# Deadspot?



## Seventy7 (Jul 4, 2012)

I'm having some technical difficulities here. 

I recently bought a Tyco Police Pursuit set and with the exception of 1 curve it's complete and in very good shape. 

I cleaned the track with alcohol and a rag and tested 4 different cars and they all stopped at one spot in particular. I checked the short piece of straight track and put some elbow grease into cleaning it. Same thing.

So I switch out the piece to an identical piece of track from another set I have and you guessed, all 4 cars died in the same spot. I've checked the connection to the pieces on both ends to it and everything seems fine--before and after that one piece the cars are great.

So my question is would it be possible that one or both of the pieces on either end of that small straight have something wrong with them that would allow the car to run _on_ them but cause a dead spot _after_ them?

I know this sounds ridiculous..just getting my feet wet again and trying figure out what could be causing this being I switched the piece out and it's still happening.

Thanks in advance!


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## Grandcheapskate (Jan 5, 2006)

Remember that you need two electrical connection breaks (not one!) before you see a dead spot. My guess is you have a bad connection on both sides of that straight. Why? Probably because the pieces on both sides of that straight have bad end connections that are not making contact with the (supposedly) dead piece of track.

To test for a single dead spot where there is only one power tap (your terminal track), simply seperate two track sections around the halfway point of the layout. Now, put a car on both sides of that break. Do they both get power? If not, then move the car around the track, starting from the terminal track, until there is no power. There's your break.

The fix? Pry the end of the rail out a little so it makes better contact with the adjoining piece. And make sure they are clean.

Joe


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## Seventy7 (Jul 4, 2012)

Thanks Joe, I'll give it a shot!


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