fixing tracks?

Silverbolt · Post by **Silverbolt** » Mon Dec 28, 2009 4:14 am

really wanting to buy a decent looking used Tracks... but ALL the use ones seem to have the leg locking problem.
(some more than others)

anybody got a fix for that before I spend my dough?

Post by **trance** » Thu Dec 31, 2009 9:07 am

I can tell you I've tried to fix the leg spring issue, but never could figure it out. Now if they spring out, I just mention it in the description, it's not worth the effort IMO

Silverbolt · Post by **Silverbolt** » Thu Dec 31, 2009 12:41 pm

cool thanks.. not what I was hoping to hear but thanks!

Banzai-Tron · Post by **Banzai-Tron** » Fri Jan 01, 2010 2:00 am

Could we be a little more specific regarding this problem?

As I recall (all my Tracks are packed away at the moment), there's either two distinctly different issues, or one issue, with two levels of severity (can't remember which... been sippin' the New Year's Whiskey already)

Silverbolt · Post by **Silverbolt** » Fri Jan 01, 2010 4:40 pm

as far as I can see there is one issue with varying levels of badness.

legs pop forward in vehicle mode.

Silverbolt · Post by **Silverbolt** » Tue Jan 19, 2010 1:53 am

if somebody has a cheapy to sell me I'd like to take one apart and see if I can fix it.

been looking at ebay but they still seem to want a lot for them

Rhymus · Post by **Rhymus** » Wed Apr 14, 2010 11:37 pm

Are we talking about G1 Tracks? Because i think my G1 Tracks (which i acquired used, so i don't know if it came this way) had that problem, and it was a pretty simple fix--although unfortunately i don't remember very clearly how i did it, and i'm not especially inclined to dismantle a working toy to remind myself how to repair a broken one. i trust you'll forgive me for playing by "If it ain't broke, don't fix it" rules.

One of my G1 Tracks's legs would not stay fully retracted when he was in vehicle mode, nor would it stay fully extended when he was in robot mode. i remember taking apart that leg, being surprised at how few pieces there were inside, and especially surprised at the mechanism that was supposed to keep the leg in one position or the other--as i recall, it was just a small bent or curved sheet of metal. i'm still not sure quite how that would do the job--as a GUESS, maybe the bend or curve of the metal allows Something to slide past the metal sheet when pressure is applied (pulling the leg into robot mode position or pushing it back into car mode position), while that same Something is not supposed to slide past the bend/curve without such pressure. And MAYBE, the reason the leg springs back out is that the bend/curve in that little sheet of metal is not in quite the right position, so the Something can't quite make it all the way past the bend/curve, so it reverts to its earlier position.

That theory fits with my fuzzy recollections--i sort of think i might have flipped that sheet of metal around the other way, which could have altered the distance between the bend/curve in the metal and whatever that Something i mentioned was. The theory also seems plausible to me as an assembly error that might recur in a large number of figures produced--if the bend/curve is near the center of the metal sheet, no one might notice if some (or most, or even all) of the metal sheets accidentally got flipped around the wrong way (like, maybe someone thought it didn't matter if the sheets got flipped around, so for some reason they repositioned a conveyor belt to run right to left instead of left to right), or maybe some of the metal sheets were bent/curved in slightly the wrong place.

Keep in mind that all of this is based on a VERY HAZY MEMORY and GUESSWORK, not me looking at a dismantled G1 Tracks leg, much less taking it apart and putting it back together to see which way it works and which way it doesn't. i'll advise you to ignore that my "randomly assigned" serial number as a member of S.T.A.R.S. "just happens" to be the same as the number on G1 Wheeljack's racecar mode--we all know about Wheeljack's success/failure ratio as a mechanical engineer. Nevertheless, i hope to encourage you to try fixing your G1 Tracks (if you get one with this leg problem) because i have a 100% success rate (out of 1 attempt), and i found the task pretty easy. If you do attempt to repair a G1 Tracks with this leg condition, i hope what you find turns out to be something like what i remembered, so my memories, however vague, might help you. Still, i must disclaim all responsibility for any failure(s) you have with your attempt(s) to repair any G1 Tracks figure(s).

...Hey, Trance, i should've thought of this before i typed all of that nonsense, but does any of what i just described sound familiar to you? How many times (and on how many different Tracks figures) have you attempted to fix the leg problem? Do you remember what the pieces of the disassembled leg looked like? Anything like what i was describing? It would also be useful to know if you tried the same thing i described, and got different results, because then at least we could presume that my "fix" is not what solved the problem.