I run post war Lionel on tubular track along with some Williams engines on Gargraves, using four separate transformers for the 8 trains running simultaneously. I noticed with the ZW that sometimes the train governed by that transformer actually speeds up once the transformer has been on for several minutes. Does it take that long for the voltage to build up in the tubular tracking, or what? I have a steamer that will slow down and speed up at intervals on another transformer. But I suspect there is a problem with the engine itself because at times the pilot light will be on but on other occasions it will not light. Don't know what the engine problem might be. Finally, I picked up a used TAC 2001 twin transformer that runs two trains. Problem is that without any warning, one of the channels will automatically start the horn on the Williams engine by itself--kind of spooky. In fooling around with that transformer, it seems that I can make the horn go off just by increasing the throttle a bit. If I change the throttle for one of the channels, it can alter the power of the other channel. I thought each channel was independent of the other. Any clues here? Thanks
Original Post