FIXED smoke on GS4 6-11127 4/29 update

If it's not heating up, the likely culprit is the smoke unit regulator board. It's the last part listed on lionel parts page for this loco.

It's a fairly common issue.

https://www.lionelsupport.com/...dc-b472-4b4b03ce0439

Gunrunner John should be chiming in shortly with further assistance.

Ricko, Thx for the link, I'll try to be patient. I might mention the most smoke I saw was like a mist/fog in the stack. That was it.  

How much smoke fluid did you put in it? Can you hear the fan run? Can you feel it getting warm at the top of the stack? More info is needed to help.

LOS, I put in 15 drops ran 10 minutes at 140 then another 10 drops. Don't hear a fan, but train sounds might be too loud to hear. Didn't feel the stack. I will do that, and turn off sound. Thx

So, with ear to stack don't hear fan, but very faint hum/buzz.  Started it off and first video is best I've had on smoke, then stopped.  Put in 10 more drops and second video, nothing. Something else I might try?

First off, turn off the sound so you can hear the fan running.

I'd check the cheap stuff first, continuity of all the wiring, the 6-ohm smoke resistor, etc.  Rick is correct, the regulator is a frequently trouble spot, but I'd check for the wiring, switch continuity, and the smoke resistor first.

Thx, I'll check it all. Btw, I did have the sound off with my ear to the stack. Didn't feel heat, hear fan. Only very faint buzz/hum. Is the first video with smoke even close to what it should be?

Check around, sometimes it's the simple stuff.

Well in the 1st video you have a blockage as you can see the smoke just stuck in there. Run it slower and turn the sound off. At that speed, with a blockage, the smoke is never gonna come out.

Most importantly, if that engine only got 10 drops, and you ran it 10 minutes.... the wick is completely dry and now burnt. It's probably charred but still salvageable.

Are you running conventional? or Command? I assume from that speed it's conventional.

If you lower the volume down to nothing via the CAB 2 and then run the engine very slowly forward you should be able to hear the fan motor pulsing to produce the chuffs - I think four per driving wheel revolution on this model.

I can just about see some chuffs in your first video despite the engine running at speed but it is certainly not showing normal Legacy smoke output. It looks like the heating element is functioning but the smoke is not being pushed out of the stack. 

But I am not sure that's the problem. You mention putting in 15 drops and then running for 10 minutes at speed step 140. A normal Legacy smoke unit will certainly use up that amount of smoke fluid in that time. Adding another 10 drops afterwards wouldn't fully refill the smoke chamber. Have you filled the smoke unit before? Is this a new or used engine? To start with its smoke unit should be filled with a lot more than that, I'd say about 25 drops just to test whether it works and more if you want to saturate the smoke batting, which Legacy engines really need.

P.S. This is broadly the same as what LOS says in the preceding post, which I did not see before adding mine. You mention the CAB 2 setting in your original post so I assume you are using command control although the engine is flying along like it was running conventional.

In the first vid you have smoke "hanging around" the stack which might suggest the elements are producing smoke but the fan is not working and pushing it out.

Maybe the fan is kaput or as was suggested by others here, a wire may have come loose.

Time to go inside.

Took shell off. The fan isn't running. I don't run my trains fast but book said do that to get them to smoke, so...  Now, on inspection, the fan ran when I touched it with some jumpers on the bench, but when connected back to the board it doesn't turn.  There was burnt wick material around the resistor that I cleaned off and it gets hot.  But given what I'm seeing with the fan is there something on that board that would be repairable?  I don't know squat about it, so a new board might be best.?

LOS, I ramped the voltage just enough to check if it worked off the board, so I'm confident I didn't hurt the motor. 

Rick, GRJ, here's a pic of my smoke unit, and the replacement from the Lionel site. My board doesn't seem to match the picture in the Lionel parts site. Mine serves as a cover/mounting base for the components of the smoke unit. The replacement doesn't appear to be the same.  Am I missing something?  TW

Edit:  Sequence #22 SMOKE UNIT ASSEMBLY / 6 ohm ANALOG appears to be correct(unavailable of course) pic below.

I just saw your video. You have smoke, as others have said the fan isn't working.

To add to laid off sicks statement. A fan that runs off of jumpers still may not operate off of the voltage from the smoke unit board.

I have a legacy Berkshire that was offered at the same time this gs 4 was.

The fan on my Berkshire quit 6 months after I bought it. A couple drops of oil on the fan motors  bushing behind the impeller worked in by spinning it with my finger got it to work again.

Having said that, given the age of the Loco at this point, I'd probably just replace the fan motor. It's only a few bucks.

Fan motor failures are very common with Lionel.

While your at it, order some new wicking and replace it as well. Over time, the wicking will burn no matter how much fluid you ad and will need to be replaced, nature of the beast.

Rick, on the Lionel parts site I didn't find the fan/motor. Are there other parts sites I can check?

This is what is available. Are the mounting holes compatible with your motor or if not, will it fit?

Chuck, I'll check it. Put assembly back together to see if it worked so I need to pull off locomotive. 

Ahhh, not sure our pics match.  My motor screw holes are at 9 & 3. Yours at 11 & 5.  Think my motor body 1/16" longer and shaft slightly shorter.   

TedW posted:

Ahhh, not sure our pics match.  My motor screw holes are at 9 & 3. Yours at 11 & 5.  Think my motor body 1/16" longer and shaft slightly shorter.   

Ah, I think we might be getting somewhere and maybe someone on the forum can help out with the fan motor you need:

1.  I recognize the smoke unit assembly listed as the replacement unit for this engine and shown in your photos. This is the "6 Ohm Analog" unit used in the early Legacy FEF-3s as well as your engine. Yes, the complete replacement unit has been unavailable for a few years, which is a pity as it is the best/highest volume smoke unit Lionel ever produced - as I or indeed any other owner of the first Legacy FEF-3 can attest. Some parts, including the PCB, resistor and AC regulator, are still available from Lionel but not the whole unit. In my experience it's the AC regulator that tends to fail before anything else.

2.  But if your fan motor is not running at all then the problem seems likely to be with it rather than anything else. Lionel does not list the fan motor for your engine or the FEF-3 as a separate replacement part. However there is a horizontal screw hole motor listed as part 610-8057-211:

Where I have found this on the Lionel support website it says "must contact Lionel to order" although I cannot guess why. The more recent (and more reliable) motors from Lionel have diagonal screw mountings as I think you already know/have found.

3.  Unless someone on the Forum can provide you with a horizontal screw motor or you contact Lionel to see if they can supply one your best option may indeed be to see if you can modify that mounting bar. Personally I'd ask around about the equivalent horizontal screw motor first. Something equivalent might even be available on fleabay or Amazon. Good luck in any event. 

The MTH BE-0000041 smoke fan motor will work fine in this application.  I've put them into many Lionel locomotives.

There is also the power to the fan, have you checked to see if the fan actually gets power?

Given a dimension check on the screw holes, the motor can be oriented diagonally if need be. Are we assuming my problem is the motor?  Even if it runs on the bench?  GRJ, I'll gladly use the mth motor but on a year old thread a member said he had to buy 5 of those motors from mth. I just checked, and they haven't been available indivdually. Could I buy some of the parts from Lionel and an mth motor and put them together?  Further, to cloud the issue, would a third party have my whole smoke assembly someplace?  I truly appreciate all your help on this issue.  I bought this unit and an FEF3-844 a couple months ago. Been running them with no smoke n thought I would try some smoke for fun. Yeah right...TW 

TedW posted:

Given a dimension check on the screw holes, the motor can be oriented diagonally if need be. Are we assuming my problem is the motor?  Even if it runs on the bench?  

Just to be sure, you cannot detect any sound of the fan spinning when the engine is powered up and in motion? Indeed, if the engine is on a powered track and you just push it forward the fan motor should pulse in synch with driver rotation (or that is what my FEF-3 will do and as your engine is from the same period of manufacture I reckon it's the same). If there's no evidence of the fan working then unless you have a power supply issue to the motor terminals it seems likely that the problem is the motor itself. 

BTW, you don't mention trying to lubricate the fan motor bearing or how much voltage you put to it to get it to spin on the bench. Lubrication can free up a motor that is "sticky" for whatever reason. I think that these motors are designed to run at 5 VDC supplied from the engine's electronics (not sure if it's the AC regulator or another connection to the early Legacy boards) so putting more than that to it won't show that the motor will run with the power input it's meant to have.

GRJ, I'll gladly use the mth motor but on a year old thread a member said he had to buy 5 of those motors from mth. I just checked, and they haven't been available indivdually. Could I buy some of the parts from Lionel and an mth motor and put them together?  

Brasseurs Trains has the individual fan motor GRJ mentions above at $6 per piece: http://www.brasseurelectrictra...ice/mth/railking.php

Further, to cloud the issue, would a third party have my whole smoke assembly someplace?  

I doubt it but you could try searching the major parts dealers. But it's seldom the case that you need a complete replacement and it won't help if the real problem is with the power supply to the smoke unit.

I truly appreciate all your help on this issue.  I bought this unit and an FEF3-844 a couple months ago. Been running them with no smoke n thought I would try some smoke for fun. Yeah right...TW 

Believe me I've been there too and it's maddening.

No fan when engine powered up on track. I performed that test with the shell off and looking into air intake on top of motor, the fan was not spinning, ever.  The smoke would just kinda pool in the fill and intake holes. When I blew into them the smoke would puff out.  For motor bench test, I used a cw80 simply slowwwly applying power till fan ran smoothly. No meter on the connection but certainly no more than a few volts based on position of handle. Not very exact I know.  I did put a drop of oil on motor shaft and turned shaft a dozen or so times to work it in. But no change as motor was not frozen or difficult to turn at any time since I pulled it out to check.  I did find a link for a single motor, thx anyway.  I have sent an email to Jeff @ train tender in a search for parts I could cobble together using your list above. An email to Lionel for part info will go out Monday.  I'm clinging to electronic problem, nothing to back that up, but I have no problem replacing all the working parts to rebuild what I have. Pcb, ac regulator, motor, resistor are all in play.  Thx again. Ted

I'd check and see if any voltage is coming off the board to the smoke fan.  The AC regulator doesn't actually power the fan on these, they have a separate regulator on the smoke unit to generate the 5V and the gating to run the smoke from the chuff switch.

A little more looking turns up this PCB for the smoke unit with a "must contact Lionel", but it doesn't say it's unavailable.

Uh, sorry, I'm only asking about this because I've done roughly the same thing. How did you connect the transformer to the fan motor? (Your bench photo above shows the motor detached from the smoke unit so I assume you tried to power it independently of the smoke unit circuitry.)

The transformer outputs AC power, the motor runs on DC. The motor will certainly spin under AC applied directly to it but will burn out even if the voltage is low. A test of this kind is no indication the motor will spin with the correct DC power fed to it. Most people try using either a 6 volt battery or a partially depleted 9 volt.

Final thought about a remedy; have you tried a reset of the engine in case something's got scrambled on the main boards? Sometimes pressing the "R" button on the CAB2 does the trick, other times you need to follow the more thorough reset sequence described in the manual. Better to try this than start rebuilding in case you don't have to.  

Uh oh, ya got me I tested ac only. So, got this fine little device GRJ and Stan told me about(they're sick of hearing about it), an ac/dc buck converter. Hooked to cw80, thru converter set at 4.5vdc(4.48) and here's the results. But I dont know if it means anything. To perform a reset I'll have to put it back together right?  Including shell or no?

You don't need the shell to run the locomotive.  I test them all the time with the shell off.  Obviously, for locomotives with the smoke unit in the shell you have to put it back on.

John, HC52, I checked the voltage from the smoke unit pcb and got no reading at the female plug where the fan plugs into. On the test track I checked power from the plug you diagramed. With a connection on red, I got 17.6vac(matches track power) on the chuff sw white wire; 9-10vac on the ac regulator black wire; 17.6vac on the H+ black wire(don't know what that is). So it seems to me there is power to the smoke unit pcb. Your picture of the pcb is very close to the one I have. Then I put the chassis on the track and pressed the reset button on the Cab2. The manual for the engine doesn't mention an engine reset that I could find.  I'll put the smoke unit back together and install to check if the reset corrected anything. 

TedW posted:

John, HC52, I checked the voltage from the smoke unit pcb and got no reading at the female plug where the fan plugs into. On the test track I checked power from the plug you diagramed. With a connection on red, I got 17.6vac(matches track power) on the chuff sw white wire; 9-10vac on the ac regulator black wire; 17.6vac on the H+ black wire(don't know what that is). So it seems to me there is power to the smoke unit pcb.

Not sure what to make of these results, especially the first one you mention. It does seem that there is power to the PCB but maybe not to the fan itself. I haven't seen a board like this one develop a physical problem that would produce that result but it's possible that a trace or solder connection has broken. Or maybe the plug itself is defective although I have not seen that happen either. If you have a spare male connector with wire leads I'd try plugging that in and testing whether there is power to the wires. From your earlier test it appears that the fan motor spins with the correct DC voltage applied to it when it gets power.

.  .  . Then I put the chassis on the track and pressed the reset button on the Cab2. The manual for the engine doesn't mention an engine reset that I could find.  I'll put the smoke unit back together and install to check if the reset corrected anything. 

The other reset I had in mind is actually in the TMCC section of the manual at page 18 although the commands for Legacy using a CAB 2 are the same. I've attached a copy of that page.

Let us know what happens!

TedW posted:

The manual for the engine doesn't mention an engine reset that I could find.  I'll put the smoke unit back together and install to check if the reset corrected anything. 

How hard did you look?   From the User's Manual, page 18.

My bad boys. Mea culpa. Performed the reset, no joy.

I'd check right at the regulator on the smoke unit to see if it's outputing 5VDC for the smoke motor.  You should see ground on the center pin, a fairly high value of DC on the lower one, and 5VDC on the pin at the top of the picture.

I appreciate all your time and trouble. I put the shell back on and will let it simmer awhile. The goof on missing the reset instructions has me spooked. Off my game right now. I'll still search for parts. Thx again

Exasperating, isn't it? I'm only adding this because it seems the problem may be isolated to power to the fan motor.

1.  I was thinking of mentioning the onboard PCB voltage regulator that GRJ refers to as this part is easily obtainable from Digikey and the stock component is known to fail. I wouldn't like to try replacing it myself as re-soldering parts to a PCB is something I have found challenging. That may just be pathetic ineptitude on my part.

2.  The PCB itself may be available from Lionel as they show something similar available on the replacement parts site (see above postings). But you'd have to call them and see if they have the right one as there might be different "codes" for or versions of these. However, as this was a part that I think was used in a limited number of early Legacy engines it may be that there is one you can use. Replacing the PCB as a whole is not a hard job and if (as I believe is the case) it does not come with the resistor and smoke unit funnel installed you can salvage these from the smoke unit you already have. The resistor is screw-mounted, not soldered, which might make transferring it from one unit to another easier.

3.  In your position I'd probably try replacing the PCB myself but the wiser course although more pricey is to get the engine seen to by a repair specialist. But then I could not stomach having this particular steamer without smoke and I'd go the extra mile to have it back in proper working condition.

I got a lead on some motors, will get 2-3 as next in line is an fef3 844. It may have the same problem.  So have queried my source for wicks, resistors and motors. Also checking GRJ's efforts on the pcb he found with a note to Lionel. We'll see what they have to say.  In the meantime I'll put the 844 on the track and run it till I get the GS4 sorted out. I'll take it apart again and check the regulator John ID'd.    Sunshine out today, I'm gonna play some golf.    Thx again for your valuable time. TW

Well I suggest you put more than 10 drops in your 844, and refill it often. Or remember to turn them off 

Waiting for my ttime, bored, so I take the shell off the GS4, set it on test track to test voltage on pcb per suggestion, and wham!   Ever have that happen to a capacitor? 

When they get old, it can happen.  It could have also been defective.  That's a pretty common cap, you can get them on Digikey.

Would that account for no power to fan motor?  Or could I be so lucky?