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  • #46
    http://michiganexposures.blogspot.co...wn-tracks.html

    I changed up the layout a little bit. Set up the yard at one end and the town at the other.

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    • #47
      Decided to start redoing my buildings with styrene instead of cardboard.

      http://michiganexposures.blogspot.co...-makeover.html

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      • #48
        Just a little update:

        I never showed a picture of the GP7 running around the layout. Mostly because that simplistic metal hoop coupler wouldn't stay attached to anything. So, I went out and eBay'd myself a set of wheels off another engine that had a knuckle coupler and swapped them over. Now it can actually pull stuff, and for once, the headlight bulb WASN'T burned out! (and for added realism, that's how the Southern actually ran their engines, long hood forward, the opposite of how most railroads did it)

        https://fbcdn-sphotos-c-a.akamaihd.n...dab2d1a3171a0f

        Got all my rolling stock up to standard now, finished replacing all those broken couplers and loose wheels.

        https://scontent-a-ord.xx.fbcdn.net/...fa&oe=546AE773

        Now, I'm going to need to go back online and look for a large lot of track, I've got more switches than sidings as it is right now. Check this out, one of the turnouts is actually a remote controlled one. (The rest are manual)

        https://scontent-a-ord.xx.fbcdn.net/...23718572_n.jpg

        It was a lucky kid indeed who could afford these back in the day, each came with a built-in green/red signal light to show the position of the switch, a remote toggle, and enough wire to reach it anywhere on a typical modest-sized table. I wasn't holding my breath, but, after wiring it up, it goes like clockwork. I was sure that flimsy-looking switch made of 50-year-old plastic wouldn't still be up to the challenge. I was wrong.

        The pile of silver stuff over there are lead wheel weights I got out of the tire room at work. Now that I've got so many running pieces, and building longer trains, the engines are having trouble with traction, so I'm going to ballast them down a bit. Wheelslip on the turns is a common problem when you go over 5 car consists. (In real life too, locomotives carry large supplies of sand to put down on the rails when it gets slippery, metal-on-metal doesn't make a lot of friction for grip once you break traction)

        Later models of the Flyer trains had tiny grooves machined into their wheels so you could add small rubber band "tires" for better traction, but none of mine have that, so we'll have to just brute force it with some more weight.
        - They say nothing good happens at 2AM, they're right, I happen at 2AM.

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        • #49
          I don't know if this is practical or not, or if it would work, but have you thought of giving the engine wheels a light coat of some sort of traction paint on the inner surface where it sits on the track? A quick search turns up this paint additive that looks like it might help, just mix it into a clear base.
          You're only delaying the inevitable, you run at your own expense. The repo man gets paid to chase you. ~Argabarga

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          • #50
            There's another factor - and this applies to adding tyres too - which is that most model trains pick up their power from the rails through the wheels. Even if there is a third power rail (with its own slider), the return path will be through the wheels. It's therefore a bad idea to interfere with the conductivity of that path. Some new models are supplied with rubber tyres, but not on all the wheels, and even so these often have more conductivity problems than un-tyred models.

            This also applies to real electric trains, although the 750 or 25,000 volts involved in that case (those are the third-rail and overhead-wire voltages used in the UK) is at least capable of burning through a thin layer of rust or sand.

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            • #51
              I was just about to say, I'm hesitant to use any chemicals because the wheels have to pick up the electricity too, and any additive may inadvertently insulate them.

              When I had HO trains, they solved the traction problem by having metal wheels on one side, and rubber on the other. However the first set of wheels was aligned, the trailing set was flipped around 180 degrees so that the metal wheels (that carried the power) rode on opposite rails and completed the circuit, while the rubber ones provided traction.

              It's not such a problem on the steam engines, the tenders behind the locomotives have the pick-up wheels, while the larger drive wheels can be made with large gripping tires since they don't have to pull double-duty as both traction and contact wheels and have the added advantage of being directly under the electric motor so all the weight is pushing down on them. Dad's old steam engine can happily pull 8 or 9 cars before it has trouble.

              It's really only a problem for diesels, they have smaller wheels and the motor is biased towards the front, so the weight isn't evenly distributed, ideally, there should be a small set of power pick-up wheels, maybe hidden underneath, in the middle, so the actual driving wheels could be given either tires or some kind of abrasive surface for better grip, but as it is, they had to be made cheap enough to be sold as toys after all, so they put metal wheels all around and figured it would be good enough since most toy train sets never grew beyond what could go around a christmas tree or a basement card table anyway.
              Last edited by Argabarga; 08-09-2014, 01:42 PM.
              - They say nothing good happens at 2AM, they're right, I happen at 2AM.

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              • #52
                Putting some ballast weights into the model would probably help. It should increase the adhesion of the wheels more than it increases the overall weight of the train.

                That's sometimes done on real locos too - particularly the six-axle American units, which don't inherently weigh much more than the four-axle ones, but are made to weigh 50% more anyway to get the full adhesion from the extra wheels. The very rare BR Class 13 shunters, dedicated to hump-yard duty, were conversions of pairs of Class 08 shunters - one of the modifications also being added weight.

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                • #53
                  Quoth Chromatix View Post
                  That's sometimes done on real locos too - particularly the six-axle American units, which don't inherently weigh much more than the four-axle ones,
                  Bit of a nit-pick, but there is no such thing as a six-axle American unit. "American" refers to the 4-4-0 wheel arrangement, while six-axle units would fall under 4-4-4 (Jubilee), 2-6-4 (Adriatic), 4-6-2 (Pacific), 2-8-2 (Mikado/MacArthur), 4-8-0 (Twelvewheeler/Mastodon), 2-10-0 (Decapod), 0-10-2 (Union Switcher), or 0-12-0 (Twelve-coupled). I'll leave out the articulated locomotives and diesels.
                  Any fool can piss on the floor. It takes a talented SC to shit on the ceiling.

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                  • #54
                    He's speaking about diesels, which use a different kind of naming convention.

                    There's really only two types of wheel arrangements used nowadays.

                    Locomotives either have two powered axles in each of the two wheel sets (Officially called "B-o" in modern AAR parlance) for eight wheels total (as my little toy one is), or three powered axles per wheel set ( called "C-o") for 12.

                    Since there aren't the multitude of arrangement for leading trucks, trailing trucks or drive wheels you see on steam engine setups, most people when referring to diesels don't even use that "Official" designation and will just say "four axle" or "six axle", or even more commonly, just the manufacturer's model number.

                    For example, EMD, one of the two major American locomotive makers since the 1950's, designates it's four-axle units as the "General Purpose" or GP series... so, it's just common to call them out as such when you see them since you know anything starting in "GP" means four axles. (GP7, GP18, GP38-2) Same goes for the "Special Duty" or SD series, that signifies six axles (SD60, SD45-2, SD80MAC) So you'll say "There's three Geeps (GPs) at the head of that train" and everyone immediately knows you have 3 engines with four-axle trucks.

                    Since there's fewer wheel permutations these days, the wheel arrangements themselves aren't descriptive enough to give each it's own name like "Mogul" or "Mikado", and an SD80MAC is never called a "Co-Co" by railfans, even though that's technically correct, it doesn't tell you much because so's every other "SD" out there.
                    Last edited by Argabarga; 08-10-2014, 10:05 PM.
                    - They say nothing good happens at 2AM, they're right, I happen at 2AM.

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                    • #55
                      I've made quite a bit of progress on my trains....

                      http://michiganexposures.blogspot.co...-sturgeon.html

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                      • #56
                        Quoth mikoyan29 View Post
                        I've made quite a bit of progress on my trains....
                        You sure have, they look great. 'morning06' is an especially good shot.

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                        • #57
                          So, after a long wait, I finally got the new wheels on the K5 locomotive. The old ones fought all my attempts to pry them off and I had to break down and get an ACTUAL specialized tool for removing them (essentially a tiny little gear puller) and they came off in about 3 seconds apiece.

                          Then came the hard part

                          Trying to remember how this mess all goes back together, since to get TO the wheels, the driving rod assemblies had to come off, and they, kinda go to pieces.

                          https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.n...70ba0cfdbcfe13

                          Fortunately, there's plenty of pics of these engines up on eBay :P , good high-quality pics taken by digital cameras to show that the one you're bidding on isn't missing anything, and they make handy diagrams to figure out how that mini erector set goes back on!

                          https://fbcdn-sphotos-f-a.akamaihd.n...080368d1cb407b

                          And after reassembling it, I had to take it all apart, again... and re-quarter the wheels.

                          The driving rods on steam engines (and it holds true for even toy ones) have to be "quartered". That is, the wheels on one side of the engine have to be one-quarter turn ahead (or behind) the ones on the opposite side.

                          The rods on a steam engine move in reciprocal back-and-forth motion, at the limit of their travel on ether stroke, there's a tiny "dead zone" where they stop before changing direction to go the other way. If BOTH sets of rods are synched, they BOTH go into this area at the same time, and become stuck, only by the OTHER rod being in motion can it work through this area and begin the next cycle. (think of it like trying to pedal a bicycle, without the pedals being opposed, without the "other" one to help it around, you'd be done after one push...)

                          Long story short, I messed up the quartering, twice, and only on the third try did I get it right, runs like a champ now.

                          The next issue was I got some very small traction tires to fit to the wheels (they're really thin rubber bands) for added pulling power. Three of the four snapped right on, but the fourth keeps popping off and getting stuck in the works, I've had enough for tonight, so tomorrow, I'm super-gluing that one tight.

                          There's only 4 because those middle two wheels on the engine are just for show, they don't have flanges on them and aren't geared, doing so would have made the train so rigid, it wouldn't have been able to go around the 30 degree turns on a toy train track without derailing.
                          - They say nothing good happens at 2AM, they're right, I happen at 2AM.

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                          • #58
                            Quoth Argabarga View Post
                            The driving rods on steam engines (and it holds true for even toy ones) have to be "quartered". That is, the wheels on one side of the engine have to be one-quarter turn ahead (or behind) the ones on the opposite side.
                            While things work best if the wheels are "quartered" exactly 90 degrees (so one side is at the maximum torque position when the other is in the dead zone), it will still work (exception: Stephensen valve gear - valve motion is driven by the rod on the opposite side) at other angles (especially on a model, where the side rods are just for show). The critical thing is that all the drive axles must have the SAME "quartering" angle as each other, otherwise the side rods will bind.
                            Any fool can piss on the floor. It takes a talented SC to shit on the ceiling.

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