RailPro > RailPro Specific Help & Discussion
Loco Stopped. “Motor Over Peak Current”
G8B4Life:
--- Quote from: MtRR75 on May 08, 2021, 01:49:42 PM ---As for (3) mechanism moves easily from motor all the way to the drive wheels.
--- End quote ---
That's a good start. At least the mechanism isn't stuffed.
--- Quote ---As for (4) the resistance across the motor leads is about 5 Ohms. Not sure what that means. (I have limited electronics knowledge)
--- End quote ---
Neither do I, I don't know what the resistance should be. Apparently it's not so simple to measure the armature resistance of a permanent magnet DC motor so 5 ohms may be correct or it might be way off but I just measured a motor and got the same ball park figure.
Sorry, when I said short between the motor leads I was thinking damage to the insulation that was allowing a short.
Does it go straight to the motor overload warning as soon as the throttle is moved or does it take "giving it some juice"?
- Tim
MtRR75:
--- Quote from: G8B4Life on May 08, 2021, 10:06:20 PM ---
Does it go straight to the motor overload warning as soon as the throttle is moved or does it take "giving it some juice"?
--- End quote ---
For locos that work.... I set the loco on dead track. Then, I turn on the power. If the room is quiet, I hear a faint click through the speaker less than one second after power up. I am guessing that this is the LM turning on.
For this loco.... I set the loco on dead track. Then I turn on the power. I hear the LM click on, followed about a second later with a second click. About a second after the second click, the triangle warning sign shows up on the LM-2 loco screen. By the time that I punch the Info button the "Overload Warning" is waiting for me on the Info screen. No time to power up. NOTE: See partial correction in next post.
Also, My brother-in-law knows lots more about motors and overloads than I do. But he admits that he has never worked with motors this small. However, he said that 5 Ohms sounded about right to him.
MtRR75:
More Info.....
(1) While the shell was off and the loco was sitting on a table, I used the old “9-volt battery test” to check if the motor was working. The motor and the gears ran in both directions. I put the loco on dead track and repeated the test. Same results. So the motor is OK.
(2) Next, I turned the track on, then looked at the Info Screen on the HC-2. Initially there were no error messages. On the Info Screen, the Motor Current was zero, and the Voltage was 13.9 V.
Next, while I kept looking at the Info screen, I started turning the speed knob in on the HC-2. Immediately, I got the “Motor Over Peak Current” message. (The Motor Current remained at Zero, and the Voltage remained at13.9 V.)
Two corrections:
(1) The only “Click” I get is when the track is first powered up. The second click that I heard earlier may have belonged to another loco that was sitting on the track
(2) This loco does NOT have a “keep alive” installed in it.
G8B4Life:
So it seems that the motor's ok but do remember that a battery doesn't have an overcurrent setting so if the motor was previously drawing eg 300mA and it was now suddenly drawing eg 2A due to a fault the battery would still power it.
If the motor is actually good then that just leaves the LM. As it goes into overcurrent immediately as the throttle is turned there's only a couple of things I can think of.
* The Motor Max Current setting in the LM has been messed up
* There's an internal fault in the LM
If you haven't done so check what the motor max current is set to in the LM, obviously it shouldn't happen but maybe there was a glitch and it got set to zero or some really low figure. See if increasing helps.
If you still get nothing at this stage I'd try swapping out the LM for another one and seeing if the problem persists.
I'm also not sure about these "clicks" you hear, I'm not sure that you should hear clicks or not. I can't remember hearing them but then it's been a very long time since I powered on an LM.
- Tim
faithie999:
if you have a multimeter, re-do the "battery test" with the meter set to the Amp setting and the meter leads in series between one of the battery terminals and the motor. then you'll have to correct the amp reading for the fact you're using 9volts instead of 14 volts--multiply the reading you get by 9/14.
I assume you've been unplugging the LM for the battery test to prevent possible damage to the LM.
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