I have read here that some people use their worst engine for testing their track for good power supply.

My 3080 is mine and it runs very erratically . You can even see sparks coming from the rear wheel on occasions. It suggests to me that the wheels are not properly conducting current to the motor. Has any one else had an engine with that problem. There doesn't appear to be anything obviously wrong except it is rather warn. Your can see the idler gear between the 2 front wheels wobbling around. Brushes appear to be ok.

Dereck

Hi Peter, mine has what appear to be good tyres on it. One would think the other 4 wheels would make enough contact. I haven't fully looked at the problem yet because i cant see an obvious fault. The engine has always done this even though the tracks have been cleaned. And after all, it is only a test loco. I might fasten an earth wire to it and hard wire it to the circuit somewhere to see if that cures the problem. [ 24 hours absence from the railway sometimes does allow inspiration. ]

Dereck

Must have been the rum.. Gee I would have thought that it was still too cold down there for sailing..

Kiwi , thanks for that. I have a lathe and have made oversize axles for locos before. Something to think about and work on later. {i have to do it now jut to prove we were right ]

Adrian. No not too cold. But remember, cold air is more dense, hence more power. I had to have my sailing jacket on though to stop the wind chill. An interesting day, as we broke the kicker just before the start of the race and had to quickly jemmy up the original rope system in time for the race.

Dereck

Pulled it apart last night. The rubber tyred axle measured 96 thou and the other 2 measured 98 thou. Bored out the front and rear bushes to 106 thou and the middle one to 103 thou,. That could mean that when I make new axles, the gears might be 3- 6 thou closer together so that wont cause a problem with the wear that is there.. Easier to make and fit new axles than to buy, bore and fit new bushes. It is time consuming though and not worth doing if you have to pay someone to do it. Just another side to my hobby. My bushes didn't look anywhere as bad as the bushes in the picture above.
Dereck

ps Why 2 sizes?? Well, if I stuff up one and go too far , Ii can make it to fit the smaller bush { hopefully } . [ I am only an amateur machinist ]

Hi Dereck,

You can set up your DHG with "Trickschaltung." For this, you have to unsolder the bulbs and resolder them to 2 contacts on the reverse unit that you can see below:



If the front bulb lights up in reverse, simply change the connections over.

Since the 3080 is really the same as the 3078, you could probably use the lighting parts from the 3078.

The 3001 actually has directional lighting as factory fitted, and, if I remember correctly, the 3039 E10 also had directional lighting in the first version.

This link has some diagrams about how to use LEDs: http://www.stummiforum.de/viewtopic.php?t=108179