Anton Stedman Posted June 3, 2020 Share Posted June 3, 2020 Hello, sorry this subject has probably come up before but I have a locomotive from the Somerset Belle DCC set. It has been working fairly well for a few years. Recently it has accumaleted quite a lot of dust so i decided to undo the casing and clean off the dust from the pickups, etc. I also lubricated it with a new Gaugemaster GM619 Lubricator which I found worked very well on another loco..However when I put the Loco back together I found it is very jerky when running forward but not backwards. Could this be a quatering issue? It looks alright to me but I am no expert. I also tried it with a 9v battery as well as with my Select and the same issue happened: Fine backwards but jerky forwards. Could this be an electrical issue? .I have a Select 1.5v and Railmaster with Elink.Thanks in advance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
STG Posted June 4, 2020 Share Posted June 4, 2020 It's unlikely to be an electrical issue (although potentially possible)- many issues with DCC decoders will not necessarily happen on analog (battery in your case).In my dmus to sort out poor running, I normally disconnect the motor and test that all the gears and wheels rotate freely, although this may ba harder to do given the locomotive in question will probably not just require a screw unscrewed to separate the bogie like my dmusI have little experience with steam and the only loco on my layout that had quartering issues had many other issues and promptly broke, although I can say that when it did have quartering issues, it did run worse in one direction than the other Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rog RJ Posted June 4, 2020 Share Posted June 4, 2020 It could be the pickups not contacting the wheels properly or dirt on the wheel backs ( I'm assuming it has pickups that contact the wheel backs) or the gears need a bit of running in to get them working smoothly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
96RAF Posted June 4, 2020 Share Posted June 4, 2020 Tip it upside down and watch the pickups as you apply a 9v battery to the wheels. Are they distorting in one direction and not the other. Is one catching on the wheel spokes.Is the motor fully secure. If loose it could be torqueing out of mesh with the gears one direction but winding into mesh in the other direction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Anton Stedman Posted June 5, 2020 Author Share Posted June 5, 2020 @STGHello, thanks for the reply 😀Whilst I waited for a reply I did do a Decoder reset which made no difference. The loco is fairly simple to unassemble and the locomotive shell basically just unclips. Also there are 3 screws holding the wheels in so very easy to take apart. It is a railroad hornby product so that may be why..I have tried your idea of taking it apart completely. I found that when I disconnected all the gears and wheels that the motor runs fine. Also I found one or two bits of dirt around the 'worm' that looked a bit like tiny pieces of ballast! After removing these and replacing everything and testing it step by step it seems to be better now. But I think the ballast/dirt must have been there for a while and then moved when I first took it apart because the minute I tested it after the lubrication and cleaning, it was running badly.Also thanks to everyone else's replies. It might easily happen again so I will refer back to this if it does. 😀 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Please sign in to comment
You will be able to leave a comment after signing in
Sign In Now