Subject:
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Re: How long will train 9v motors last?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.trains
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Date:
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Mon, 22 Jan 2007 21:35:27 GMT
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Viewed:
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3777 times
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In lugnet.trains, Jindrich Kubec wrote:
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Hi,
we’re preparing a museum show (our first). The trains will run on two
layouts, driven by some timer & RCX. We’re currently discussing how
often and how long should each loco run. Are there any estimates how
long will the 9v trains motor last? Anybody has experience with such
long-running automated layout? (long running = few weeks).
Regards,
Jindroush
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Jindrich-
SCLTC has lots of experience running 10 week shows that are frequently
unattended by club members. For these shows, we run 4x5+2*5= 30 hours per week.
We have also done a month long event where we ran 84 hours a week. Our
experience with motors matches other comments posted here, except, as I have
pointed out in other posts, our observation is that while motor units (the
combined electric motor, gears, pickups, and wheels) will fail, that the motors
themselves almost never (OK, 1 bad in 100s) ever fail. What goes wrong first and
95% of the time is the electrical pickups that contact the wheels wear through
and break off (making a shrill sound until they stop running altogether).
We generally arrange with our venues so that if club members are not present to
start up or shut down, there are venue personnel that we have trained on hand to
flip single master switch power switch.
For RCX based operation, we do two things special: (1) We put the RCX AC power
on a UPS so we don’t lose programming if we get a modest (10 hour) or less power
failure. (2) We connect one sensor input on each animation RCX to monitor a
light powered by something from the main switch. When the RCX sees light from
the sensor because the main switch has been thrown, it runs the animation. Works
great. An alternative mechanism would be to program the RCX to use it’s internal
clock to match the show schedule, but that’s probably unecessary work.
With regard to the RCXs stopping after 15 minutes, that’s a default setting that
can be set to infinity by setting it to 0 with the LEGO supplied setup program
(and various 3rd party tools as well).
With regard to making trains that will run a long time, here are our
observations:
- Heavy trains are bad, especially ones with Super Chief cars.
- Bogies that turn are much better than fixed wheels on layouts with switches in them.
- BNSFs and other engines with low-to-the-track fronts have trouble making the transition to the start of hills unless the transition is very gradual.
- Hills are bad because the best speed for up is not the best speed for down. For our over-and-under cloverleaf layout last year that had hills, we broke the track into 4 section and gave each section its own LEGO voltage regulator with its own voltage setting (higher on uphill, lower on downhill, in between for level).
- Better to run trains too fast than too slow. Once they start to slow down from wear, heating, whatever, the process tends to accelerate.
- Make sure cars roll easily. On a 2 plates per track hill, a car should start rolling down by itself. If it doesn’t, check for dirt, grime, and the bad run of wheel mounts that rubbed the wheels under load (easily fixed with a knife).
- Make sure the track is clean of both oil and oxides and that power is supplied in more than one place.
- Keep in mind Mindstorms cannot supply enough current to run multiple motors on the same channel at full current output. We have several LEGO voltage regulators that have been modified to supply 3A instead of 1A (a rather convenient upgrade, since the regulator IC used internally is available at the larger current rating, though a bigger filter cap and transformer is required).
- We often make a point of parking trains on downhill runs at the end of the day so that if the trains must run unattended the next day they have a better chance of starting up.
Good luck!
-Ted Michon
SCLTC
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Message has 1 Reply:
 | | Re: How long will train 9v motors last?
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| (...) Any recommendations on how or how often to clean the track? PSLTC has one of the Centerline L-Gauge track cleaners and tries to remember to run it periodically, but there exists doubt about it efficacy since it seems to clean the top of the (...) (18 years ago, 25-Jan-07, to lugnet.trains)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | How long will train 9v motors last?
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| Hi, we're preparing a museum show (our first). The trains will run on two layouts, driven by some timer & RCX. We're currently discussing how often and how long should each loco run. Are there any estimates how long will the 9v trains motor last? (...) (18 years ago, 21-Jan-07, to lugnet.trains)
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