Vision line Challenger 6-11210 3967

Ps the wire between engine and tender is hooked up

Your on the right track most likely if all sounds stop it’s the IR tether. As far as volume it will make a huge difference especially the whistle if the the plug is properly connected for the front speaker

Thanks Zac

@zhubl posted:

Your on the right track most likely if all sounds stop it’s the IR tether.

Actually, I think you'll find if the IR tether loses sight of the tender, the chuff will stop but the background steam sounds will continue.  If all the sounds drop out, that's normally a power interruption.

Try it, just drop a business card in the path of the IR and you'll see that the chuff stops but the background sounds continue to play.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

Actually, I think you'll find if the IR tether loses sight of the tender, the chuff will stop but the background steam sounds will continue.  If all the sounds drop out, that's normally a power interruption.

Try it, just drop a business card in the path of the IR and you'll see that the chuff stops but the background sounds continue to play.

Spot on, probably a bad section of track/dirty.

Thanks GRJ. It’s all new gargraves track where it’s happening, I also cleaned that track there to make sure that was not the problem. Your right the chuff stops and you can still hear the steam. I’ll also block tether like you said to see if that does the same.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

Actually, I think you'll find if the IR tether loses sight of the tender, the chuff will stop but the background steam sounds will continue.  If all the sounds drop out, that's normally a power interruption.

Try it, just drop a business card in the path of the IR and you'll see that the chuff stops but the background sounds continue to play.

Thanks for catching me John. I was thinking all sounds the are transmitted via the tether but obviously I didn’t make that clear 😅

GRJ, I put the business card in front of tether and it did exactly what you said.

Yep, so it could be the tether misaligned, fairly easy to check.  Another possibility is a broken solder joint under the heatshrink on the drawbar.  Tug gently on each wire where it goes under the heatshrink, I've had a number of these where the joint to a sender or receiver was loose and would open on curves or in one direction.

GRJ, I did what you said, the tether wires seem tight.I think I see what’s happening. When backing up the drawbar drops down a bit and The infared doesn’t line up. I hold down the drawbar on engine while backing up so infared lined up and it worked perfectly.so Than I was going around track and all the sudden the screw and spring fell out on track that’s on front truck of tender. See pic. Do I have the spring in correct place? I put it back together but noticed screw or body thread is stripped. It tightens a bit and than slips. Also originally I tightened it gently so it must of been stripped originally from factory. Can I get a new screw for that, unless it’s not the screw and it’s the base of the body. So now all the sudden the smoke quit working. I tried everything but no luck. I did lay engine on its side when I checked tether wires. When I put back on track no smoke. When it rains  it pours. Brand new engine.also now I can’t get chuff sounds back on. That happened once before but came back on. Frustrating.

Well, stripped truck screws always seem to be the casting and not the screw, nature of the beast.  It would be too easy if it's the screw.

I guess now the drawbar issues are minor...

What is your suggestion for the next step, I hate to send it back to Lionel. Did I have spring in correct. The screw just keeps falling out.☹️

The cuff sounds are working now. No smoke at all and the stripped screw problem. Can’t really run it now without the screw in tender. Any ideas on the smoke unit. It was working great maybe when I laid it on it’s side some smoke fluid spilled over on some contacts.??

Difficult to say exactly what happened.  What screw are you talking about anyway?

Picture of screw , sorry I send a pic but I guess it didn’t go. Also do o have it in coy position. Smoke unit too?

Is spring and screw in correct position?

I haven’t taken the tender apart yet, as I’m leaving for Florida tomorrow for two weeks. If it’s the base of tender that’s stripped maybe I could put a nut on inside of tender if there if room. If it’s the screw that’s stripped than hopefully I can get a new screw. Also cause both smoke units are not working may I should send it to Lionel to fix both issues. WhT do you think. If you were interested I. Fixing it I would pay you GRJ.

I think I read Lionel had an issue with circuit boards in that engine. Remember they drain the regular batteries and supposedly they needed to reflash the circuit boards for sounds. I read that in some previous post a month or two ago.

There were some boards that had a discharge issue, not sure if these are the ones.  The good news is, the YLB - RailSounds Battery Replacement wouldn't care, and it wouldn't be a problem.

The screw looks OK as far as position, you should be able to examine it to see if it's stripped.

Smoke units are a mystery, if all of them stopped, try reprogramming it and checking the position of the smoke switches.

The screw is hard to tell, I looked at it under magnifier, there is one spot that doesn’t look perfect, but hard to tell for sure. I did reprogram the engine. But still no smoke. Turn unit on an off etc.

Couple of thoughts -

The battery issue with these engines was when a 9 volt battery is installed in the tender, the sound system would drain it completely after you shutdown the engine.  The software code would not turn the battery/sound system completely off.  So John's statement about his "last battery" is spot on.  It would not care if it was drained or not.

There are two identical screws (P/N 691-1210-T13) that hold the draw bar in place on this tender.  They both screw into the bottom of the tender frame which is sheet metal.  So the screw(s) could be damaged or the sheet metal screw hole may be stripped. I have never had the hole in a frame strip, but I have seen the screw threads crossed and stripped.  I would hope new screws could solve the issue.  Both the screws and the frame show they are currently available on the Lionel parts website.  I was surprised the frame was less than $13.00

If the smoke units are not working, would there be a code (flashing cab light) that would be given, or is this model made before they started to do this?  Maybe one of the other techs may know the answer.

As a side note, if this engine is new old stock and has not been run for several years, my first thought would be the fan motors are not turning.  The only way to fix this is to open up the engine and test the smoke unit motors with a ~5 volt DC power supply.  If you do this, I always disconnect the smoke unit wiring from the control boards to prevent any possible back flow voltage. If the motors do not run, then you will need to either replace the motors or try to free up the motor shafts.  I have had very good luck getting old motors to spin with a little cleaning and oil on the sleeve bearings on the motor shaft.

As far as sending the engine back to Lionel for repair - I'm not sure I would recommend this.  I do not know Lionel's current repair status of working on out of warranty items, but I seem to remember they were not doing out of warranty repairs.  You may need to contact them and ask for details.

If you feel this repair is beyond your capabilities, I would seek help from one of the good people here on the forum.

Best of luck.  I have this engine and enjoy running it.  And I expect to have some maintenance required as time goes.

Thank you Dave for your help and info, the smoke units we’re working great. I had taken engine off track and laid it on its side , than put back on track and than stopped working. Also thank you Gun Runner John for all your feed back and help I appreciate it a lot. Ron

You are welcome.

Regarding the smoke units -
Thanks for the clarification.  Can you hear if the smoke unit motors are running? Or can you feel the air movement in the exhaust?  I turn the sounds off so I can hear the smoke units run as a first step.  I guess there could be some smoke fluid that could be blocking the exhaust ports when you placed the engine on its side.  You may need to clear the ports by gently blowing the exhaust backwards.

As a side note, my 2.5 yr old grandson watched me blow on the smoke stack exhaust once.  And now I caught him try to do the same thing.  LOL.  And saying "more steam".

I tried that . Turned down rail sounds to quite and cannot hear fan, before it stop working I could hear it. Maybe when I laid the  engine on its side some of smoke fluid got on some of the electrical contacts?  Because before that it worked perfectly.

Dave, Your grandson blowing in smoke stack, lol 😄😄

@DaveGG posted:

If the smoke units are not working, would there be a code (flashing cab light) that would be given, or is this model made before they started to do this?  Maybe one of the other techs may know the answer.

The flashing diagnostic codes came with the RCMC electronics, this locomotives is too early for those.

Ok thanks John, I ordered a new screw for draw bar, it was available. Hopefully that works. If it’s the tender base that’s stripped, that’s available for 13.00. Will try new screw first.