I joined this forum in order to learn [see my recent posting on the technical side of our hobby and my latest adventures with a DCRU-WD installation ], anyway, since I found the forum because I was using the Google search engine and looking for help [and which I received!] on my O-gauge trains, it occurred to me that other folks are doing the same thing on the search-engines and this is how they learn from others "in the know" who share their experience and expertise. So while I duly admit to getting "wordy" and hardly making any revelations to seasoned pros in this O-gauge dedicated forum. I have the search-engine person in mind who seeks answers and by pure chance arrives here. Or, conversely, the avid train hobbyist who may love O-gauge model trains [or returning to them after some years] but who on the "technical" side of the hobby are, shall we say, woefully deficient. Like me! I'm now 4 months away from the Big-Big-Big [figuring that 50 is the Big 50 and so 60 is Big-Big and therefore ==70== has to be Big-Big-Big 70!] and I am still learning as I go since trains have changed/evolved so much ==technically== since my first Santa Fe 2343's ABA set in '53! So too tho', even the post war stuff has its many tips and tricks.
Case in point where me, as the amateur tinkerer, was able to come to the rescue: A friend of mine buys a boat-anchor in weight O gauge Pennsylvania GG from Ebay. Gives me a call and says, "I knew it was too good [** in price] to be true." He then says, "It arrived today and I practically ran to my "new track" [remember that one --- "new track"], hooked it up quickly [** remember the word "quickly"] and the thing is dying on me! The GG just creeps along ... the track is 110% sound ... I checked it thoroughly track by track ... and I'm using my faithful 275 watt ZW which can move virtually anything ... the GG has to be defective ... ****! Maybe I can use it as a door stop [!] or a permanent static fixture on the train wall. I moved too fast on that one and the guy had said "no returns" and maybe that's why I got such a great deal although he did say it ran!" I listened for the "buzzwords" in his phone recitation like "new track" and "quickly" and "it ran" so I say/ask, "Bill, let's do this by the numbers, what did you do 'exactly' when that GG arrived?" and he relates the events how he went to his "new track" and "quickly" placed the GG on this "new track" and how the GG hardly moved and just creeped along. Bill said he knew both the track and his "trusty ZW" transformer to be good! Then came the possible clues as to what 'may' be wrong ... .
I asked him, "Bill, in your zeal to "quickly" see if the GG performed on your "new track", what did you use for the track hook-up wire to the lock-on? He says, "I fiddled with some on-hand wire but I didn't have my reading glasses [!] to get the wire into those small hole spaces after you press that 'plunger piece' [!] down on the Lionel lock-on, so I just grabbed a couple of those alligator test leads [!!!] and connected .... " ==STOP!== Bizzzzzz! I then say, "You mean those ==very thin wired== multi-colored alligator test leads that come 10 or 20 in a bag and used for small electronic circuit testing, right?" and he says "Yeah! Is there a problem?" My response was this: "What you're doing is akin to putting a telephone pole through a straw!" and he says, "I don't follow you!" and so I explain, "The WIRE GAUGE of those typical very thin DC test leads is probably 28 or 30 AWG [which I explain to Bill] and when you use your hefty ZW 275 watt transformer to push its available "juice" through such very thin test lead wire, you create an enormous ==resistance== so that the "juice" that is transferred to the track is woefully insufficient to drive the train except to perhaps have it creep along as if it was severely ailing! FIND your reading glasses and use some heavy gauge wires from the ZW to the lock-on and give me a call back." In 15 minutes, Bill calls back and says, "I'll be ****ed! The GG runs like a top!I figured electricity flow was electricity flow [...] now I see what you mean!" This explains why folks here will often comment that as a bare bones minimum, they will use at least 14 gauge wire for their transformers [old timer KW, ZW, etc. and the new stuff like MTH, MRC, etc. ] and some even prefer the heftier 12 gauge wire [for the transformer and lesser gauges for any 'helper' wires in a long run] ] to assure maximum voltage and amperage transfer from the transformer to the AC O-gauge tracks. OF NOTE, I ==know== this is elementary stuff to many forum members here but again, it's the casual search-engine help seeker I have in mind who is just getting into trains or, indeed, those returning to it after many years [possibly in their retirement and now have more time to devote to the hobby] but where that "technical" side of trains [especially today's trains much less the old-time post war stuff] needs some brushing up ... or catching up!
Recently, I salvaged a veritable MINT ABA set of PS1 [** ProtoSound 1] equipped [in the engine anyway versus the two accompanying dummy units] because I got nothing but dings and clangs and even remembering to cut the power completely to get it out of stand-by and then MOVE brought nothing ==UNTIL== I found myself here and found out that one of the primary "culprits" of a seemingly "dead" PS1 engine is that the rechargeable 8.4 battery that powers the chip board has failed! Sure enough! I tested it with a temporary 9 volt non rechargeable battery and the engine came back to life! That was the problem! A failed 8.4 volt rechargeable battery which powers the PS1 AND which also makes the train work! I erroneously thought the only thing that chip board did was create a variety of railroad related 'sounds' and that the problem must be elsewhere! No! The PS1 chip boards do much more than create just 'sound' and if the chip board fails [from a faulty 8.4 volt rechargeable battery], the whole system fails and the engine will not run save to make ding and clang noises [if there is at least some power left in the failing battery OR the track power brings on the dings or clangs -- as one OGR forum member put it some time ago on PS1 systems, to wit, "the 5 dings of death."]! Great place to learn here! And I'm very grateful for it even at the risk of being wordy or relating "basic fundamentals" but which to the newcomer or returnee to the hobby who may not be into the technical end of the hobby, can be a veritable revelation! And as much of the technical discussion that takes place here is to me but I try to learn from it when things go wrong. --- Doc Tony
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