Worst locos

sidney Dec 16, 2022

  1. sidney

    sidney TrainBoard Member

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    in my small fleet i have three locos that no matter what ive done to them REFUSE to work reliably if at all.
    AND two nw2's that are junk now , one a kato the other bman.

    1st up Kato end sd70ace with TCSK1D4 decoder. from day 4 has never run good. cleaned it well and still no go . when it did run it pulled like 18 mules, that's the only good thing i can say about it....

    #2 ATLAS B23-7 with TCS 1029 AMD4 decoder . sometimes she run good but only higher speed then it slows way down and gets intermittent , AGAIN cleaned well and no change from day 1.

    #3 Intermountain SD0-2 with ESU LOKSOUND select decoder installed. Ran great for a while pretty good sound , started having problems with it picking up power so AGAIN cleaned her up real nice and its never ran consistently a month after ive had it.

    ALL locos have been cleaned many times ALL locos have had many adjustments ALL locos now just sit in boxs (think im gunna sell the dang things )

    NOW i have TWO atlas locos running full time and those are the ONLY two that have stood the test of time running with little issues.... EVEN my nw2's are dead again they as well have never ran great. one of them the gear slipped , i repaired it and now gremlins have it . the othere one Bman is junk from day one . (never buy them bmans there junk)
    im tired of trying to get these working consistently its just impossable.
    Could be they need different decoders i dunno. I do know they have been problematic from day one..
     

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  2. sidney

    sidney TrainBoard Member

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    both of my very good running locos from day one are atlas locos. these two have been very good runners from day one . the TPW is slow but runs great and does very nice crawl speed like in a snail moves faster .
    the CSX is much faster and also crawls real slow like in a snail moves faster with out issues.
    The TPW (orange loco has NCE decoder and i dont remember what the CSX loco has for a decoder...
     

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  3. Many Trains

    Many Trains TrainBoard Member

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    The B23-7 - try changing the decoder. It's worth a shot trying a different decoder to see if that will make a difference before junking it.
     
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  4. sidney

    sidney TrainBoard Member

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    yup i was thinking about the NCE decoders as the one loco that has that installed is a very nice runner . she creeps along very very slow and hardly ever a glitch.
    but that kato sd70 im sure its going away as ive changed just about everything in that loco and its still garbage . complete waste of money.. ive got extra trucks for it as it had a few messed up gears from the factory. i may keep them for parts rigs too(just for them gears and motors.
    problem is if i keep them i want to try an fix them when ever i look at them.....
     
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  5. DCESharkman

    DCESharkman TrainBoard Member

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    The Intermountain may be a victim of the Frame plague , if it came with the decoder preinstalled, send it back to IM.

    With more Kato locomotives than I can count, I have yet to find a bad one. You may need to solder the side pick-up paddles to the motor lead.

    The Atlas are common with alignment issues, again make sure the motor leads are soldered.

    Never trust a physical mechanical connection, always solder and always get a proper electrical connection.
     
  6. brokemoto

    brokemoto TrainBoard Member

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    There have been complaints about the gears' cracking on the NW-2 and the RDCs. None of mine have shown this problem Y-E-T. I have only two NW-2s but do have several RDCs. I have Kato F-units and RS-2/RSC-2. They are excellent. I have had several other Kato F-units and like you, have yet to see a bad one. The same applies to the RS-2/RSC-2s. I once had more than I now have. Never have I had a bad one. I had Kato Mikados. Once you got the tender properly weighted down and did the traction tire driver swap, they were good, as well.

    Other than Atlas-Kato or CC-Kato, those are the only Kato locomotives with which I have experience.
     
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  7. mtntrainman

    mtntrainman TrainBoard Supporter

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    My worst:

    FVM ES44AC !

    It looks great and ran fine when I got it...until it didn't !!
    Numerous contacts with FVM. Numerous parts sent. No joy !!
    It now sits on THE Deadline...just to remind me how much $$$ and time I wasted on it. :censored:
    .
    [​IMG]
     
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  8. Calzephyr

    Calzephyr TrainBoard Supporter

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    I hate to keep beating the dead horse... but the Intermountain Railway Co frames are making a former favorite to become a most hated.
     
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  9. in2tech

    in2tech TrainBoard Member

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    If bought brand new and from authorized store, don't these locomotives come with some king of warranty? I mean when you buy them they are expected to run, right? Need to look at my warranties for my Kato ES44DC's ( a year might be up? ), and the brand new one I am getting soon! Matter of fact I am not even sure what the warranty time is? Might have passed already?

    Best of luck to everyone.
     
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  10. sidney

    sidney TrainBoard Member

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    well right after i posted i got to fiddling with the IM SD40 got it to running pretty good (again) its very picky. she s got sound. i cleaned her up an put no-ox on the axle cups an any place it made electrical contacts. will see after a day or two if it stays. Its always been a picky loco from 1st day.

    the atlas B23 i cleaned her up and now she is working again i must have done something right to that one cause she runs very slow now crawls. Again with this one i did the no-ox on the bearing cups and electrical parts that make contact... (maybe that makes a difference for them time will tell )

    The kato SD70 well its just a lost cause it runs then stops runs some then gets quirky again ..when she was new it pulled like a rapped ape.
    my kato nw2 had a gear spinning on the shaft. fixed it by sliding the gear back and filing the shaft a bit then add super glue and slide the gear back over. Thats still holding, but its dead again power problems the bman nw2 its in the junk box along with the kato.
    so far all my atlas locos have been dependable runners. with the exception of that b23...
    i could put that sd70 up on blocks around the loco shop yard. i dunno im tired of messing with it.i wanna play with my toys not fix them all the time.....
    see what i mean if i look at them i wanna fix them except that dang sd70 im just tired of messing with that one.
     
  11. sidney

    sidney TrainBoard Member

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    in2tech i tried that warrenty stuff with a Bman i had bought new they sent it back saying there was nothing wrong with it , ive never got that one to work. sent it off to somebody here on this place and they fixed it and sent it back to me . Wasted way too much money .... it ran for about half a day then died that was it for the bman trashed it (i think i sold the body on flea bay and trashed the frame ect.it just pissed me off brand new loco and never ran .that was it for me NO MORE BMANS.........
     
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  12. alister

    alister TrainBoard Member

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    When I saw the title of this thread I assumed you all would be talking about Lima (pancake motor) or Mehano and maybe early Bachmann F9's, Plymouth switcher or bluebox / blackbox Bachmann 4-8-4 Northerns. IM I can understand, Kato and Atlas - it's rare that they mess up at least with their later runs and they usually fix issues pretty quickly
     
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  13. 308GTSi

    308GTSi TrainBoard Member

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    Eeeerrr, did you leave that parked in a bad neighbourhood ??? :D
     
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  14. tehachapifan

    tehachapifan TrainBoard Member

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    I was about to say that I think I can see in the pic why it may not be running.;)
     
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  15. Mark Ricci

    Mark Ricci TrainBoard Member

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    Not having any loco service experience as well as just starting out, 3 out of 4 locos bought brand new because of warranty. Fortunately, addressed within warranty period because all 3 new locos out of the box had issues. The BLI had pickup problem but ran great after BLI sent replacement trucks. The SD35 went back to Atlas 3x before it ran right and the Bachmann GP7, while a incredibly great creeper, gear cracked within a few months of purchase.

    Mentioned vibration in Bachmann service request and initially they inferred it could have been the cause. The gear was fixed but vibration remained. Bachmann then claimed the vibration is normal which probably is the case. Hoping the vibration is not the cause of the cracked gear. Buying new with a warranty paid off but not without some grief. Believe Atlas, BLI and Bachmann have 1 yr warranty.

    Nothing worse than spending $$$ on a paperweight.
     
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  16. MK

    MK TrainBoard Member

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    That loco must have had custom wheels, perhaps alloy. Now had he used cinder blocks instead of logs... :ROFLMAO:
     
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  17. in2tech

    in2tech TrainBoard Member

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    Have to say I didn't get this at first :) Then I noticed it was jacked up, and the rim's where gone :) AKA, trucks/wheels!

    I'm not laughing at the person that got a bad locomotive. I'm laughing at the joke :)

    So is this a DCC thing, or is/was it true of DC also?
     
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  18. JBrown

    JBrown TrainBoard Member

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    I see about cleaning the engines, but did I miss about cleaning the track also?
     
  19. OleSmokey

    OleSmokey TrainBoard Member

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    Yeah i know all about the paper weights. I got one still. a BLI NW-2 thats still in the box. A fair paperweight but really to light to work for that too. I had two and replaced one with a new dcc decoder and that has fixed that one. Waiting till i have a few more greenbacks to get another decoder. I have three Atlas loco's. two of the rs-2's and a S-2 that have worked great out of the box. I have a Bachmann 70 ton switcher that i got new. I have had to send it back twice but they really fixed it this last time. It is now a great little runner. From what i have seen its a crap shoot as to what does work and ones that are junk from the get go. My take is you can get a good one from a company and two bad ones from the same company. My take is that a box was dropped or something that caused damage to the engines. Bachmann is always a crap shot. I have had 5 of them. I have one good one after that one went to the company to be fixed. That Bachmann that has vibration in the loco i would bet is a bent axle. Just my two cents
     
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  20. Hoghead2

    Hoghead2 TrainBoard Member

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    Eek! Hoodrats stole your bogies!
     
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