Lionel 6-38036 Smoke Unit...

The black wire goes to hot, and the bare wire is a ground wire.

Thanks.

Now if I can figure out the rest (), I'll be good to go!

Mark in Oregon

Strummer posted:

Here's a photo of the unit in question:

When I first got this engine, the smoker worked just "fair", and now does not work at all. I was able to get it to function briefly by "jiggling" the wire to the right of the unit slightly, but now that doesn't help; I suspect a loose connection inside the unit itself(?)

How does one go about repairing or replacing one of these? Does that wire to the left hold the cap in place? And where on earth does the wire on the right go to? It runs up under all the circuit boards, past the plunger mechanism. I also noticed that the fiber ring on the bottom of the round section is slightly loose; it that normal? And it appears that in order to get to the screw that holds the whole thing in place, the cylinder block has to be removed first!

I see that replacement parts are available, but I don't want to order parts unless I can figure out how to put it all back together. If I can't fix this, I think I'll just gut the whole thing and run it on DC! I don't see why that wouldn't work...

EDIT: I'll never convert over to the Legacy system, so all that circuitry is not needed, and the motor is a DC can, so it should run really well powered by one of my (very nice) DC power sources...right?

Help!   

  Mark in Oregon

Mark, if you gut all the electronics, and run that engine on DC, you'll never get that smoke unit to produce enough smoke to even satisfy an ant. you'd need to pull a lot of cars to build up some voltage, or run the engine at Mach III...

Hi Mark: The inside of this type of system has some fiberglass batting which acts like a wick and the resistor which provides the heat.  The general arrangement is for one side of the resistor to go to chassis ground and the other to the power supply.  Usually, it is the bare wire that goes to chassis ground.  This would be the one on the left facing your picture.  In the older units, it was generally soldered to the steel bracket supporting the unit.  I can't tell from the picture where yours is connected.  The other side with, with the insulation, goes to whatever is supplying the power to the unit.  This could be track power or a source on the control boards.  If you have an ohmmeter, lift one side of the resistor from its connection and see if the resistor has continuity.  The side of the connection which you can't locate may be going to the switch which controls the smoke system.  With the resistor disconnected, you can pop the top of this type of unit to examine the inside.  I appears to me that the insulated side of the resistor  is soldered to a wire with the connection covered with heat shrink.  If you decide to try to repair it, and have questions, e-mail me.  Good luck.

Phranzdan

Guys

If I go the DC route, I won't be concerned about the smoke unit anyway.

I have worked (successfully) on smoke units on some post war Lionel and Flyer, but this newer stuff with all that circuitry is very intimidating, so I don't feel confident in my own abilities to do a repair.

Guess I'll think about it a bit and then decide what to do...

Mark in Oregon 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-DEZ6CErz0

might want to watch this general video from lionel

Thanks for that link Shawn.

Mark in Oregon 

Strummer posted:

I have worked (successfully) on smoke units on some post war Lionel and Flyer, but this newer stuff with all that circuitry is very intimidating, so I don't feel confident in my own abilities to do a repair.

There is no extensive "circuitry" for this smoke system. It's a bog standard TMCC locomotive, there's a wire from the smoke unit through the smoke switch and on to the motherboard. If you unsolder the bare wire to the smoke unit mount, you can pop the top and do any necessary maintenance of the smoke unit.

Thank you John; that's very helpful.

In the video Shawn posted the link to, the fellow mentions the color of the heating element wrap as being important; on this engine it looks like that cloth wrap is the same color (black) both inside and outside of the smoke unit itself. Is this ok? Also, is there a good process to wick up any extra fluid from inside the unit? I think I may have over-done it a bit...  Could that be the cause of my problem?

I'll look at it later today and let you know how I did. Again, I'm not really into all the extra "bells and whistles" in any scale...but I admit I do rather enjoy the smoke feature. 

Mark in Oregon

The wrap around the heating element starts out white, and usually the best advice for decent smoke is to lose the wrap anyway.  If it's black, that would explain the lack of any smoke.

If you like smoke, you need one of my upgrades.

gunrunnerjohn posted:

The wrap around the heating element starts out white, and usually the best advice for decent smoke is to lose the wrap anyway.  If it's black, that would explain the lack of any smoke.

If you like smoke, you need one of my upgrades.

Nice video. 

I don't "like" smoke per se; I just don't mind it as much as I do all the other stuff, like sound effects, etc.

So I have the top off the unit and indeed the wrap is light brown at the ends and black in the center. Are you saying I can remove that wrap and it'll be ok to use, assuming everything else is ok? The center of the "batting" also looks pretty charred....

Thanks for hanging with me on this...

Mark in Oregon

Yep, remove the wrap, replace the batting, and and you should be good. 

As you can see, I love the smoke!

Here is a picture of where I'm at so far; have replaced the 'batting" with a piece cut from a "cotton round": the things used for removing make-up, etc. I cut a piece the size of a quarter, cut a notch, and it's sitting inside the unit in the photo.

You can see the old batting is pretty shot. you can also see the blackened center of the heating element wrap itself.

Am waiting to get a "go ahead" on removing that wrap... 

EDIT: Thanks John, I just saw your "green light". 

Mark in Oregon

A good try, but no luck. Not working, so I guess it must be something else.

Oh well...

Mark in Oregon

Mark....you may not want to use cotton...it will burn,try fiber glass insulating material..may not solve your problem,but you won't have a fire......Joe

That's a good point, although since it doesn't work anyway, I guess it doesn't really matter.

I will turn off the smoke feature (just to be safe) and reassemble...

Mark in Oregon

Take the cotton out and throw it away.   In a pinch, you can use fiberglass insulation batting, it's way better than cotton.  I used it in a number of cases.

Ok guys, I give up.

Repairing this is beyond my scope; have fixed several post-war smoke units in the past, but this high-tech model has me beaten. I just don't feel comfortable trying to track down where the hot wire goes, since it's tucked up under all that advanced circuitry. As "GunrunnerJohn" said earlier, that wire goes on to the "motherboard": anything with a "motherboard" in it I stay away from!  

Can someone suggest a reliable repair source (preferably in my time zone?)  

Thank you.

Mark in Oregon

If you're getting any heat from the smoke unit, it's unlikely that the electronics is the problem.

Well that's the thing; I don't think I am getting "heat" anymore. As I mentioned earlier, when this first started to act up, I could get it to work by jiggling the hot wire a little; now I get nada.

????

Mark in Oregon

The fact that "jiggling the wire" fixed it tells me that you have a simple local issue, not an electronics issue.  It would be the resistor is simple defective in the smoke unit, or a solder joint under the insulation is loose.

You're looking in the wrong place if you're looking at the electronics.

That sounds encouraging: if indeed the resistor is at fault, how would one go about replacing it?

Or, how would I remove the insulation to see if I have a loose solder joint? I ask this because it appears to be a "closed" system: I mean, the wire was wrapped before it was installed, etc. You know what I mean... 

Thanks again for bearing with me on this.

Mark in Oregon

Get yourself a free meter from Harbor Freight, if you miss the free window, pay a few bucks for it.

Free HF Multimeter Coupon

With this you can simply track down what is going on with the heater or the associated wiring.  We can also help you.

I have this thing:

I've only ever used it for measuring volts: will it tell me what I need to know?

Mark in Oregon

Believe it or not, it doesn't have an ohms function, so you need a meter capable of measuring resistance so we can check the resistor and the wiring. 

7 Function Digital Multimeter

D*mn! 

Ok, I shall find one that does...

Mark in Oregon

Here is a dumb question. Since you were wiggling the wire to the heater, you may have created a short and scrambled the radio board. Have you tried a reset recently?

If he created a short, it could have also taken out the triac, it doesn't take long if you connect the smoke power to frame ground!

Gee, I don't know what any of that means... 

Will this work? I forgot I had it...

It says "ohms" right there... 

What do I do now?

Mark (still) in Oregon

Crank it up to Rx1 and connect the two test leads together.  If the needle moves close to zero, see if the zero pot will zero it.  If not, put new batteries in it and try again.  If we can get it working, it will do.

Okay, I tried that; it stayed on zero, regardless of which way I spun the dial. Dunno it that means anything.

I did check the volt feature with a couple of different transformers/power packs, both AC and DC; it seemed to work fine for that.

Thanks!

Mark in Oregon

Have you attempted a hard reset? That may be all that is wrong with it. Do you know how to do a hard reset?

I do not...do tell! 😊

Mark in Oregon 

PS: remember I'm trying to run this off a "regular" MRC AC transformer, not any kind of Legacy or similar system.

Strummer posted:

Okay, I tried that; it stayed on zero, regardless of which way I spun the dial. Dunno it that means anything.

I did check the volt feature with a couple of different transformers/power packs, both AC and DC; it seemed to work fine for that.

Thanks!

Mark in Oregon

Needs batteries for the ohms function, probably dead.

This unit takes only (1) battery; I tried 2 different new ones (batteries)...the results were the same.

I shall purchase a new meter at the local hardware store tomorrow.

Mark in Oregon

What MRC power pack?  You will need a TMCC or Legacy set up to reset the features. After you check the heater resistance, and it is OK, I would take the engine to some one who is operating those. Do you have the original instruction book? I structions are on page 15. If you don't the manual is on Lionel's site. You checked the smoke switch that it didn't get turned off while you picked up the engine?

The ohms function on most of these analog meters was protected by a fuse.  You would need to take it out of the case to check.  Problem may be finding a replacement fuse. 

Chuck Sartor posted:

What MRC power pack?  You will need a TMCC or Legacy set up to reset the features. After you check the heater resistance, and it is OK, I would take the engine to some one who is operating those. Do you have the original instruction book? I structions are on page 15. If you don't the manual is on Lionel's site. You checked the smoke switch that it didn't get turned off while you picked up the engine?

I mentioned (in a different thread I guess) that I don't have any Legacy or TMCC systems, and have been (attempting) to run this with my MRC O27 transformer. The online manual says this engine can be used in such a fashion.

And no, I turned off the smoke unit only after I decided that I may not be capable of fixing it myself. It's my hope that after I get the proper ohm meter that you guys will be able to walk me through the repair of the smoker...

Mark in Oregon 

Phranzdan posted:

The ohms function on most of these analog meters was protected by a fuse.  You would need to take it out of the case to check.  Problem may be finding a replacement fuse. 

I'll look into that, thanks.

Mark in Oregon