Clockwork Question...

Jack

Many of the motors will go airborne without a minimum of the shell on them for weight. The instructions told you to add more cars if it went to fast   One thing you may try is cleaning out the governor housing and shoe with a q-tip and alcohol. Some one may have oiled it not knowing any better. Kinda like oiling your cars brakes.

Steve

The first thing to try is cleaning the governor out.  It is very easy to contaminate the governor when oiling the motor, which will then cause the motor to run too fast.  Use a Q-tip soaked in alcohol and scrub out the inside of the governor drum.  If there is oil or grease caked on, use a toothpick to loosen it up, then wipe it out with the Q-tip.  Try to dribble some alcohol down on the outer edge of the weight to help remove oil from it, too.  If you need to lube the governor's shaft, use a toothpick with a drop of oil on the end, and touch it to the end of the shaft on the outside of the motor to keep from re-contaminating the governor.

Marx governors use a die-cast weight.  As such, they sometimes wear out or succumb to the effects of zinc-pest, especially the pre-war motors.  If this is the case, it will need to be replaced.  It can be done, but since the motor is swaged together, it can be a bit of a challenge.  Also, nobody offers replacement weights commercially, so you will either need to machine a new weight or just replace the governor using one from a donor motor. 

Try cleaning the governor first, let us know how it works...

Thank you, gents, I will try your suggestions and report back!  

Gave it a good cleaning to remove any oil, and it seems improved - still a quick little bunny, however!

Question:  This motor is what I think is called a "rising gear" motor?  Were these ever used in the CV?

The CV only came with ratchet motors, as that locomotive was discontinued before the introduction of the riser gear motor.  You can bolt the riser gear motor in the shell, but you may have to tweak the front crossmember to get the screw holes to line up... and the riser gear itself may rub the top of the shell when winding.  Marx motors tend to run pretty fast with a stock governor... hopefully yours will stay on the track!

Marxies definitely need a string of cars to slow them down.

Jim McClenin

Thanks for the info, James!  .....And Jim, you are right about the string of cars!  LOL

Love those Marxies!