Athearn tune-up parts/washers?

[Anonymous]

I am planning to tune up the drive mechanisms on my Athearn GP9s and SW1500s and need to know what size ( OD and ID ) shim washers to use on the axles and for the motor. Walthers sells some in packs of 6 (motor thrust washers) for $1.80 but I was also wondering if anyone sells larger quantities for a reasonable price. What washers should I use on the wheelsets if I need to adjust them to NMRA specs? Thanks for any help. Brian

[dharmon]

Ask at the LHS. Most will have a plastic dealer box of Athearn power train parts..gears, bushings, clips, etc. These boxes are quickly becoming a thing of the past, so if you LHS has one, I'd buy a few spares for the future.

[Anonymous]

You dont need washers to adjust the wheelsets. Each wheel is attached to a half-axle, these half axles are held together with the plastic gear on the wheelset. To adjust the wheels, simply twist them and gently push or pull until you get them to NMRA specs. If you dont have an NMRA standards guage for this, I highly reccomend you get one.

You might also want to invest in a book about fine-tuning Athearn. I have a copy of Tuning and Upgrading Athearn Locomotives (from Railmodel Journal). I believe Kalmbach has published a similar book.

As dharmon said, buy the parts you need as soon as possible. I was lucky enough to have my local shop order some athearn parts for me, only to see them out of stock at walthers less than a month later. If you cannot get Athearn parts, there are other companies (like A-Line and Northwest Short Line) who sell drive compnents designed for Athearn locos.

Josh
Spokane, WA

[Anonymous]

Everyone is making is sound as though Athearn is going out of business. Do you think that Athearn is going to stop selling extra parts? I am in the process of trying to order the DCC boards so I can upgrade my blue box engines.

[dharmon]

QUOTE: Originally posted by schumach

Everyone is making is sound as though Athearn is going out of business. Do you think that Athearn is going to stop selling extra parts? I am in the process of trying to order the DCC boards so I can upgrade my blue box engines.

No, according to my LHS the parts boxes that used to be sold to LHS's....the plastic boxes o' parts are no longer available and it really isn't worth the trouble to them to order the parts to fill it, becasue they don't sell enough of them. Supposedly Athearn is no longer going to market parts, that is package them and sell them at the LHS. But you can still get parts from Athearn directly. A-Line and some other companies make compatible parts..drives and such. What I was getting at is if your LHS has one, and you do a lot of restoring, remotoring, etc like I do...get them now while it easy, instead of having to order a bag of washers from Athearn. I'm sorry if I gave the impression that the sky was falling. [:)]

[Anonymous]

You did not make it sound like the sky is falling, but all I keep hearing and reading is that Athearn is going to RTR only and getting rid of the blue boxes, along with the accessories. But I do appreiceate the infomation.