I just completed repairs on a couple of engines and thought I might have a couple of tips the group would be interested in.
#1 MTH premier cab forward traction tire replacement. I have read a lot of folks complain about having to disassemble the whole engine to get these on because it is located next to the cylinder. The trick I find helpful is to remove the side rod bolts on all the wheels accepts the wheel with the tire. This allows the side rod to be threaded through the tire and get it back to desired drive wheel that there is limited access to the bolt. It is still a challenging effort to get the tire around the rim, but reduces the job to less than 30 minutes for all four tires.
#2 MTH premier triplex smoke motor noise in the tender. I had not run this engine in over a year and the tender smoke unit was producing a horrible noise. I just took this unit apart to drop a little bit of oil on bushings for the smoke motor. While this did quiet it down, the seal between the stack and the smoke unit would not reinstate filling the tender with smoke. The seal was old and not recoverable. I replaced this with a 7/32 x 11/32 x 1/16 o-ring I bought at the local hardware store (50 cents). Seems to work great for now, hard to say long term how the oil will effect the rubber, but by that time it will probably need to be rebuilt any way. If you plan to take the smoke unit out, I would recommend buying this ahead time, before opening the tender and finding this an issue and can’t complete the job.
Thanks!
Mike
