Model Forum / General / Railroads / June 2004

Folks,
   I did some running this last week at the club I belong to, and both the
locos I brought had problems staying on the track. One of the derailments
caused a short (!) that took some time to figure out. (The engineering dept
did a shoddy job one place...)

One of the locos I have probably had 15 years - I never remember it
derailing on my old 4'x8' layout with the 18" curves - the club is usually
40" curves! The lead truck's front axel goes off towards the right side of
the track and you get the normal sound as it is pushed along. That loco is
an Athearn SW1500 that was repowered with a Sagami can motor about 10 years
ago. I installed a Digitrax decoder in it not to long ago, but it runs fine
on my test track here.

The other loco I had problems with is a new Genesis unit - SD70M that
derailed in the same manner - the middle axle stays on the rails, the lead
axle goes right and the rear axle goes left on that lead truck.

Most folks run their stuff on the same track I was using with no problems -
what can I do to get these locos to run right?

Thanks!
Rick