James - help needed

[Kevin-375451]

Hi all,

I've bought a second hand James. Its my sons birthday present and it isn't running.

So the first thing I checked was the tender join. Gave it a clean, noticed that someone had opened the pins up so sorted that... No look

Used contact cleaner on the wheels and brushes. Found some of brushs not behind the wheel so moved them back.. (but should they be in front? Goes a little bit

What I don't understand in the main part of James the cabling shorts the two track lines.. And on the tender both + /- are on the pin... Surely this is not right?? But looking at the service guide it is

Any advice

[96RAF]

Is it the early James with the ringfield motor in the tender or the later one with the double ended can motor inside a bogie drive casing.

The service sheet for the early model 282 shows the powered drawbar which uses the pin and springy fingers, how this works is shown in my loco drive image below. The later model service sheet 423 shows a solid drawbar but does not give any details of how the loco wiring is passed to the tender, but both have pickups so there must be a plug/socket or similar.

[Kevin-375451]

Thanks for information. It's the older and when looking at it the fingers are damaged. Can I still get this part?

Im am correct that the tender/motor should runs without the front carriage connected as it getting power from the wheels?

[Going Spare]

It they are still intact, it may be possible to reshape the drawbar fingers. If you do need to replace the drawbar assembly, Hornby no longer offer it (X8432) and I doubt you will find it available from any of the major parts suppliers. There are a couple of rather expensive used examples on ebay. I would check with the likes of Lendons of Cardiff, New Modellers Shop or Peters Spares regarding the suitability of other, very similar, drawbars of the same design but intended for other locos, which are still available.

As the tender has its own pick-ups, it will run on its own but not consistently as two of the pick-up wheels have rubber traction tyres so electrical contact will be dependant upon the wheel flanges contacting the side of the rail head.

[96RAF]

Although the exact X8432 spare is out of stock …

… you could try this one also out of stock here as it has the same spring along the drawbar same as James.

Failing that you could revert to an unsprung live drawbar or even a dead drawbar and wire loco to tender thru’ a 2-pin plug and socket.

[Going Spare]

Better, if possible, to use a Chinese dual-feed drawbar because the X1499 is a single-polarity feed from the chassis block to the tender rather than from the loco driving wheel pick-ups and, this James having a Chinese chassis, none of the driving wheels are live to the chassis. So the pick-up wire from the driving wheels on the same side of the loco as the tyred tender wheels would need to be terminated on the loco chassis block or the drawbar and the other-side pick-up wire insulated. The tender wiring may also need to be altered if the pin connection (rather than the plate connection) is not linked to the tyred wheels pick-ups, to avoid a short circuit.

[Kevin-375451]

Thankyou for everyone help. I've got James going. I managed to reshape the drawbar so James will be working for Christmas.

I live in new Zealand so will have to a wait a while to get a replacement part.

Thank you everyone