Need to replace Micro Ace Series 817 /813 motor axles..

[Samurai_Chris]

Guys. I bought two sets of these trains before leaving japan, and they had only been run a few times. but on both, the plastic axles have broken, and now they sit unused? I am talking about the Fukuoka trains.

 

Anyone know of a cheap way to get them back and running?

 

Chris

[cteno4]

chris,

 

are you talking about wheel set axles or drive shafts to the motors (some have called those axles)?

 

which fukuoka trains, the diecast one mile trains or something else?

 

if it is a broken wheel set axle, then you might be able to find a replacement wheel set from another train. if its a drive shaft then you can sometimes find the replacement part from kato/tomix. ive even used kato drive shafts to fix a tomix train in the past! they are pretty cheap like $3 for a set of 3, trick is finding the correct one. drive shafts can break at any point. my suspicion is that something causes the wheels to stop (crash, bit of grit into the truck gears, etc) when running and all the motor torque then goes onto the driveshaft, usually stripping off the tiny bumps on the ends that go into the motor and truck universal sockets. ive seen it happen on relatively new trains and older ones as well. i have seen one with a snapped drive shaft, this i could only guess was a defect in the plastic to snap like that. the drive shafts are usually made of a slightly flexible plastic im guessing to give them some give with all the torque

 

little more info and maybe we can figure it out.

 

jeff

[Samurai_Chris]

Yes mate, the plastic drive shafts. I believe the motors are fine!

[cteno4]

ok its a microace, so no spare parts. if you got them from a japanese source you can have them send it back to ma for repair, they do this pretty cheap or free, but must come from the shop you bought it from (not used i think) usually. shipping of course can be expensive.

 

best option is to try and spot a tomix or kato set of drive shafts that might work. ma does do some odd drive shafts that are not the same style as most ma and kato though. have you torn it apart yet to see? if so usually you will find the little nubs (4 or them) on the ball at the end of the shaft that fit into the universal socket joints on the motor and truck are stripped off and the ball will feel pretty smooth (usually 4 little nubs sticking out to engage on the inside of the universal joint socket).

 

the way you can usually tell its a drive shaft is that one truck will usually turn and the other not (unless you stripped both at once, but ive never seen this in maybe a dozen or so instances). try just applying power to the wheels with a hunk of feeder track with the train upside down to see if this is the case. sometimes the wheels may spin a bit but stop if you put any pressure on them. they tend to run horribly or hardly at all with only one truck like this at high power.

 

of you do take it apart and find this you can snap a pict of it and get the dimensions i can see if any of the spares i have might work. tomix actually made one that was in two halfs that fit into each other so you could change the length quite a bit!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Samurai_Chris]

Thanks Jeff.. Actually obe of the actual rods had snapped , but yes, the little nobs on the other one did. I just hope I have all the parts there. Will take a pic for you..

 

Chris

[cteno4]

chris,

 

good, make sure to put a ruler in the pict next to the parts for sizing.

 

ill see what i can figure out. after we had a few of these go a long time back i use to by a pack (2-4 each at like $1.50-2) on hs orders to just have a range of them to try and repair ones later. worked well then for some reason we have not had one break the last couple of years!

 

jeff

[Samurai_Chris]

Ok, I have taken a heap of pics to give you an idea, as you can see that the connection to the wheel axel is in perfect condition, but the rods and nibblets have broken off.. Out of four axles. Only one hasn't broken..

 

Still in good condition..

 

 

Drive shaft broken off, now missing.

 

 

Looking towards the motor.

 

How it should look, undamaged drive shaft

 

Other side

 

With Ruler

[cteno4]

Chris,

 

Ugh, unfortunately this kind of dive shaft end I think only ma uses. I've not seen a kato or tomix drive shaft like this. I fear it may require rolling your own. Other option is to use a tomix, tomytec or greenmax mechanism.

 

Jeff

[Samurai_Chris]

Ok then mate.. I have looked everywhere, and can't find a site to pick anything like this up...

[cteno4]

Chris,

 

Sorry but micro ace does not sell spare parts. Hobby search has a good selection of tomix and kato parts, but none I have every seen use this kind of end joint.

 

Jeff

[angusmclean]

You have my sympathy Chris, as I think this will be tricky to repair.  Although many Microace models look good, and I have many of them, I have just been repairing the motor mounts on a couple of their ED75 locos and found the design/production of intricate parts pretty substandard, and with one driving axle not even engaging with the gear tower, their quality control is probably done by substandard workers in China. Main reason I hanker after many Microace models, and others, but stick to purchasing mainly Kato.

 

Angus

[Samurai_Chris]

Thanks Angus.. Well, the wife is taking the kids home to Japan for a month on Wed, so I have put the two motors from both sets in a box and have given the wife instructions to take them back to the store I purchased them both from.. Hopefully they might have some luck getting them fixed?

 

What annoys me, I bought them on the day this series was released and paid 18,500JPY for each set.. Not cheap, when both break within days of the other...

 

Chris

[cteno4]

Chris,

 

I think thats your best bet. MA seems pretty good on repair of items like this when returned thru the hobby shop purchased at. if was pretty new hopefully it will be free of charge.

 

wild they both broke, but makes sense they might have had a run of bad ones misassembled or bad parts. the ma drive train is really tough to work on as angus noted. i too am always a bit concerned of this when buying as replacing parts may be impossible, but they do make all those odd trains you just dont get elsewhere that are too much fun, especially the painted trains! actually im guessing ive got a few dozen micro ace trains and have had problems with two. one just needed a good cleaning and lubing, and the other (my dr yellow) started making horrible grinding noises and ive got him half torn apart but have yet to get back to him and finish as it was not really evident how it came apart and i put it aside a while as to not get frustrated and brake something!

 

best of luck with this.

[brill27mcb]

Chris,

 

Ugh, unfortunately this kind of dive shaft end I think only ma uses. I've not seen a kato or tomix drive shaft like this. I fear it may require rolling your own. Other option is to use a tomix, tomytec or greenmax mechanism.

 

Jeff

 

Looks like a telescoping shaft design, too...

 

Rich K.

[cteno4]

the one i took apart did not really telescope as much as just let it come in two. in the proper fit the shaft is pretty much fully inserted into the other end. i always assumed the telescoping tomix one was to fit a few different sized cars as it had a much longer telescoping section than the ma.

 

jeff

[CaptOblivious]

A bit late, but I wonder if you could have scavanged parts from one of their replacement motorized chassises? Anyway, you probably took the best route, good thing it was open to you!