Is the Smoke Unit in my Legacy Sante Fe 3751 Toast?

If the smoke fan motor is on but no smoke is coming out then it's possible the heating element is bad. Did you check to see if there is cool air coming out of the stack when the smoke fan motor is on?

Catnap:  Thanks for the reply.

 

The smoke unit isn't "on" in the normal way.  I can hear a fan spinning VERY, VERY fast....at what I assume is the max RPM of the motor.

Did Lionel tell you what exactly they did to it when it was in for repair?

I presume you added fluid several times during the 2 hr run session. These smoke units are probably only good for about 5 minutes of running on high before they need more fluid added.

 

Have you tried a reset? In addition to what catnap said, if you stick your nose over the stack you should be able to feel the heat if its still heating up.

 

Could be the regulator, smoke units usually smoke like crazy right before the regulator goes out, then you get nothing.

 

This doesn't explain the fan, but if the fan is operating its probably hard to tell if its going too fast. Usually with lionel they stop working altogether.

 

 

If its still under warranty, might be still worth the aggrivation of sending it back. Send Lionel an email with all of the specifics regarding the recent repair. Theres a chance they might pickup your end of the shipping this time.

 

Judging by the video and the events you describe I'd think that the AC regulator has gone, which is a fairly frequent occurrence with Legacy engines. If that's the case however you should sense the tell-tale scent of a burned out electrical component, which you don't mention.

 

The heat generated by having high voltage fed to the smoke unit heating element might have damaged the fan motor itself or the circuit that controls it. I think you will only know for sure by having a look at the smoke unit yourself or getting someone who can do repairs to look for you.

 

You mention substituting an MTH smoke unit. I don't think that this is necessarily easy or will leave you with a whistle smoke function. In your position I'd get a local repair person to replace the Lionel parts. Yes, I know they might fail again but I have had better luck with replacement Lionel smoke units than the factory-installed versions.

 

I've worked on a number of these, and putting an MTH smoke unit in there would be a real challenge, I sing with the chorus and recommend just fixing it.  It wouldn't affect the whistle smoke, that one uses a separate smoke unit for the whistle.  However, I don't see this as a realistic change in any case.

 

The times I've seen the smoke regulator short out, the smoke unit has only lasted about 30 seconds before it was a goner, both times I had to replace not only the regulator, but the smoke unit PCB, resistor, and wick.  Pumping about 40 watts into a smoke unit doesn't allow for long life!

 

The smoke unit is driven from the RCMC in the Legacy Northern, I haven't seen one of those fail, so I'm not sure exactly what the failure mode might be.  I don't think they use triacs on that board, so it may have a different failure mode.

Did you get the 3 blinking cab lights again?

Are you sure its not out of smoke? Spitting fluid out is normal, happens to mine all the time. Thats why guys who weather their engines, usually keep the smoke unit off.

That amount of smoke, especially after Lionel worked on it, is not unreasonable. You know the fan motor works, but is the resistor getting hot? That's the question of the day.

Hi Guys,

 

This engine is not equipped with a smoke regulator, like John says the smoke units are driven from the RCMC board. The only thing you can do is reprogram the engine with a different ID/ engine number and see if that unlocks the RCMC board. If not the RCMC has to be replaced.

 

John the RCMC doesn't really fail, it shuts off the output to the smoke units, usually because the units are overfilled with smoke fluid. The last 4 engines I've repaired had enough smoke fluid in them for 3 months of use. Most everyone is overfilling there smoke units.

 

Alex

When the fan went, the heater burned a crisp imprint into the compressed fiberglass wicking.  That stuff is junk.  If you are hearing the fan, feel for hot air coming out of the stack.  If you have that and I believe you may, install the rope wicking and you will be very happy.

 

I remove all the stock wicking that comes with my engines and put the rope (shredded) wicking in.  I see your issue many times.

 

No AC smoke reg in that engine.

The smoke looked great while it was smoking!

 

Alex,

I suspect I am in that category for fear of running dry and equally damaging the heating elements. I wish there were a rule-of-thumb as to when to add fluid. I normally add 10 drops of so every other run, but sometimes the runs are not that long.

 

Also, if I think that there isn't enough steam (or smoke) being generated, I add more fluid; but now I see that it is entirely possible that the apparent low volume of steam may be because there may be too much fluid already!

 

With all the technology available, it doesn't seem that it would be that daunting to insert a couple of electrodes (wires) into the wick to measure the resistance between them, and correlate this with the moisture content (humidity indicator). Then, when the low threshold of moisture were reached, an LED or an announcement from the crew (crew talk) would alert the operator that it is time to add fluid. 

 

Alex

TAS did that.   It would shut down the unit.  I do like your idea Alex about the announcement.  That would be very cool.   The best way to judge when to add fluid is to read the book that comes with the locomotive.  It is spelled out very clear when to add smoke fluid. 

 

 

I add a lot of fluid to mine .. The only engine I ever had muti issiues with is this same engine .. It had a bad cord and bad motor. I changed them motor(mth) and cord and never had anymore problems . This engine was made when I think they had those really bad motors.

Thanks to everyone for all of your replies.  Tax season has kept me from replying back sooner.  My apologies.

 

I do get the three blinking lights...again.  And I've had no shortage of smoke fluid added.  When I free up, I'm going to stick my nose over the smoke stack to see if I can smell anything.  I also like the idea of programming the loco using a different number.

 

Once I exhaust all of my easy fixes, I'll go the routes suggested by Fitz, Alex, and GRJohn.

 

Thanks again, everyone!