Bad brush = $25 motor replacement!?!?!

[bsoplinger]

I sent off an email to Life-Life/Walthers about getting replacement brushes for a couple of motors that have cracked brushes. I found this out when I popped off the brush holder to solder a DCC motor wire and out slides pieces of brush instead of a little piece of metal :'( I figured a few bucks for parts and even more for shipping. Imagine my surprise when I was told:

Individual brushes for the Life-Like N scale locomotives are no longer available.  The motors are now enclosed can motors and the entire motor is replaced.  The pricing is: [$25 if they have it]

What's worse, is that some of the motors I needed (for particular models) are listed as "not available."

Does anyone know if there are compatable brushes available elsewhere?

[Carolina Northern]

Has anybody seen one of these "can" motors? Maybe they thought you looking for an HO?

[Mark5]

typical Walthers ...

[SirTainly]

just a thought, could you use Atlas ones ?

[bsoplinger]

just a thought, could you use Atlas ones ?

Hence my question at the end of my post asking if anyone know of compatible brushes  :

Trouble is, I can't seem to find much info at the Atlas parts site either other than 2 different numbers listed as 'brush and holder.' I had sent an email asking the Atlas parts people if they had brushes for the newer N-scale "scale speed" motots, as I know they'd be close enough. The email came back late Thursday, just before Atlas' summer vacation break, so I won't know for another week if they are the right ones. The email reply I got wasn't quite helpful unfortunately.

[Chris333]

What locomotive did this motor come from? May help in finding replacement parts.

[bsoplinger]

What locomotive did this motor come from? May help in finding replacement parts.

I have 3 right now, 2 are mine, 1 is a customer's. I found each when I took off the brush cap to soldier in a hard wired decoder. I got pieces of brush in each case, as if the brush just cracked. I wonder if they are made of a sintered metal and the manufacturing process just went wrong? Regardless, the models the motors are from are:

FA1 (A unit if it matters)
DL-109 (Which is the one that Walthers says they don't even have a replacement motor for)
SW8

Now I can take the brush from 1 of my bad motors and use it in the other to get me down to 1 non-working motor. But it seemed sensible to just replace all 3 brushes instead

[Zox]

I don't know about the particular motors in question, but quite often motor brushes are made of graphite--which would explain the cracking.

If they are graphite, that might give you some options for making new brushes. I doubt mechanical pencil lead would work--too much binder, not enough pure carbon--but I think graphite may be available in rod form. If you could find a rod of the appropriate diameter, it could be cut to length, and hey presto!

[Chris333]

I would bet Atlas brushes would fit, but don't know for sure.

[Robbman]

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