AC Comander Pulmor motor runs slow

What’s your power source?….the motors in this family of locomotives are huge, power hungry motors ……

I lop off the whole back end of those engines, and go Pittman, …..there’s just no comparison,….they’re geared perfectly for the large Pittman motors, AC commander or not, I doubt anybody could get 100% satisfied trying to tame that giant Pulmor ….there is no cruise feature with an AC commander …..just an FYI …

Pat

Hello Pat

I run a modern Lionel ZW with a 180 brick on each mainline.  Track sees full power and all my other command engines run perfect.  I admire your work moving to Pitmans.  This AC conversion was a test as it's what I have time for.  Modifying like you masterfully takes more time than I have unfortunately.

Marty, I have a boat load of ACDR TMCC take offs you’re more than welcome to try one of those if you’d like, …..I’ve never tried an AC commander on one of those high stack motors…..maybe the AC commander doesn’t like that big honking motor?….I know my buddy Sean tried one on a 2037 postwar and he was somewhat happy with it, but that thing probably draws half the power that giant Pulmor would,……but again, I’ve never used an AC commander, …..it does sound like you’ve got plenty of power at the track,…..try disconnecting the AC commander and see how it runs hardwired forward straight up on AC power ….that’ll tell the tale on how the motor is performing,……

Pat

@harmonyards posted:

What’s your power source?….the motors in this family of locomotives are huge, power hungry motors ……

I lop off the whole back end of those engines, and go Pittman, …..there’s just no comparison,….they’re geared perfectly for the large Pittman motors, AC commander or not, I doubt anybody could get 100% satisfied trying to tame that giant Pulmor ….there is no cruise feature with an AC commander …..just an FYI …

Pat

Pat,

This is not a solution for the poor guy.  He's just looking for an answer to his question.

Your initial response doesn't even remotely answer that question, particularly since his T-1 is running so slow, even slower than you would expect with the Pulmor in place as it came from the factory.

Thank you for the follow-on though, because that does.

I had a similar shortcoming with my Pulmor Mohawk (6-18064) when it was new and just out of the box.  It's the same approximate vintage as your T-1.  It took a while but someone figured out that the ACDR was suffering from a poor choice of components.

Just before that I had put it away and didn't pull it out for almost 20 years.  As I came back into the hobby and discovered the source of the issue, I ordered a new ACDR (which had the fix in it and superseded the old one) from lionelsupport.com, installed it, and have had no problem since.

I doubt your issue similarly would be a bad AC Commander, but it could be.

Mike

@Mellow Hudson Mike posted:

Pat,

This is not a solution for the poor guy.  He's just looking for an answer to his question.

Your response doesn't even remotely answer that question, particularly since his T-1 is running so slow, even slower than you would expect with the Pulmor in place as it came from the factory.

I had a similar shortcoming with my Pulmor Mohawk (6-18064) when it was new and just out of the box.  It's a similar vintage to your T-1.  It took a while but someone figured out that the ACDR Was suffering from a poor choice of components.

Just before that I had put it away and didn't pull it out for almost 20 years.  As I came back into the hobby and discovered the source of the issue, I ordered a new ACDR (which had the fix in it and superseded the old one) from lionelsupport.com, installed it, and have had no problem since.

I doubt your issue similarly would be a bad AC Commander, but it could be.

Mike

Mike, as usual, you jump the gun,……read on son,….you’ll see suggestions for a fix….

Pat

Pat,

Fair enough.  You beat me to my correction by about two seconds.

Read the edited version.  It acknowledges your follow-up.

Thanks for your patience.

Mike

The engine had no problems running conventional before I removed the old electronics.  Nice loud fast moving just as the same era Mohawk I have as well.  I just hooked up the motor without the AC Commander and no issues with engine. 

Here's how I have the motor wire, not complicated and matches both instructions and how others wire the same motor. 

Marty, see if you can rule out the engine or the AC commander themselves, do you have another platform you could stick the AC commander in to see if the problem follows the commander?…..if so, you might just have a bad one…..if not, you’ll have to look closer at that T1,….again, you’re more than welcome to an ACDR TMCC, which is the factory equivalent to an AC commander….

Pat

Problem solved.  I though I input the Aux1 feature code correctly, but alas I did not.  Once I resent the engine ID and code to 4 I now have a strong runner.  Knew I was something I did wrong since it's my first one.

Kind of surprised all my searches on related fields never brought this up.

@Chemwiz posted:

Problem solved.  I though I input the Aux1 feature code correctly, but alas I did not.  Once I resent the engine ID and code to 4 I now have a strong runner.  Knew I was something I did wrong since it's my first one.

Kind of surprised all my searches on related fields never brought this up.

Glad you got it fixed, …..AC commanders for some of us are mute issues, beings there’s no cruise capability,……if there was, I wouldn’t be killing myself to jam Pittmans in these things…….have fun!…

Pat