I received 5 of the problem Proto 3 (P3) engines that have poor signal capture. Friday I removed the shell from a P3 SD-24, re-positioned the wires on the top of the circuit card, then removed the black screw that goes into the truck ground and wire brushed the screw until it was bare on the threads and under the head, then re-installed the screw. I repeated the same on the other truck. I then tested the engine before re-installing the shell. I was using a separate test track, TIU and handheld. The engine added fine and then started with out a problem. Re-installed the shell and retested the engine and then put it on the layout and it worked so much better in signal capture.
Today, I started on a BNSF Dash 9, P3, that also has signal capture problems. The engine, in a lash-up, would start with a P2 engine just fine, however; the engine wouldn't move. I rebooted everything and after getting another lash-up start, I hit the direction button to see if the back up lights would come on. They did, and I had an operable lash-up. About every forth start, I'd had to repeat this process. So, today, removed the shell and found the wires on top of the circuit tower, needing re-positioning and then put a wire tie around the bundle to keep them in place.
Next I removed the truck assembly from the motor and dropped the truck off so I could gain access to the black ground wire screw. In order to remove the screw, on the rear side of the truck, there's a cover assembly, held on with two number 0 screws that keeps a plunger and spring locked into the top of the truck. The plunger and spring came part way out and I re-installed it and its spring in it's cavity and then left one number 0 screw in the cover so I could swing it out of the way and get the black screw out. After removing, cleaning off the black covering and re-installing the cleaned screw, I swung the cover over the top of the truck and installed the other number 0 screw and then tightened both screws. I repeated the same process on the other truck. After making sure that both wires in the truck cavity were clearly not touching each other, I re-installed the truck as I had done the first one. The only difference was that I made sure the micro-plunger, and spring, did not come out of the cavity, as on the first truck, as I now knew that it existed and to just swing the cover away while getting the black screw out and re-installing it.
After re-installing the second truck and inspecting everything for clearance, lack of a wire binding and all screws properly tightened, I then placed the engine on the test track to check for operation before re-installing the shell. On the test track, using the "add an MTH engine", I received the "no engine to add" message. I removed all active engines from the menu on the test track hand held, removed the batteries from the hand held, re-installed them and tried again and got the same message.
I've removed trucks for years and installed new traction tires, replaced roller assemblies and just about every other process and it's not rocket science. This is the first time in nine years of adding engines after a repair I've receive the error message. I went over the entire engine again and could not see anything wrong. I tried a engine recovery with the hand held and got "Recovery unsuccessful" message. I can't find any loose connector plugs, out of place wires and since the shell isn't installed I know that there's no pinched wires under the shell.
I tried one more process. I installed the P-3 engine on the layout next to it's P-2 lash-up engine. After turning the TIU on, waiting for about 20 seconds and then advanced the Z4000 throttle to see if I could start the lash-up, using the lash-up address. As soon as I advanced the throttle, the P-2 engine did an uncommanded start with about 1/2 the normal of engine noise volume. The P-3 never did a thing.
Other than the fact that the engine is a P3 and has no battery and you have to wait for the circuits to charge before starting, the engine is just another engine. The SD-24, P-3 engine
had no problems that I did two days earlier.
What might be some things that I should recheck or do? Obviously, the test track is clean, the engine wheels are clean, everything worked fine before completing the screw cleaning and wire bundle re-positioning. I purposely started the engine before the repair so I could insure that if there was a problem, I would know when it happened and that it was a repair error.
Thanks for the help
Moke Mike
