?
Kind of weird answering my own post here... but... I was wondering if there are levels of motor failure I'm not recognizing in my vast array of locomotives. Jeff C (Leikec) didn't describe the nature of his motor failure as completely dead... or... running too slow... or cogging... etc. I have locomotives from all manufacturers which perform at different levels within the same run of a particular manufacturers model. I have Kato F7's which came in the same batch which run at various speeds... some much faster others much slower. Same with Atlas, Intermountain and Bachmann. Most of this I attribute to a need to break-in or perhaps adjust something that is binding on the slower running models. I have hundreds of locomotives and it is a rare day when one doesn't run right out of the box. That said... as I mentioned before... some don't run as well as their 'same run' brethren. I'm not sure if that qualifies as a possible 'motor failure' issue. A little better info on the term 'motor failure'... versus... maintenance/break-in would be nice to know. For all I know... I've got a bunch of 'duds' in their jewel cases which should have been returned to the manufacturer for repair a long time ago.
My idea of motor failure would mean it stopped running, altogether and can never again operate; or it turns but not as designed, such that the unit it should power cannot be used for it's intended purpose.
My idea of a motor failure is the old classic smell of burning wire or plastic, and an ozone smell in the air. That and the attempt to imitate an Alco product or a steamer. All the other failures have always been attributed to a broken contact or solder joint, and a few rare cases the motor brushes failing by either disintegrating, or the spring putting tension on the brush giving up the ghost.
I finally had a motor to fail in one of my IM F units earlier this year. Contacted IM via email and they promptly sent me a replacement. It was waaaay out of warranty so it cost me ten bucks plus shipping,seriously everyone else wants four bucks just for bushings and they replaced the entire motor for ten. Cant say enough about their customer service. BTW this a really easy swap.
I had a bizarre from Kato, one was a warranty replacement the other was sort of weird. The warranty replacement was to a motor that had a short in one of the poles. The old lerch-stop action. The weird one was a non runner. So I decided to pull the motor and tinker figuring I had nothing to lose. It too was new and under warranty, but curiosity got the better of me, and I am glad it did. When I took off the brush caps, and pulled out the brushes, I found the problem. There was a small piece of paper the kept the bruss from making contact. I pulled out the paper and re-assembled the motor. Installed it back into the locomotive. Now it has been running flawlessly for the last 4 years. I still can't figure out how that piece of paper got in there....... With the volume of locomotives I see, whether it is for my collection or for layouts my friends and I build for charity, I have seen all sorts of weird things like this. The funniest one was an Atlas locomotive with a Golden LED on one end of the light board and a bright white on the other. Another easy fix......
