Railking sw-9 switcher

Anybody got any suggestions ???

C"MON guys   nobody wants to talk to me ??

I had a MTH SW1500 that the sound was OK on startup and shutdown,  BUT when I added power to it the sounds would come on, then shut off, come on, shut off, etc.

Removed the MTH guts and replaced with ERR DC Commander.  So I'm not much help to you. 

Is the engine working ok NOW ??  What can you tell me about ERR commander ??  Thanks

OK, let's start with some basics.  What is the MTH model number (30-????) for this engine and what electronics are inside (Protosounds, PS2 or PS3)?  If it has a battery, have you tried putting in a new, appropriate battery to see if that solves the problem?  Have you tried taking the shell off to check that all wires are well connected (not hanging loose or weakly connected) where they belong?

With this info, maybe you will get some help.

Chuck

I have put in a BCR repacement !!  It has PS#2  The engine is approx 10 yrs old ??  Are the top & Bottom circuit boards plugged together ?? I dont want to go in there and start pulling chips & boards unless I know what I"M doing !!  My thoughts are to pull chips and boards and spray contact cleaner on plugs ??  My buddy ran the engine for 2 hours on Sat and seemed FINE   I showed up on Sun after lunch and THE GREMLINS kicked in !!  As soon as he went to show me it acted up and shut down ??  When you tap on top of shell  it will go into start up mode  but then it will shut down and refuse to run ??

I had a similar problem with a Railking switcher engine with ps2. Sometimes it might not run and if you tapped on the engine shell you might get it to run.I removed the shell and after a close visual inspection I noticed that one of the small connectors in the wire bundle was not properly seated.I snapped it back into place and the engine ran fine.

ok thanks  i'll pull the shell and look for loose connections !!  I took off the truck and found a small screw that holds the circuit boards to the frame ,,it was loose so i tightened it down !!  Engine ran fine for 30 min then shut down again !!

what the heck, try this...  Power it up with sound for a minute, remove track power.  how long do the sounds continue on?

Are all the center rail rollers picking up power?   Test with continuity meter at work bench or place a piece of electrical tape on the center rail and park a set of rollers on it... the other set of rollers should pick up the power.   (reverse and test again)

Jumper both outside rails .

Is the engine shorting out or just shutting down? I would guess if it comes to life by tapping it there's a loose connection someplace,,,, (check wiring  from trucks to circuit board,)

thanks for the reply !!

I have one that did the same thing. I removed the PS boards and protocouplers. I replaced them with manual couplers, a Williams reverse board and a Williams TBII sound board and now it works great.

Hey Mike   what was yours doing ??  It almost sounds like loose boards or a loose connection  But we have checked almost everything ?? and it is still running normal and then WHAM it just shuts down ??

Mine would go through the power up sequence, then shut down and start over again when I tried to get it to move. It wouldn't move at all. It would just make sounds then shut down when the direction button was pushed. It could have been a battery issue, a board reset issue, a bad board or some combination of these. I didn't want to deal with it, so I went the conventional route to make it as problem free as possible.

Yours is running, so you could have something loose. Electronics and electrical devices can sometimes be difficult to troubleshoot. I have been an Avionics technician for over 22 years, so I am very familiar with intermittent failures. (That is the reason I took out all the fancy electronics and went simple. I do this all day at work, I don't want to do it for "fun".) Maybe try taking the shell off and powering it up with the wheels off the track and see if you can push on a wire harness, connector or on the boards to see if you can determine if something will consistently cause it to stop. If so, it will help narrow your problem down. It could even be a bad solder joint, which is much more difficult to find. Good luck.