You gotta be kidding me !!!! This just aint right !!!! Shessssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhhhhh !!! Took the trucks completely apart. This is like running 90 weight gear oil in a power steering unit !!! :angry:
Believe me...I'm trying my best to give this FVM locomotive the benifit of the doubt. I really want this thing to be the best locomotive in my fleet. But..... I have a 4 axle Atlas GP40 that will easily pull the same 12 cars up the same grade !!!.
George, Stubby a fellow model railroader and good friend has three of these FVM units. When he first bought them he brought them over to my layout. We put them on the track and "Believe it or not" they ran smoother then anything I have. Out pulling everything I own by 5 to 6 + cars. On my layout the rule of thumb is one locomotive must pull ten freight or passenger cars up my 2% grades. The FVM's out pulled anything and everything I've got. The alcohol issue. Geez and to think we are having this discussion again. Do your own experiment. Take a perfectly clean piece of glass and dot some alcohol on the surface. Allow to dry. Now with a clean cloth remove the residual. Did you find any residual? What you found was the detergents left by cleaners in both the rag and on the glass. The same would be true when cleaning track. I have to use a dry cleaning pad behind the one I use for the alcohol application. Used to break up the oily residual left on the track (or a better word for it "Environmental Build Up" as used in professional contract cleaning circles) from having lubed and oiled my locomotives. Alcohol, does not leave a residual. Now back to the FVM locomotive. George did you buy this used, was it given to you (I know I didn't send you one) is it new, out of the LHS with no known previous owners? Not that your answer will solve the problem. Guessing, you have a problem with the tabs that feed current to the motor from the decoder or light bar. This may require stabilizing the motor so it doesn't move or rock back and forth. A piece of very thin styrene may do the trick. Bend those taps back in so they touch the motor and see what that does for you. Also, check the electrical contacts from the wheels to the trucks and one up and into the chassis to the decoder. Any break in electrical contacts at any of these points will spell a dead engine on line. If you've already tried that and still have the problem...I'ma stumped. Just clean that goo out of the truck and this tells me it may have been in inexperienced hands at one time or another.
Rick....Brand new mech sent from Matt himself. :-( I'm reading of guys that pull 24 cars with the same single locomotive !! Maybe its just not meant to be for me to have one that runs good :-(
Realroaders (I coined that for the 1:1 scale) I believe get a running start toward a steep climb. Maybe this was only in steam era..But with my steam I do this alot.. get rolling faster and faster on level and hit the hill. But only to about 75 mph..on too toyish. If no go then double head locos or 'double the hill' (split train and pull half up ,then back for 2nd half... ..I'm in HO and I don't know what FVM is yet..
BTW....for all to know... I checked the wheel gauge on the locomotive and all the cars and the track gauge too...all good. I cleaned or replace all wheelsets on all the cars to metal. They ALL will roll down the grade on there own just fine. Locomotive will pull 10 cars just fine. Just not 12 :-( Even more frustrating when everyone else can pull the paint off the wall with just ONE of these...:crying:
NO, No, no. This is a FVM, with one of the best reputations for performance out there. My opinion of course but I ain't kidding. Stubby's came new in the box...allegedly, but after a brief exam I found they had been used. Sorry, I'ma not closer. I'd already be on way over to look at it. Give it a good overall exam. If you are unable to fix it as in make the needed adjustment's. I would suggest contacting Matt to see if he can repair it or make you a trade. Got's to remember he wants to maintain his positive reputation. Can't believe you are having such difficulties. Best to you!
Yea...Matts been good about this. Its the THIRD one I got. The first two had major brush cap issues. He sent this one and even offered to pay return postage on the old mech ! A standup guy for sure ^5. This one ran fine for a few weeks. Then it musta saw it was me running it and said "To heck with that !!!" ...LOL
Again, NO<NO<NO. They are called "Rails" and have been way before you were born and will be after we are both gone. LOL Oh hell, coin any phrase you want. I like it. We got's to have some fun...right?
George and all, I am not throwing rocks, just trying to give George some ideas. I rcv'd a new FVM ES in the Ferromex paint scheme with the ten year anniversary paint scheme about ten days ago. I got it from one of TB's e-tailer advertisers and reputable shop. No chance the loco was used before I got it. The only chance would be that the e-tailer rcv'd it from a supplier in a used condition. I put a decoder in it and the thing would not run, period. I took it apart, and yes I broke the rear end light tube in the disassembly process. What I found was that, first off, there was enough white grease on the gear towers of the trucks and the worm, basically any moving part. I think there was enough to grease ten or more units. Absolutely ridiculuos. See the picture George posted. Also when I inserted the decoder the units light board moved forward approx 1/16 - 1/8 inches. What I found after disassembly was that the brush caps are very loose and that the brush tabs were bent like a piece of spaghetti and not making contact with the decoder tabs. So I soldered short piecse of wire from motor tab to decoder tab in order to insure contact. It does run but I have not had a chance to test on a layout. I shall see. I want to say that Matt has been more than fair with me regarding problems with the first GEVO (would not stay on the track). Having said that though, I am not sure the QC is up to par for Matt and his Company. I understand that he is a one man operation but perhaps he needs some help. I have purcahsed three of his GEVOs and not one of them performed, out of the box, as does a KATO. I don't know about Atlas as I have not purchased one in several years. George, you may want to check the motor brush caps and tabs if you have not already done so. Carl
Thnxs Carl.... Sorta had the same thing going with the first two I bought...brushcap problems. I wasnt sure I had any hope of getting things sorted out. Like I said...Matt did more then I expected to rectify the problem. This new mech...the motor runs fine...its the wheels that slip/spin on the rails. :-( I really like the looks of this thing too...$&^$(^&%$_)(%^%# dang it !!!! :-(
Most of the "problems" mentioned here have nothing to do with Georges problem. Motors heating up do not cause traction loss, faulty electrical connections may cause a stall on grade that the loco can't recover from but won't cause a smooth running loco to start spinning it's wheels. I think many are over thinking the problem. Seeing the amount of grease in the trucks is surprising because my early run KCS loco didn't have hardly any lube in it. That was the first thing I did was lube all the gears and bearings. Now that I see that picture, my guess is the grease in the trucks is migrating out of the belly of the truck, onto the wheels. It takes 7-8 laps of the layout for the moving gears in the trucks to distribute the grease out to the wheels. Clean out those trucks and see what happens. While you are at it, bend a little extra tension on the pickup leaf springs. That may help give you some more float in the trucks and keep more wheels on the ground on uneven tracks.
Thnxs Tony....did all that and put it back on the track with the cars hooked on. It went around the turntable end...started up the grade...and yup...sat there and spun its wheels...again !! I shut everything down and closed up THE RV !!! Was mad enough to chew barbedwire and spit nails !!! Now I am sitting here going through it all in my head and realized>> After cleaning the trucks and the locomotive...I hadnt cleaned the track again before running it the last time...DOhhhh !!!!! Tomorrow I'll clean the track and the locomotive wheels and give it all one last go.
Well forgive me for not reading all the way through the thread. Or not! Hurrumph! Wheels spinning? Now I know why the alcohol discussion. Ironically, I have used WD 40 to loosen up a very old mechanism and get it running again. Yep, until it dissipates and dries out completely it can cause slippage. I think something similar has happened to your locomotive wheels and from the looks of it I would guess we know where the grease is coming from. SO, that means Tony and I agree on something. We did what? Grin! Oh, you need to know I do not recommend using WD40 except in very extreme cases. I mean as in died, sitting on dead line waiting the torch. I do recommend denatured alcohol. I have several model railroad friendss that use the DA to clean out old mechanism's with a relative high score of success. Just a thought! This is going to be tough to clean. Patience, my friend, patience. And, when I asked the Great Spirit for such, I noted that NOW...would be good.:sweat: Sigh!
Ok...THE Wife and I went back and looked at that picture of the truck one more time...before bed time. We where discussing how disgusting it looks. She happens to ask me why the wheels look weird. I ask her what she meant by 'weird'. She says they look like they are two different colors. I look again and dabnabit...it looks like all the wheel spinning has taken the silverish coating off the wheels ! Is it possible that whatever the base metal these wheels are made of just isnt playing well with whatever the metal of the rails are made of...as far as traction goes ? Yea...I may be grasping at straws...I'm getting to old for this...ARGgghhhhhhhhh !! I'm going to bed. My head hurts...:headspin:
If Alcohol doesn't leave a residual then explain why when used on a HO slot car track with electronic timing, the lap times dropped considerable when Alcohol was used to clean the track? When we switched to a better product the lap times got better.
Denatured alcohol does not leave a residue! I use it for cleaning lexan RC car bodies before painting and have for years. We also use it for cleaning the mold release from RC car tires and wheels before gluing them up. It's a must have item in both my RC and train tools. In your slot car example, the alcohol was probably pulling the oils out of the plastic track and drying it out, making it slippery. Have you ever noticed that new track is faster than old track? As track ages and the oils dry out, the track slows. Oil of wintergreen is often used as a traction compound to help replace the oils in the tires. Oils help traction in a slot car, they soften the surface area of the tires and the track.
