small steel wheels

[grandpopswalt]

Hi Guys,

I'm looking for a source for reasonably priced (under $2.50 per axel) steel wheels. I model in 1:24 scale and need 22" to 24" wheels. In real-world terms that means a 1" or slightly smaller wheel. What is the actual diameter of the 1:29 scale wheels? Any input will be greatly appreciated.

Walt

[Anonymous]

GRANDPOPSWALT
HOW MANY SETS ARE YOU LOOKING FOR, I HAVE 4 SETS OF BACHMAN G-SCALE FROM TWO 4-6-0 S WOULD NEED TO BE PAINTED . BEN

[Anonymous]

Walt,

Good luck in finding them now! I have called several stores and nobody seems to have the Bachman larger sets in pacs of 4. So I back ordered [:(]

[Anonymous]

You can also try St Aubin Station in Woodstock Illinois. I bought a box (six packages) from them over the phone a month or so ago and the price including shipping was about $50.

[Anonymous]

Grandpopwalts, Found these guy's in GR adds in confusion. Goto Hartford products at www.hartfordpr.com they have a nice wheel /truck selection to choose from. They may seem pricey to some but from the pics I saw they are very detailed.

[vsmith]

Gary Raymond (as advertised in GR) offers wheels is several different sizes, Bachmann wheels are widely available, try San-Val, they had both large and small last time I was there, and they sell there own line of replacement wheels.

[Anonymous]

Think ya'll might have to help me on those Hartford wheels and trucks.
How do you measure it?

[kstrong]

Probably the best (and cheapest) you're going to do is Bachmann's small diameter (24.5mm) wheels. They're just under 1", so they'll scale out nicely for your needs. I've seen them on line for around $10 for 4 axles, so that's right in your ballpark. www.wholesaletrains.com is where I think I recall seeing them. I don't know if they're in stock or not.

Sierra Valley would be my next choice. They make an unplated steel wheel that would fit your needs, though they don't jump out on a Google search, and the dealer listing I found didn't show prices.

San-Val will be another cheap option. I don't see them listed on their web site anymore, but they used to sell wheels that they labeled as "#1 Scale" wheels, which were right around 1" dia., just larger than the B'mann wheels. They were originally designed to be used with the MDC/Roundhouse rolling stock, as these wheels scaled out to a scale 33" in 1:32. I used them for 24" wheels when I was doing 1:24 modeling, and now use them for 20" wheels for my 1:20.3 stuff. (Early Billmeyer and Smalls freight equipment ran on 20" wheels.) A phone call may answer your questions there. Let me know what you find out, as I'm down to my last few sets myself.

Later,

K

[Anonymous]

KStrong, you just gave me knowledge and you didn't even know it. Billmeyer and Small Car Co. in 1877 built a few cars for my prototype R.R. the Waynesburg & Washington. I'm in the process of building 3 boxcars and have yet to purchase wheelsets. Any Idea on diameter of wheels for rolling stock built in the Penn Fort Wayne shops?

[grandpopswalt]

Gentlemen,

I really appreciate the feedback. I'll start my search right after the holiday.

I put a set of B'mann "small steel wheels" under one of their boxcars and found the proportions very pleasing, although, another 1/16" larger would be just right.

Walt

[kstrong]

Carpenter Matt

I do not, because I'm not familiar with those shops in particular. Are they the W&W's shops? I must confess a seriously limited knowledge about that railroad, though the new book is on my wish list. Here's some history that may help, though.

At the 1872 St. Louis Narrow Gauge Convention, where representatives of many of the narrow gauge railroads met to determine standards, etc. (not to be confused with today's modern Narrow Gauge Convention, which focuses on modeling), the attendees "agreed" that the drawhead or coupler height should be 24" from the rails. For a car using the common "flexible end beam" system, this meant the coupler pocket (where the link was inserted) was attached to the end of the car, in line with the frame. The center of the frame, then, had to be 24" above the rails. These cars needed wheels that were a smaller diameter than 24", as they had to fit under the frame; 20" was a commonly used. Cars that used a draft-gear arrangement, common on passenger cars and later day freight equipment (c. 1890 ff), the wheels could be a larger diameter, commonly 24 or 26", because the draft gear hung below the frame itself.

I'm not sure if there was an advantage to a larger diameter wheel or not. The only one I can think of would be rotational speed and journal bearing wear, but at the 8 to 15 mph that the trains ran, I don't see this as being an issue. It could very well have been simply a matter of using wheels large enough to place the coupler pocket where it needed to be.

When the East Broad Top converted its rolling stock from link-and-pin to automatic couplers in the 1910s, they replaced the 20" wheels on their wood hoppers with 24" wheels. This raised the frame 2" so they could add the draft gear under the frame of the cars, which previously had used the flexible end beams. As for the flat cars and box cars that were also equipped with flexible end beams, they were simply retired and replaced with larger, higher capacity cars.

One thing to remember when looking at wheel diameters, too, is that they were frequently shopped, and turned down a half inch or so each time to get rid of any flat spots. So a car that was originally equipped with 24" wheels, could at some point in its life actually be riding on 21" wheels. There was an accepted maximum that could be taken off of a tread before it was considered too thin, but I don't recall what it was.

Later,

K

[Anonymous]

K Strong, the Billmyer and small Co. resided in York, Penn. They were only a subcontractor. According to ther book I have THREE FEET ON THE PANHANDLE, the W&W switched to automatic couplers three years before the saftey compliance act of 1893 which required them.
On April 1, 1903 an amendment was was made and stated" whenever as provided in said act, any train is operated with power or train brakes, not less then 50% of the cars in such train shall have their brakes used and operated by the engineer of the locomotive drawing such a train; and all power-braked cars in such train which are associated together with said 50 % shall have their brakes so used and operated;..." meaning the EBT was in violation of the saftey compliance act or maybe grandfathered in someway?

[kstrong]

Up unitl 1911, the EBT was operating very much in violation of the Safety Appliances Act. The wording of the original 1893 Act didn't give the government any real means to go after violators, in what could be interpreted as granting a "window of opportunity" for railroads to comply. The law was amended in 1908 for the purpose of giving the Secretary of Transportation jurisdiction to bring legal action against the non-compliant railroads. The government was then quick to threaten the EBT with court proceedings. To paraphrase the song, "The EBT fought the Law, and the Law won." But their defiance bought them a few more years.

Conversion to automatic couplers was first, beginning in 1911. Air brakes began to be fitted two years later. The whole process was completed by 1918. The delay in the air brakes was partly due to the fact that the locomotives had to be fitted with air tanks and compressors to supply the train brakes. Most of their locos to that point used the Eames vacuum brakes, and only for the locomotive. Their now famous steel hoppers were the first cars to be built with air brakes and automatic couplers as standard equipment. They arrived beginning in 1913.

*****

So the Penn Fort Wayne shops were subcontractors for B&S? If that's the case, I would assume they would use the plans and specs of the B&S, and go with the 20" wheels for the early rolling stock. The EBT shops were rather infamous for their ability to "replicate" (read: steal the designs and build themselves) the cars rolling out of the major builders' shops, and used 20" wheels on much of the equipment they turned out until the 20th century. I would assume that the PFW shops would do the same.

Later,

K

[grandpopswalt]

Kevin and Matt.

Please keep it up! Your exchanges are extremely enlightening. RR history is fascinating when read from reference books but takes on a whole new meaning when evesdropping on a conversation like yours (probably because you're focusing on the salient facts).

Walt

[Anonymous]

K strong, The W&W was it's on enity or Co. from 1877 till 1885 when the Penn RR took over. The W&W actually went all the way to Pittsburg until the B&O bought the Pittsburgh Southern and regauged it to standard. Most of the frieght cars were Billmeyer and small till the Penn took over then they went to Fort Wayne PRR shops. Most passenger cars were Jackson Sharp. All motive power with the exception of the earliest engines were all 260 Moguls. LGB's is a dead ringer[:D]

[kstrong]

Matt,

The only reference I could find for wheel diameters on the W&W comes from an Ed Cass drawing of a W&W gondola in the Aug/Sept. 1999 issue of the Narrow Gauge & Shortline Gazette. (Which by strange coincidence has an artilce on modeling the East Broad Top as well.) The gondola depicted was built in 1910 by the Fort Wayne shops. The wheels are 24", and the spacing on the trucks is 4' 6". That's a fairly long wheelbase, longer than even the Aristo truck, which measures out to 4'. Hartford sells a 4' 6" wheelbase truck with 26" wheels, but I'm sure he'd substitute 24" wheels. They don't match the style of those in the Cass drawings, though, having a much flatter top bar than what's depicted.

You didn't say what the build date was for your box cars, but if they were built by the PRR shops, it's a fair bet that they were built using standard gauge practices at the time, which would much more likely be a draft gear assembly mounted under the frame. I would think the 24" wheels would then be the most likely ones used. Depending on how close "close enough" is, I'd be very tempted to use the Aristo archbar trucks with either Bachmann or Sierra Valley wheels. (San-Val's "G-gauge" wheels are another alternative.) They're nowhere near as detailed as the Hartford trucks, but for half the price, it's something I could live with. I use either those or B'mann trucks (which scale out to 3' 7" in 1:20.3) for my rolling stock.

While we're talking about the Gazette, do you recall an article on the W&W in that magazine? I thought I had seen one at one point in time, but darned if it's coming up in any of my searches. The Ed Cass gondola drawing was the only hit I got.

*****

Walt,

Hartford's web site ( www.hartfordpr.com ) has the Sierra Valley 20" wheels (that's 1:20 scale, so it would be 24" in 1:24) for $3.50/axle.

Glad we're able to pass along a little extra history. It probably won't win you any Trivial Pursuit games, but it's still fun to learn...

Later,

K

[Anonymous]

KStrong, The car's I'm building were made by the Fort Wayne shops. I have kinda already desided using the aristo archbars and spend the extra for the bearings and metal wheels.

As far a the narrow gauge shortline gazzette goes they have done two or three articles pretaining to the W & W. I search everyone of the archives one day, the wife um.. i misplaced the dates I found.

[kstrong]

If you stumble across the article dates, send them my way, would you? I read the "blurb" in Hilton's American Narrow Gauge Railroads, but it says precious little about the rolling stock. Flemming's Narrow Gauge Railways in America is no help there either, as the book was originally published the year before the W&W was built.

In the "there's an interesting prototype" department, thought, Fleming's book lists the Pittsburgh and Castle Shannon Railroad, which I originally thought to be the Pittsburgh and Southern, which connected to the W&W at Washington. (It's related, more in a bit) The P&CS was built to the oddball gauge of 3'4". If you're looking for a railroad to model using all your 1:22.5 rolling stock, this one's a sure winner. They only operated 10 miles of track between Pittsburgh and Arlington, PA, hauled mostly coal, and at its peak, ran 23! passenger trains a day. Fleming's listing shows them as having 6 locomotives, 7 passenger cars, and 416 coal cars in 1876. To make this railroad even more interesting, they laid a third rail on the line--5' 2-1/2" for electric streetcars in 1905. The narrow gauge lasted until 1909.

The P&CS spawned the P&S via a board member who had his own agenda, wanting a southern extension to Washington. He resigned from the board, and built his own little railroad, this one with the more common 3' gauge. It later sold to the B&O, ending the W&W's visions of service all the way to Pittsburgh.

BTW, lest you think that Colorado was always the narrow gauge capitol, Pennsylvania boasted more miles of NG track, and more NG railroads than Colorado. Most were very short lived, either folding altogether, or converted to standard gauge by the 1900s.

Later,

K

[Anonymous]

Kstrong, I think this is why the W &W and other narrow gauge lines appeal to me, they are easier to model given the lines were not very long to begin with. The W &W being only 28 miles from Waynesburg to Washington. My father modeled the W &W in HO in the 1970's, his layout was of the Waynesburg yard, it was never completed due to my parents divorce.