Hi all --
Since no one has been interested in a SWM 4-4-2 that I still have from my shop
days, I thought I might put it to work. While I had straightened out the
polarity / direction problem that it came with, I had not addressed all the
issues this particular model had. Even though I ran this engine inverted in a
cradle for an hour in each direction, it was still very noisy and rough (not
all of these engines were like this – I sold a few others that ran very well),
so I figured it needed a new motor. I found a good candidate in my piles of
stuff (no identification on it, but it ran perfectly with NO vibration and gobs
of torque), and committed to the project by cutting the worm off of the
original motor. There was no other option as the worm was very securely
attached to the motor shaft and that assembly would not pass through the hole
for the shaft in the motor mount. While I had things apart, I thought I would
check out the gearbox, so after cleaning the gearbox and gears, I reassembled
and ran just the gearbox with a Maxon motor. While it ran sort of OK, the
GEARBOX got hot! A quick check showed the idler gear shaft was tight in the
bearings, so I pulled the bearings, filed the faces smooth and relieved the
shaft holes just a bit. I checked the worm similarly, and when I ran it the
next time it was fine. I mounted the new motor, added a plug to the headlight
wiring to make disassembly easier and reassembled. The engine ran much
better, but it took another adjustment session on the gearbox before it ran
really well FORWARD. It’s OK in reverse, but RRM has nothing to fear...
Next I found it couldn’t pull two brass passenger cars up my 2% and it seemed
that the inside bearing trailing wheelset was at fault. Sure enough, when I
pulled it apart the bearing was stuck in its slot and the springing was too
stiff. I filed the bearing to fit the slot, shortened the spring a fraction
and now it pulls 2 brass cars. Once I get the new SU “wood” passenger cars
built, it will be a perfect match. I just have to unletter and re-letter the
loco now...
I hope everyone had a good week, and that the hurricane causes no real trouble
for you!
Bill Winans
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