ShaneGoesArd

I was gifted it by a workmate, who's father had bought it for his son, but he had never used it as his son was never interested.

Hi all, I was given a Thomas Hornby set for my son a year ago, I set it up once, but it was too big, and too delicate for him to play with, so stuck it back in the box on top of a wardrobe for later. The other day he spotted it and asked to play with it. He's mental about trains, especially Thomas, so I got it down and assembled it. All was well, and he was having fun watching the train go round the track, adjusting the speed, making it go backwards, etc. But then disaster struck, the loco stopped working and started smoking. I thought maybe it's just over heated, or the motors burnt out. Tried again today and no luck, it runs for maybe 2 seconds then cuts out, and you can smell electrical burning. He's in bits as he really wanted to play with it. Which brings me to why I'm here, does anyone know what could be the cause of it? could it be the motor? I heard that they have a life of 100 hours and as far as I'm aware, the set had never been used, other than the 10-15 minutes we used it. One thing to add, in his excitement he dribbled on the track, could this have an effect? I have no experience with Hornby products prior to this, so I'm a fish out of water here. The set is the basic starter pack, 1 x Thomas loco, 2 x Carriages, 1 x Circular track, Transformer & Controller.