Back It Up

The Bachmann 4-4-0 conversion I have never did want to back up. Any attempt to reverse this loco would cause the locomotive to roll over and fall off the tracks.

I finally figured out what the problem was. I have a non-Bachmann screw in the loco to tender connection because I lost the original and couldn't find a replacement. The problem was the original screw was shouldered and the replacement was not.

The tender connection is a large open loop that goes around the screw. With the standard shouldered screw the shoulder fills this hole pretty well, with the replacement, not so much. So, when the loco would back into the tender it would get close enough that the driveshaft would bind against the loco body and tip it over.

I filled the tender loop with a piece of scrap styrene, drilled a smaller hole for the screw, and just like magic the problem is solved and the loco will back happily around the layout with it's train preceding it, no problems at all.

I only wish my standard gauged Bachmann 4-4-0's ran this well.