Atlas MP-15dc With Sound

[rrinker]

It's fixible, my Athearn RS-3 was like this. It probably still only picks up with wires on one side, through the truck bolster for the other. Part 1 of the solution, I soldered pickup wires to the other side of the trucks so it was all wires, no relying ont he truck bolster. That improved things but it still wasn;t perfect. I found what ought to be a true solution on another forum - the whole pickup system depends on the metal axles rolling in the square bronze bushings, and those bushings touching the metal parts of the sideframes. But it seems the plastic sticks down too far on som and they don't make good contact with the metal sideframe. The trucks need to be taken apart and the plastic filed a bit - or you can just use some flexible wire and solder the pickup wires right to the bronze bushings. I cheated - I got another one in an 'off' road name for $20 of eBay and that one ran perfectly so I swapped shells. Eventually I get around to fixing the other one.

--Randy