3rd Rail C&O Greenbrier electronics failure - "Fixed!"

Call them 

I was amused at this post when I saw it Henry. I also own a 3rd Rail Greenbrier and enjoy it, however, back in 2008(?) I was running mine after ten to fifteen hours of no problem running when it suddenly stopped with a train of 25 cars. All sounds stopped and the unit would not respond to TMCC commands. I sent it back to 3rd Rail and they actually replaced the engine and tender with a completely different locomotive and tender.

Fast forward to 2014; I was in the process of powering-up my second Greenbrier and saw the dreaded plume of white smoke issue forth from the tender. I opened it up to smell burnt electrical parts. I replaced them with a ERR Cruise Commander suite of electronics and the Greenbrier is still in revenue service.

I suspect that the TMCC boards Lionel was supplying to the aftermarket in the mid 2000's time frame either had some marginally spec'd components or there was a manufacturing issue with the boards. I'm not speculating that this was known by Lionel or planned by them, just that two failures in the same limited production locomotive run is suspect.

I'd say your best bet at this point is to replace your TMCC boards with ERR boards.

The TAS EOB board has been known to croak like that.  If you want a drop-in replacement, send me an email to my profile address, I still have a couple of those boards.

I want to say "Thank You!" to GRJ here, as well as the email I sent to him Monday night.

I received the replacement board Monday afternoon and installed it in the evening.  My Greenbrier is fully functional again!  I appreciate John!

Once again, proof that the Forum is the place to ask questions, get answers and in this case get the part as well!

Great People!  Great Forum!  Great Hobby!  

The traces on the EOB can't handle the current surge at slow speeds.  MIke warned of this and suggested instead of the hot wire going to the connector that it be moved and directly soldered to the full wave bridge rectifier.  Swapping out boards will fix your problem but  it will happen again if the hot wire is not moved.

sorry to say I don't have any documentation on this mod anymore GRJ Can easily follow the trace and tell you were to solder the hot wire to the rectifier is indeed that's where it burned up the last time

Thanks Gary.  That is good to know.  I will send GRJ an email to ask about that information and diagram (photo). Unless he responds here.   

This engine may get a full upgrade to PS3 or ERR when I can truly afford it. The engine was a 10th Anniversary gift from my wife back in 2007. So I plan on keeping it for a very long time!

That board could probably be repaired.  I noted that one of the TAS EOB boards I have does have the wires soldered directly to the bridge rectifiers bypassing the PCB traces.

GRJ, if I send you a picture of the bottom of the board (mounting plate removed), so that you could see the PCB trace that burned off/out, would that help?  I am all in for trying to repair it if you believe that it can be repaired. 

Learning is part of the fun! 

Thanks.

Don't try to remove the bottom plate, it's a real PITA to get it back on without taking all the triacs out!  Look carefully, the triacs screws go in from the top.  Gonna' be hard to get a screwdriver into those with the PCB in the way.

You can simple reach in and cut away the peeling trace and run the wire on the topside from the bridge rectifier connection over to the socket position.  Since you're not going to use that socket anyway, I'd simply remove it.