Over-clocked Gordon

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I just test-ran my first attempt at a modified engine. WOW!!!

Gordon's tender is rigged with two AAA batteries, a re-formed paperclip, some balsa packing and some insulating tape - not a permanent solution, I admit, while his motor housing is packed with lead in a similar way to Powerful Gordon's (thanks again for that most excellent post) and there's a lump of lead in place of the standard two rods over the front axle. I found that too much weight in the front results in loss of traction at the rear.

As I type this he's hurtling around the track with eight coaches in tow (three long, three short that he's borrowed from Emily, and two long that were once Spencer's at the rear), including up ramps that he had trouble getting up with three coaches yesterday.

First Question - does running these standard motors at 3VDC do them any damage, apart from obviously racking up the wear and tear? How long will it be before I detect a disconcerting burning smell?

Second Question - when I add a ninth carriage, the drag of the train is enough to pull it off the track when it goes around a curve at the top of a ramp. This is to be expected I suppose, and eight carriages is plenty long enough for me, but I wondered if anyone had attempted to get around the problem by weighting carriages at or beneath their wheelbases to give them a lower centre of gravity ?
I weighted the bottom of a rake of green flatcars and they still have a tendency to topple over if the train is too long, the trick is to strategically add weighted cars every few cars to get the best results but it's all trial and error, the momentum of the train has allot to do with them not tipping over but when a slowdown occurs is usually when they topple.
[-] The following 1 user Likes Ucwepn's post:
  • HankAmericanEngine
Honestly, a mr.motorman should help prevent fallen over carriages. I would think you could just have the train at about half speed than hammer down the throttle on a turn so the train picks up speed instead of losing it. I don't know if this theory would work as I don't own a mr.motorman.
Proud owner of Tomy/Plarail trains. Cool



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