Sounds like I better find a boiler board 🤔
Thanks again GUNNER
BIGLOU....... .................... when the tech used a simple bypass wire on the DCC/DCS switch to get your BIGBOY running without losing signal was it a wire soldered between the two posts that normally have that little black plastic piece slide down over them ? I've been sorting out issues with my Railking Challenger with a lot of running on the layout. Since I HAVEN'T been running smoke ,which seemed to be the "signal dropout " time , I have also noticed signal loss when going back and forth several times in succession. It's like these Challengers get confused when you start giving them too many commands . None of my other steamers or diesels have these issues. It seems for some reason that these larger ARTICULATED steamers have some issues . Barry mentioned the drawbar issues.......... ................I have heavily reinforced the female connectors on both ends of the drawbars and I use the MYH.slip on collars on the tender post. I still think there are issues with how that tender post and drawbar work against each other at different angle movements.
Of some interest is the large 14 WHEEL TENDERS on these large UP steamers. The 8 " dummy " wheels seem to me to need be ground down a bit and radiused on the inside and outside. Going into and out of curves seems to sometimes give the tender a little jerking around even without a consist.
There must be something to the name " CHALLENGER " .
"was it a wire soldered between the two posts that normally have that little black plastic piece slide down over them ? "
Sorry to say that I'm not 100% sure of precisely how the tech did this. He did tell me that I can only run DCC from now on, but if I wanted to sell the engine for any reason, I could have him remove the bypass, or just let the potential buyer know what was done to the engine. The big boy has been running great since the wire work, with absolutely no problems with the drawbar connections on either ends of the drawbar. I have an MTH premier challenger and another MTH premier big boy; both of them have problems with the drawbar connections to the tenders. I've used sink washers to tighten the fit to the tender connections. This has worked quite well, with minor adjustments from time to time. I did purchase a few collars from MTH and I believe these should work better than my (make-shift) washers. I have yet to install them though. I agree with you that these big engines have had a lot of issues with the drawbar connections, but our taking control of the issues have made things work pretty well. I have used longer drawbars, at times, and these worked great. However, I don't like the added space between engine and tender, so I just work around these little annoyances because the engines are all terrific.
As for your tender issues on curves, I haven't experienced too many problems there. I use large 80" curves, so that may be why I haven't had any issues, yet. I do notice bumps when entering large radius switch tracks. Your thoughts about the angle movements being an issue is, must likely, correct.
Best of luck to you, Lou
Actually, the jumper removed is for DCC, for DCS the jumper is installed. Why any tech would solder to the tender board is beyond me, just adding or removing the jumper plug would do the trick. The tender board normally comes with the plug installed, if I have occasion to remove it, I just hang it on one pin and leave it in the tender.
HEY LOU..... ...............this sure is a lot of fun ,huh !!??
This may sound nuts but you have to make a " silk purse out of a sows ear " when necessary. I take some of my old black automotive pin stripe tape and with some tension (carefully and accurately) wrap it a couple of times arsound the female connector . I then have my SUPER THIN SUPER GLUE applied over the tape and slightly at the bottom of the connector. Be careful not to let this glue go to the PINS ( I swear this STSG will follow a path to the next room if you are not careful ) I accomplish all this with a fine needle dipped into the glue. Still doesn't get rid of the flex between the tender post and drawbar itself on these behemoth engines and their beautiful tenders. I'll have to have a couple of Molsen XXX s while on the incubation break to study this issue !!! 🤔 On the MTH collars I take the soldering gun and slightly soften one end of them and found they don't loosen over time.
I wish I had the room to use your 80 inch curves. I have e everything between 72" to 31" to work out this three dimensional piece of art.
Godspeed , have fun .
Sorry John, I meant DCS, and I the tech did the work as you stated.
In that case, there's nothing to do if you ever sell except put the jumper back on. 
Once again, thanks John. The problem with us novices/artists talking tech stuff is that we might send someone off in a dangerous direction. Thanks for correcting me. I called the tech and he gave me the same information that you did. Although, I never plan on selling these engines, my sons, or grandsons, might sell them some day. Best, Lou
Hello from the land of Sandwich.
My wife and I have recently moved to Sandwich Illinois, into our forever home with half of the attic
dedicated to an MTH O gauge train layout. It took me 66 years to finally put up permanent tracks for
the MARX trains that Santa Claus brought.
Anyway, I wanted to report that my recent purchase of an MTH 30-1818-1 Challenger resulted in a few
problems, that I see others in the forum talking about.
Using a DCS Remote control and TIU, I had trouble getting the the new engine to be recognized. After multiple
attempts at connecting the engine-tender tether, engine WAS identified and registered. While running / testing, the engine would stop, and would not be recognized by the READ command. Eventually, I unscrewed the tether from the
engine, and tested continuity between the pins of the tether piece, and found 2 marginal. connections. The
solder blobs did not look that bad, but in reheating the connections, I found that there were 2 pins that
did not accept solder readily. Additional solder sucking and re-soldering provided proper continuity between all connector pins (1 to 1, 2 to 2, etc.).
I also noticed the copper spring attached to the trailing truck to rub against the rear axel for ground pickup. This seemed odd, because there was no solid connection the engine chassis. The ground was made through swivels and slots to get to the chassis. I verified the intermittent ground with the continuity tester, and decided to add a wire from the copper spring to the rear engine plate, to the screw that mounts the body to the chassis. This provided a solid chassis ground to the outside rails.
I reassembled, and the engine has been running well.
Then I noticed that the front motor section had a slow down or binding once every revolution. I placed the engine on the workbench with both driving sections off the rails, and alligator clipped power to the engine. At slow speeds (3 MPH) the front section would slow, sometimes stop, then continue again to the same spot. I loosened the two motor mount screws to gain access to the worm gear, which was properly greased. I used a very small straight blade screwdriver to rub between the gear teeth on the center, geared axle. Rotate it one tooth, and rub it again. This was to clean the space between the teeth, like flossing, to be sure there was no chip, plastic, or other material. I didn't count the teeth, but I stepped 90 teeth to be sure. After reassembly, there was no binding.
While off the track I took the opportunity to understand the chuffing sounds and motor connections. I had set the
number of chuffs to 4 per revolution, At slow speed, the chuffing sounds like a dual engine locomotive should, with the two sets of chuffs going in and out of phase. So I held the front engine, and the chuffs sounded the same. It is my opinion that the rear engine generates the normal chuff triggers, and the phased chuffs are totally electronically added.
I tested this by holding the rear engine, and the chuffs stopped, but the speed control increased power to both motors, and the front engine sped up, without chuffs. Not a problem, but explains a little more about where the chuffs come from.
Bottom line, I very much like this engine, it pulls 20 cars up a 3% grade on O-54 curves, and crawls at 3 MPH smoothly.
Still waiting for the BNSF Heritage paint scheme diesel I ordered in January. Any news on those?
Roger
The chuffs are indeed generated by the electronics and timed using the tach sensor on the rear motor of this model.
