Mantua 2-6-6-2T Engine Tune Up
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Once all the wiper wires were attached it was time to route some wires. To make a neat wire harness I fastened the wires with
some homemade eye bolts.
I used two different color wires. One for the front engine, purple/blue and red for the back. No reason.
I just had those available at the time. You may want to use black
and red for your project.
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To neatened up the wire routing I made eye bolts out of brass wire.
I formed a loop big enough for the wire to fit through.
This made
routing the wires much easier and neater. I drilled a hole a bit smaller
that the wire diameter and ACC glued in the wire.
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And all the wires installed and ready for a test run.
I temporarily wired the front and rear engine together and then on to the motor. I set it on the tracks and ..........nothing.
A dead short. Those plugs
came in handy. Started checking with continuity meter. Dead short across the wheels. Pulled the plugs
and everything OK. ??Must be the wiring. Nope. Then it
came to me. The front engine has the insulated wheels on one side and
the rear engine has the insulated wheels on the opposite side. So the front engine picks up power
on one side and on the other
side on the rear engine. Solution? Flip the wheels around on one engine so the insulated are all on one side. Easier said than done.
Once
that was done back on the tracks and whalla a running engine.
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Next up is taking care of that side-to-side excessive play in the wheels. I made a washer from nylon. I did use my lathe for that.
I'm sure you can make
a washer without a lathe. The hole doesn't need to be perfect or even the OD of the washer. Not wanting to
remove the wheels to get a solid washer on and have to re-quarter
the divers I thought I give the split washer a try.I turned down
a 5/8" diameter nylon rod to an outside diameter of .250" (1/4") with a .125" (1/8") diameter hole, the size
of the axle. I sliced
off washers .015" thick and cut a pie slice out of it.
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The bearing shells need to narrowed due to the shims added to the axles.
Once the engine was running to my statisfaction with the wiring it was time to run the wiring for the lights and reassemble the shell. That'll be next.
