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Requesting advice from my friends…

I am having difficulty in successfully running two new generation Lionel Legacy steam locomotives that I purchased NIB directly from Lionel in December 2019. Before I describe the details, please let me explain that my testing with several of my older generation Legacy steam and diesel locomotives proves that they run flawlessly on the same trackage.

The two new locomotives, that are having the problems are:

LIO 1931120 “Southern Legacy USRA Light Mountain #1483” and

LIO 1931350 “Legacy N&W J #603”.

The three older Legacy locomotives that I have used in my testing are:

6-18992 “Southern Pacific Alco S-2 Diesel Switcher #1440”,

6-38984 “Chesapeake & Ohio GP-35 Diesel Locomotive #3515” and

6-11127 “Southern Pacific GS-4 #4436 Steam Locomotive and Tender”.

I am assuming that there is an issue with the way in which I have assembled and wired my layout.

The current symptom of the problem that the two new locomotives have is that immediately upon the (wireless tether) physical connection between the locomotive and the tender crossing a joint between (some) two Fastrack sections, there is an audible “pop”, and the LRS sound level drops very low. The locomotive appears to continue running as I had commanded it to do; it appears that just the LRS was affected.

Pressing the “R” reset button on the CAB2 remote restores the locomotive/tender combination to the correct sound level – I believe that it is the sound level that I had set prior to the “hiccup”; however, even if it is different, at least, after the reset, the sound level is very high, which is what I had chosen on purpose as part of my testing..

There are currently four locations on my layout at which this problem occurs.

My layout is approximately 23 ft by 15 ft. The trackage is 100% Fastrack. It is currently powered by a single MTH Z-4000 transformer and (temporarily) wired from a single transformer throttle in a “spider web” manner. The wiring includes multiple electrical connections – maybe not every 6 ft, but certainly not any farther than 10 ft. The layout is still at the stage of track “just” lying on top of the flat layout (homasote over plywood).

Before I received these two new locomotives the layout was not sophisticated, but was still more complex than simple, as well as being fairly large… double track mainline, two reversing loops, and several yards and spurs. In an attempt to isolate what/where the issues might be on the layout, I disconnected all trackage and wiring except for the outer mainline. The current symptoms are occurring consistently on this (in effect) single large loop of track.

Background – the two new locomotives had much more serious problems in running on my layout before I got to this current stage of diagnosis and correction. On the layout prior to any disassembly of the layout, they consistently and very frequently would fall into a state in which they would not respond to any commands at all, and which could not be corrected without performing a full factory reset. In an effort to decide whether or not there were defects in the two new locomotives, I assembled a simple test layout on the floor – an oval of O96 and straight Fastrack with the Z-4000 and Legacy command base and remotes that I detached and removed from the main layout. Both of the new locomotives performed flawlessly consistently on this test layout – both separately and running together simultaneously (NOT lashed-up).

I look forward to your suggestions as to what I need to do differently in order for these locomotives to run flawlessly on my layout. I am equally very curious as to what the difference might be between these new generation Legacy locomotives versus my older ones, that seems to make the new ones more sensitive to track and wiring aspects.

Thank you!!!

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Since no one has chimed in, I'll give you my limited opinion.

Since the issue only happens at 4 specific locations on the track and the engines work flawlessly on a test track, I don't think it is a tether issue right now. I would think that you may be experiencing a temporary voltage drop at those 4 locations which is causing the sound to drop out.

I would first test the track voltage with a meter on the 2-3 sections of track at or near each location.

If that tests out, I would remove the 2-3 track sections at the "easiest-to-remove-track" location on the layout where it is happening and hardwire (solder) those sections together; re-install; and see if that eliminates the issue at that location.

 

Many folks have commented about some of the new releases having sound dropouts.  Usually it's on switches or crossovers, rarely on a straight piece of track. For locomotives like the Vision Line Challenger and the Vision Line Niagara, the culprit is the two closely spaced rollers on the tender, too easy for them to lose contact on a transition piece.  My fix for the dropouts is the YLB - RailSounds Battery Replacement (RS-Lite).  This is a permanent battery replacement specifically designed for Lionel RailSounds equipped locomotive.  The RS-Lite version plugs into the audio board directly and has one wire to the center roller, job done.

It actually comes in two versions, one for locomotives with a battery cable, and the other for locomotives with the RS-Lite board.

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1st, I wouldn't test for steam issues with a diesel as they have no sound tender. 2nd, we need a track plan. It is known many Legacy steam engines loose the sound when rolling over a switch or other track piece if power or common is lost. Unlike TMCC the engines they were not programmed for the chuff to restart.

Thank you everyone for all of your suggestions. 

I am curious, but have no clue as to whether this might be a power issue, or a signal issue. The drop out occurs on straight track, not on a switch.

BTW, this is my first ever post, although I have read posted information often, and find it very useful. Please do not be bashful to suggest if I should have chosen a different Forum subject category for this particular concern.

Thanks again.

 

You mentioned your track is not fixed yet.  Those new engines are also bigger, longer than the diesels you tested with and the track is probably flexing as it goes over it, losing connection for a second.

Even on straight sections the track need to be solid, level, tight connections between track sections.  As a test you could screw done and shim the spots where it drops out and retest and I bet it will go through the sections fine.

How are you controlling the engines? Manual throttle, Legacy, Bluetooth with a handheld device and app?

If you have identified troublesome areas, just exchange a piece or two of track from that area with another area, particularly 10" pieces.

A lighted caboose or passenger car is handy to roll around and check for good power. Remove any other cars or engines.

If you are using a Legacy base, try connecting the base track wire to the Black output terminal on the transformer.

FIXED!

Thank you everyone for your recommendations.

A special thank you to "Cincytrains" for being the first to remind me of the basics -- I cleaned about 20-25 feet of track spanning the area of three of the four locations where LRS was dropping out.

Both of these new locomotives ran flawlessly repeatedly and consistently, not just over those three areas, but the entire loop (approx. 72 ft), at the "restricted speed" setting -- both forward and reverse.

Thanks again.

OGR Bob, welcome to posting on this great forum, your going to really enjoy reading what many folks (with great electronic experience) say about repair fixes, ideas, thoughts, to help us when we have operational issues. Gunrunner John is one of the best. Marty E is also one of the best, just to name a couple. There’s another thread named “What did you do on your layout today “ where we show pictures of our layouts, the work we’ve been doing and commenting on others achievements. Hop on that thread, you’ll like it.  Happy Railroading 

Along this 20-25 foot area where there were three different LRS dropout locations, the track was already tightly connected and level, and in fact there were some electrical connections close to a couple of the dropout locations.

All I did yesterday was to thoroughly clean the rail top surfaces. before cleaning, visually they did not look that bad, but my white soft cotton cleaning rag was VERY black afterwards.

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