Hello!!!
I have a newer 397 Coal Loader and only about 25% of the load ends up in the car. The rest flys off the belt during its travel. I don't expect it to be 100%, but I don't have any reference to compare it to. I've adjusted the applied voltage up and down with little or no difference. It seems that the bin movement reverberates through the entire unit causing coal to fly everywhere. Also, the bin motion has an associated loud clacking sound which draws attention two floors up from the basement. No tips in the manual other than tweaking the voltage. Any comments?????? I thought about installing some styrene strips on the sides of the conveyor to help contain those over excited pellets as a possible solution if this appears to be the norm. Thanks in advance!
Jim Z
Jim Z.
It sounds like it's running 'way too fast.
My experience is limited to the "postwar" versions and may not be applicable. Using the throttle handle I can adjust mine from no-go at all to very fast indeed. At high speeds it throws quite a bit of "coal" around, but it always bounces off the deflector at the upper end of the arm -- not over the sides of the belt guide. I mostly use genuine Lionel post war "coal."
In normal operation, the coal steps smoothly up the tray and runs easily up the belt. Most of it lands in the waiting hopper car.
The noise is caused by the action of the tension spring pulling the tray back against its stops. If the cams are installed on the shaft correctly (in phase) the sound should be tat---tat ---tat rather than ta-tat, ta-tat, ta-tat and there should be almost zero sideways motion of the tray. I suppose one could afix some kind of absorbing compound to the stops, but I've never heard of anyone doing it. It is a relatively loud accessory, but not absurdly so in my experience when run at moderate belt speeds.
I had a similar problem with my #97 coal elevator. The elevator spewed coal all over the layout, and as a result was removed from the layout. I went to PetsMart and picked up a bag of black aquarium gravel. It works much better and very little coal (gravel) spills on the layout. I did have to hand-pick out some of the larger pieces of gravel because the pieces were too large for the buckets.
Good Luck...
Earl
I decided to try the aquarium gravel on the #397 coal loader. I just loaded an entire trey full of aquarium gravel and only one piece of gravel fell on the layout after the load operation. A few pieces of gravel fell off of the conveyer but landed back in the trey. The #397 had been banned from my layout because it was too messy. Now it is going back on the layout.
BTW You can easily clean the coal off of your layout if you have a cannister vacuum with a hose attachment. Just remove the hose an stretch an old tee shirt over the end that goes into the vacuum so that the tee shirt forms a membrane across the hose. Reinsert the hose and vacuum all of your coal off from the layout. Then remove the hose and remove the tee shirt and dump the coal out of the hose into a container. The tee shirt serves as a porous membrane that prevents the coal from goint into your vacuum cleaner bag.
Earl,
Is the gravel much heavier than the coal?
Jim Z.,
Try coating the inside of the belt lightly with baby powder. I also have the first reissue of the 397 from 2000, and the baby powder eliminated the problem you are experiencing.
jimtrumpie wrote: Earl, Is the gravel much heavier than the coal?
JIM,
I have also used the Lionel Coal that goes with the Coal Tipplers. This coal is like small plastic jelly beans. Works great with the Bethlehem Gantry Crane for picking up the coal load. The regular coal tends to get stuck on the belt between the roller and the belt, I had problems with this. Here is a pic of my operation....
PS. Make sure you have the small plastic piece on the top of the coal loader, this prevents the coal from going all over the place. Sort ta? As you can see mine goes all over anyway, guess I'm not to good of a crane operator?
laz57
Laz,
I like your setup. It looks quite realistic with piles of coal. Actual coal loading areas have coal strewn all over the place.
That is impressive. Which do you like better, the PW 397, or the reissue? I haven't used the reissue that much, because I am afraid of the plastic gearbox wearing out. It doesn't have the powerful sound that the original does.
Thanks GIZ on the kudos.
JIM, the newer one runs a bit smoother then the older one. Both have that good old groaning sound, but they do run fine. Every now and then some of the fine fake coal gets the belt stuck but other then that all is well.
Thanks for all the responses. I'll have some time to play and try some things this weekend. Thanks again!!!
Jim
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