Flying Scotsman with TTS issues

[Paramedic67]

I'm on my third Hornby Flying Scotsman railroad edition loco. Without being long winded, I'm ready to throw it in the bin. I have a lord nelson which runs like butter. Yet the FS has a noisy motor, and would stop for no apparent reason, front bogies would lift.  
Anyway, my current issue is, when I run the loco with one Pullman coach, I've finally got it to work, however connect two coaches and it will stop unexpectefly, and cause the front bogies to derail. Any final ideas before I give up. 

[ColinB]

Your railroad edition I doubt has tender pickups. If you are a bit mechanically minded you can add them, I bought the tender base from the non railroad version (you need this just to get the tender pickups) and then fitted the tender pickups to the tender (you cannot use the non railrod tender bottom, as the tender body won't fit). You might need to add a connector to connect the tender pickups to the loco ones (some FS locos already have the connector).The next thing to do is put a better spring under the screw of the front bogie. What I did with this, is buy a pony truck spring from an old Hornby loco (new ones don't have moveable pony trucks) and cut it down to fit under the screw that holds on the front bogie. It is a bit of trial and error, too much spring and it will lift the driving wheels off the track. Do these fixes and it should work wonderfully. It seems all the Railroad A1 locos have these issues, I have Tornedo and another one that I had to do the fix to.

[Paramedic67]

Yjour right, it doesn't have tender pick ups. But interestingly you mention a spring under the front bogies of the FS. On mine, the front bogies is connected by a thin bar, secured into the loco body by a small screw. I couldn't locate any spring as such. are you referring to the pin the bogie turns on?

[ColinB]

Right I have just checked on my two one is a Railroad A1 loco version the other is the blue non Railroad Flying Scotsman. If it is the same as mine the front bogie, moves in a slot. On my non Railroad Flying Scotsman there is a light spring between the bogie and the slot it moves in, on the Railroad version of another A1 it is the same. On the Railroad version I cannot remember if it had a spring and I replaced it for a stronger one, or just added the spring. Either way that is where you add it. So if it has a spring, get a slighly stiffer one, if it doesn't then add one.

[Paramedic67]

On mine attached to the bogie is a pin which secured the bogie to slot for the bogie to move side to side etc.  this is attached to the flat metal coupling, which then is attached to the loco.  So where exactly are you saying I should place a spring. I'm reading it, to be placed underneath the pin, connecting to the slider slot. 

[ColinB]

Between the bogie and the slot that allows it to move from side to side. There is a screw whose head is on the underside of the bogie and whose nut is behind the slot. Well it is on all my ones. The idea is to put pressure on the bogie.

[96RAF]

To help run the spring smoothly across the bogie arm slot you can use a thin washer of a suitable diameter. This can be metal or plastic. If you don’t have a spring rob one from an old biro, but you may have to trim it to a suitable length that biases the bogie but does not lift the front drivers off track or you lose traction to add to your tale of woe. Whilst looking at that make sure the tender isn’t tipping the loco either.

[Paramedic67]

Thankyou all, I will look at these suggestions this evening 

[96RAF]

See this for the general idea...

 

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[Paramedic67]

So, I added a spring from a pen, the spring is about 1-2 mm approx, also added a washer, and hey presto, so far so good. No stopping unexpectedly and no derailing. There was no spring originally, so why has this fixed it potentially. If it's an issue, why doesn't hornby include a spring originally. 

[ColinB]

@Paramedic67 I used to work in engineering for a major car company, we used to do stupid things to save pennies. I can only assume when Hornby designed it, they found on their prototype there was no need. If you watch Sam's Trains on YouTube you will be amazed at the amount of trains he tests that derail and some of them are really expensive. He puts it down to them having a perfectly flat layout.

[Paramedic67]

I'm so grateful, as I was tearing my hair out. I'll keep you updated. 

[96RAF]

Hornby has two test layouts, the scenery dressed one you see in the adverts and a simple flat board sitting on kitchen cabinets in the workshop alongside the Scalextric test track. The board mounts a replica of the Hornby track geometry diagram with a couple of extra track runs. The whole thing is fed from a control panel that allows switching of any of their controllers into circuit from DC to DCC. A single power connector is used along with point clips and yes Colin it is flat. Maybe they need a Belgian Pave section like the car test track at Millbrook to prove their front bogie handling.

[Paramedic67]

That simple spring has transformed it instantly. The previous two I returned probably needed the same fix. I do need to source better washer though. The motor whir's a bit noisily but I've checked everything, as the motor is sealed, I can't do much.  Is there anywhere here, I can post a video. 

[Chrissaf]

Is there anywhere here, I can post a video.

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Video's are not natively supported on this forum. You can upload a video to YouTube, then post a link to it.