Trouble with Hornby Q1

(Sent to yahoo groups as well)

Hi

Well I had not expected to be writing this one, I have become accustomed to having trouble with Bachmann but like everyone I had hoped that the 'New' Hornby was going to be something better.

Anyway, I have owned a Q1 for about two weeks and in that time it has performed well. Yesterday (sods law) I had a visit from my dad and of course he wanted to see the model.

Switched on and jerk, splutter dead!

No amount of tapping and pushing made it go and the relco unit was showing nothing on the track.

So I took the body off! (unclip the pipe at under the cab) and had a look. My initial suspicion was the dcc plug and socket (I don't use dcc) so I removed the plug and inserted wires into the socket. The loco now moved. Ok, I'll never use dcc so I will solder short the connections on the under side of the dcc socket. Loco ran fine!

An hour or so later I tried her again. Dead! (Numerous words describing extreme annoyance were issued)

Off came the body. With power on I gently pulled and prodded at all the wires to no avail.

Then in a more scientific frame of mind I tested the connections with a volt meter. This showed that power was making it up the red wire from the pick ups to the dcc plug and that side of the motor. The other side that comes through the metal chassis block was not working!

However, when I placed my meter just inside the chimney screw mount voltage was there!

My attention then tuned to the small screw with red wire and terminal attached just back from the dcc plug. I unscrewed this and found that it also held in place the worm cover for the motor. This cover is not metal! Under this cover is the chassis block. And again voltage was present.

Looking at the screw, it is of the blackened type! but not chemically. I used some fine sand paper to bring the screw and under side of its head back to silver! A very light coat of oil to prevent rust was applied. I then reassembled everything and it all works.

While the Q1 can and does get pick up via the tender it needs to have it via the loco as the tenders pick up is not 100% All my tests were conducted with just the loco. I hope this has stopped the problem.

When working on these locos be very careful of the lamp irons! also do unclip the pipe from the chassis block under the left hand side of the cab.

I'll keep you posted.

With Kind regards and Christmas wishes, from

Mike in West Sussex. UK

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Reply to
Mike
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"Mike" wrote

Just wire around the DCC socket, that should solve your problem.

John.

Reply to
John Turner

Hi

After a long day at work I came back and tested the Q1 to find yet again it was dead! This time I discovered that there was no connection between the track and the chassis side of the block! So the screw I told you about was now out of the picture.

The only place left was the transfer from the wheels to the pickups. Unclipping all the brake rods was next. Then I undid the four screws on the bottom plate and removed it. Carefully moving the sand pipes out of the way.

Under the plate I discovered a real let down!

Hornby are relying on the bottom plate to hold down two bronze pads against some brass eyelets that are part buried in the chassis block. These pads are connected to the pick ups from the wheels. I noticed that with the plate in place again one of these pads could move about due to a slight buckle in the bottom plate. The bottom plate also locates on four small plastic pins that the bronze pads mount over. One of these pins was not properly locating in the hole in the bottom plate and I had to open the hole up a little. This must have caused the buckle?

I then took two very small spring washers and placed one over each pin, now the bottom plate presses down on these washers and in turn holds the bronze pads hard against the brass eyelets.

Ok, it works again, maybe in the morning it won't then I will be stuck as what do look at next. I guess that I could look to see whats on the other side of the eyelets, presumably one will have the red wire connected and the other will be in contact with the chassis block.

Thank you Hornby for destroying my faith in you :-(

Reply to
Mike

"Mike" wrote

Yes, all of their recent steam models are the same. It's a real botch, but works ...................... providing the base plate doesn't buckle, which it invariably does to some extent or other.

I can see this presenting real long term reliability problems with all their

*new* steam locos.

John.

Reply to
John Turner

I can see this presenting real long term reliability problems with all their

*new* steam locos.

John.

Thanks John

I can't tell you how pi**ed off with them I am. After all the bother with Bachmann and their lack of care re detail and mechanisms I really thought Hornby would be the answer! Have they been made aware of this stupid problem? I can't find an e-mail for them.

Reply to
Mike

Try Donna at snipped-for-privacy@hornby.com

Reply to
MartinS

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