Lionel TMCC and Legacy engines lights flickering on Atlas track

#1 atlas track does not combine or connect the 2 outer rails together. I've seen more than my fair share of users of atlas just connect one outer rail and then have issues. I purposely made all my power drops connect to all 3 rails.

#2 the black oxide finish on the 3rd rail may not play well with all types of pickup rollers. I've seen excessive sparking even after cleaning. Eventually this forced me and those users to remove or reduce the blackening of the center rail often using scotchbrite abrasive to polish. Again, first hand, I saw different roller types not work well and spark with black atlas center rail as delivered.

See this topic and the multiple replies from others with similar experience.

https://ogrforum.com/...c/172611907192675791

Thanks Vernon,

I have power connections to all 3 rails of my layout.  When troubleshooting my problem with jumpers I forgot to jumper both outside rails.  Adding a jumper to the other outside rail showed me what the real problem was.  The Atlas rail joiners just don't work well at all.  I think one of the tiny joints between the rail pin and the atlas connection part failed.

I am not sure why TMCC is so fussy about having a connection to both outer rails.

@DougC posted:

I am not sure why TMCC is so fussy about having a connection to both outer rails.

It's not!  We have a really large layout we run on for the club, and it only has a single outside rail connected, the other rail is used for signaling.  Zero issues with TMCC/Legacy on over 1,000 feet of track.

Interesting. Have seen layouts and test tracks adjacent (some feet away and not hooked up) to TMCC/Legacy tracks yet the locomotives come up in command mode.

Yep, occasionally I can start a TMCC/Legacy engine in command mode on my bench if the layout is powered, no connection between them.  It's 8-9 feet from the layout track to the bench.

Ah, the magic of radio.

Mike

Best way to set up Atlas track is to put power feeders every 6-10 feet. I would NOT use anything abrasive to ‘clean’ it. The most aggro cleaning I’ll use is lacquer thinner or Goof Off, both very sparingly. I’ll use Goof Off only when I need to remove dried glue from ballasting. Most of the time wiping it with a clean, dry cloth is all it needs. Abrading the track just makes dust and dirt cling to it better. Removing the center rail blackening to the point where the center rail looks copper looks terrible and is absolutely unnecessary.

Our club uses ONLY Atlas track, we had numerous TMCC/Legacy issues until we made solid earth ground to every section of track, added a TMCC Booster and put the antenna (After market) on a cable and disguised it as a cell tower. Now the clubs layout is 100% reliable for TMCC/Legacy and DCS is our problem child.

I am 99 percent sure your problem is the blackening used on the center rail. I have used Alas track on numerous large layouts and always had to remove the blackening for trains to run well.   Atlas is a wonderful track system but what ever they use to blacken the enter rail actually acts as an insulater and it also comes off on and accumulates on the center pickup roller.  Unless you got some of the very early production with the flimsy joiners, their joiners that have dimples on the side work just fine.  I used a fine SandFlex hand block by Kingspor which work great removing the blackening.

It is possible that a strong chemical like lacquer thinner might clean the blackening enough for rollers to make a good electrical connection but I could not make it work for me.

If you prefer not to jump and remove the blackening, take a multimeter and touching the leads to the outer rain and the center rail.  Usually you will find you need to move the lead on the center rail back and forth or press harder to have it make contact.

Also, I never had any issues with TMCC or DCS by not connecting the two outside rails together.  Remember, once a train car is in the loop, the wheels jump the power for one outside rail to the other anyway.

Happy railroading,

Don

@Ron_S posted:

Our club uses ONLY Atlas track, we had numerous TMCC/Legacy issues until we made solid earth ground to every section of track, added a TMCC Booster and put the antenna (After market) on a cable and disguised it as a cell tower. Now the clubs layout is 100% reliable for TMCC/Legacy and DCS is our problem child.

Not sure how you would connect an earth ground to every track. You can lay a wire next to the track and have it help.  Our lay a ground wire under the center rail. f you connected ground to center rail it would short. If you connect to outer rail then I believe it  would cross out your TMCC base signal.

I haven't played with the TMCC signal booster that Dale/GRJ created so I can't comment,  but using an aftermarket  antenna only makes the handheld to command base signal better. It it wouldn't affect TMCC to Locomotive since that travels wire to outer rail and third pin on grounded plug on power supply.

When you say flickering, is it irregular like trains do when going across a switch. Or is it a strobing of the headlight.

The flickering is dirty track, poor connection. The headlight strobing is a loss of TMCC signal

Thanks for all of your input and suggestions.  I have solved my problem.  First I created my own joiners between the gargraves and Atlas track like shown elsewhere in the forum.  That helped quite a bit.  Then I cleaned the track.  All better.  I bought the track as new so I did not think it was dirty.  Well it was real dirty.  Not sure why.  Should have thought of that right away.

@cbojanower  Track in this sense is the section of track NOT each rail.