I have a TYCO Santa FE engine from the mid 80's that has not been used in a while. The wheels will not turn. When I increase the throttle I hear a sound as if the engine wants to turn but it doesn't.
Good Evening Everyone, I have been looking for a replacement option for the traction tires on my TYCO locomotives and I think I found an inexpensive winner today. I have experimented with rubber O-rings and they work, but I don't like how they fit and the fact that they are rounded instead of flat. Goodies rubber hair bands were mentioned so I figured I would get some and try them. I stopped at Walgreens today to see if they had any, but they did not. Walgreens did have black rubber hair bands and clear poly hair bands. They had the clear poly bands in small so I figured I would try them. When I got home I tried them on, but they were a little to large. I initially thought they would not work, but after awhile I came up with the idea of heating them to see if they would shrink. I put the band on the tire and heated by passing my soldering iron around it. The band shrank down and held snuggly to the wheel. I am going to continue to experiment with the poly bands and I will let you all know if this method turns out to be a good replacement alternative for TYCO traction tires.
Good Evening Everyone, after completing several task around the house today I was able to get started on the Spirit of 1776 locomotive project. I am glad to report she moved under her own power this evening. The locomotive is not finished, but all the major components are working and I have everything, but the handrails to finish assembling her. I did put her together without doing the finish work on the wiring so no headlight right now. I will finish redoing the wiring tomorrow and will hopefully be able to install the weights and truck covers. Right now I have the second MU-2 motor for the dual motor setup, but I don't have the correct truck wheel assembly to install the motor. I am still working with the poly bands determining how well they will work as traction tires. I put another set on today and I found the smaller ones are easy to shrink to fit with a soldering iron, but the larger bands don't shrink enough with the soldering iron. I am going to try a hairdryer and see if it works better for shrinking the bands. I was wondering if any of you have used shrink tubing as traction tires on the TYCO's? I was thinking about trying shrink tubing to see how well it would work as a traction tire.
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