Need some help with a 2-10-4 C&0

[UP/C&O]

Hello,
I bought a Broadway Limited Blue Line 2-10-4 C&0 a number of years ago and it said it was DCC ready just add a decoder. Well, the decoder was added and it just sat on the tracks doing nothing. So I had my local hobby guy change out the sound board and put in Soundtraxx. It ran fine in the store on his test track. I get it home and it stalls out going over Atlas switches, going over Peco switches no problem. Sometimes it stalls for no reason. I have taken it back to him and he couldn't find anything wrong with it either. He did say it only had pick ups in the tender and none on the drivers. I believe this is the main problem. How can I fix this? All of my other trains run great and have no problems. I am half tempted to take it to work and have the Electrical Engineers rewire it. Any comments suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,

Paul

 

[Cjcrescent]

What I would recommend is for you to check out a set of Tomar Pickup Shoes for the locomotive.

Here is the web site;

http://www.tomarindustries.com/acc.htm

You would want to use set # 805, made for locomotives.

The way I would do it is to add a set onto the locomotive for each rail, Two shoes per side. Wire these back to the tender via a set of mini connectors like the ones from Miniatronics Corp. Here;

http://www.miniatronics.com/Merchant2/merchant.mvc?Screen=CTGY&Category_Code=4

Using the 2-wire connector, the connections in the tender could just be made to each tender truck, or their associated wires. Just make sure that the shoes on each side are connected to the proper tender truck. That is rt loco pickup side connects to rt tender pickup side.

This sounds a lot more complicated than it is. I have solved many a loco pickup problems with these Tomar shoes.

 

[Selector]

I have no better suggestion except that BLI will fix it and any other 'issues' for shipping there plus about $40, including all parts, labour, and return shipping. I offer this because it will be done as designed, and all BLI steamers should have pickups in the drivers. Some even in one or both trucks. For this one to have no pickup on the driver axles is very strange.

 

[Cjcrescent]

You got me there Crandell. I wasn't aware that BLI's had the all wheel pickup. I don't own any BLI because of the problems with them via the repair service at our LHS. I've worked on several BLI's bought off the internet, that have had pickup problems, and fixed them with the Tomars.

Since the locos weren't our product, we obviously had to charge for labor and parts, and it wasn't cheaper than sending them back to BLI, but the repairs were a lot faster. Generally 2-3 days.