Lionchief losing power

The locomotive draws more current than the 2 cars.  High resistance track joints will cause more voltage drop when current flow is higher.  I would suggest checking for and fixing any loose track pins between adjacent feed wires.

Thanks, I did that and the problem area moved back to where the switches are located.
i guess I’ll go around and check all the connections this weekend, make sure everything is nice and tight.

If tightening the rails around the track pins throughout the problematic section doesn't improve the locomotive's ability to continue through it, adding another set of power feeders in the middle of this section should.  If it were me, I'd do both things while I had the track apart.  But this assumes you're not using DCS.  If so, that would be another consideration for how power is distributed.

I hope there aren’t any more issues when I check the connections. I did add a good number of drops for a fairly small layout. When I check without load there seems to be power across the whole track (which there wasn’t when I just had the power connected to one piece of track). I could throw another drop in there fairly easily so I guess I’ll do that too. I used some nice wire tap connectors and it was actually kind of fun doing it.

I am not using DCS but I had considered buying legacy or DCS to use a nice diesel locomotive with.

This is probably a gross oversimplification but would the bus wire be different if I went to a digital system or would it just be different in how I hooked the system and power up to the junction block for the bus wire?

When only using conventional transformer throttle control, LionChief, TMCC and Legacy, bus wiring is generally considered to be the preferred method.  For TMCC/Legacy with a solid bus power distribution system in place and good electrical conductivity around the layout, the only wiring that needs to be added is a single common/ground wire from the TMCC/Legacy control base to the outside rails connection.

On the other hand, DCS wiring requires isolated block sections and star wiring is recommended with only a single pair of power feeders per block (although some have reported bus wiring works fine for them).  These considerations have to do with how the DCS signal is transmitted through the rails to and from the TIU and locomotives.  If you are seriously considering adding DCS, the DCS Companion Book by Barry Broskowitz is highly recommended.  One other drawback that may be worth mentioning when considering DCS is that, if you use TVS (Transient Voltage Suppression) diode protection on you layout, too many of them will also degrade the DCS signal.

tightened up a bunch of joints and threw two more drops in for good measure and we’re back in business.

thanks!

Glad it worked out.  Thanks for reporting back on your success.