Help sought. I bought three Golden Gate Depot heavyweight cars on the bay and they are causing transformer overload on my two track oval. Does not matter which track they are on - they trip my MRC Pure Power Dual and Single transformers lined to the tracks. The Dual is lined to the outside loop and the single is lined to the inside loop. Each car causes the transformers to trigger the circuit breaker. Any ideas as to a fix? Thank you in advance for your consideration.
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If it’s an immediate response from the breaker I would check to see if the cars were modified in any way. If it’s a result from 3 cars it just may be an overload to the transformer. I find that highly unlikely though.
Rod Miller
Sounds like you're shorting to ground. The wires for the lighting go through the frame and run along under the interior floor, check for breaks in the insulation. Also check to make sure that the pickup roller and its wire are insulated from the truck sideframes. It takes a lot of screws to remove the roof, I would remove the roof though and unplug the light boards. If it still shorts, check the wiring from the trucks. If it stops, then something is fried on the light board.
If you’re pulling these apart sounds like a great time to convert them to LED lighting. Kill two birds with one stone.
I would check each car individually first to see if you can isolate the problem to one of the cars. If it turns out to be only one that is causing the problem, it may be easier to locate the issue.
Good luck,
Don
Is it an overload (circuit breaker opens after a short time) or is it a direct short circuit (circuit breaker opens immediately?)
Do you have a meter?
Using one to check for an electrical problem on each car is worth the two bucks that one costs.
It's more scientific than guesswork.
https://www.ebay.com/i/1727850...hn=ps&dispItem=1
Check the wires from the center roller where it goes through the bottom of the car. The wires sometimes contact the floor on the sharp edge and create the short. Like stated above, you need to isolate 1 roller at a time to find it.
Each of the three cars causes this? Without a picture of the bottoms... Is there any chance a pick-up roller is touching the floor (if it is metal) or is skewed sideways and touching an outer rail?
Each of the cars was placed alone on the separate tracks and all caused the circuit breaker to trip due to overload.
Does this happen with any other passenger cars? If it does then it's not the Golden Gate cars. May be a transformer wiring problem. Un-wire and start over.
Rod Miller
What Rod said
Hard to believe there is something wrong with all cars ? Is there a 2 rail, 3 rail switch on the cars ?
Clem
No problems with any other passenger cars - the Golden Gate heavyweights, purchased on eBay - trigger the overload and shut down of two different transformers on separate loops of track.
Save a lot of aggravation, do it the scientific way, and use a meter to find the short(s). No need for guesswork, test tracks, touching of wires, or other equipment.
Please. Take the lamps out; test for shorts from wheels to roller; tell us what the readings are.
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