Actually I just need the one gear. I need the one on the main driving wheel. It split. The previous owner had a ton of bullfrog snot on the drivers and I am wondering if that led to the fail of the gear.
Any one know of where I can accuire one or who may be able to fix it?
Mike
alco's forever!!!!! Majoring in HO scale Minorig in O scale:)
I have a Proto2000 2-8-4...great engine...worth saving. I don't have a ready answer re the axle gear replacement. Wish I did. Some advice.
1. Ask you question on https://groups.io/g/RepowerAndRegear/topics
Repower and Regear is where many motor and gearing experts congregate.
2. Contact NWSL and see if they have your gear (I don't see it listed but you never know. They may be able to duplicate your gear ...they do custom work.
3. See if one of the professional locomotive gurus on repower and regear will will do your engine.
If a gearbox replacement is necessary the hardest part of the job will be disassembling the boiler from the chassis. I've never tried it..I'm afraid I'll break something. You have to remove three screws (easy) and then somehow get the cab off the boiler (not obvious to me how you do that but that's what you have to do).
Proto gears have a history of cracking over time. I doubt that the bullfrog snot had anything to do with the cracking. For diesels it's a simple (usually) replacement using an Athearn gear (60024) replacement. Unfortunately, for steam it's not so simple. Good luck.
found the thread on removing the boiler from the Proto 2000 2-8-4...thanks to trainman440.
Nevermind I got it figured out. For anyone with the same issue, here's how:1. Flip the engine upside down and remove the screw underneath the cab.
2. Remove the boilderfront, and remove the single screw. 3 remove the screw in the smoke stack. 4. With the engine upsidedown, remove the firebox cover thingies. 5. Pull off the shell from the rear of the engine, near the cab.
Thanks anyway, Ed!Charles
All that snot probably did contribute to the failure - the wheels slip for a REASON. Forcing the mechanism to withstand more force than normal is going to find whatever weak point there is - a gear that breaks, or a motor that cooks itself.
The loco will be happier now if you fix it up and don't abuse it like the previous owner.
Down with traction tires, and all that!
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
I don't know if the gear in your Berkshire is similar to that in the Proto USRA 0-8-0, but mine suffered a cracked axle gear which I was able to fix....
The gear in question was a shouldered one, and after removing the geared axle from the loco, I removed one of the drivers and the cracked gear. I checked through my supply of brass tubing and found a size (this was a number of years ago, so don't recall the exact sizes involved) and found one which had an inside diameter slightly less than the outer diameter of the gear's shoulder.Measuring the gear with calipers, I selected a suitable drill bit, and used it, in a pin vise, to ream-out the tubing slightly, then followed up with the next largest size(s) until the piece of tubing fairly-closely matched the outer diameter of the gear's shoulder. I used a dullish #11 blade in my X-Acto to carefully remove a little material from the inner edge of one end of the modified tubing (to help start it onto the gears shoulder). I then manually compressed the cracked gear and carefully started the modified tubing onto the gear's shoulder, finishing the operation using a small vise as a stand-in for an arbor press.
The loco runs as it did before the gear cracked, and I've not had a problem with it since then.
I should note the the drill bits used were from a numbered set, not SAE fractional sizes or metric sizes, although the gear's shoulder may indeed be a metric size.
If your loco has a similar shouldered gear, you may be able to repair it if you can't find a replacement.
Wayne
Redvdub1 found the thread on removing the boiler from the Proto 2000 2-8-4...thanks to trainman440.
Hey, that's me!
Of my 5 proto 2000 engines, two had a split gear. A very temporary(but easy) solution is to take the gear out, wrap a few layers of heat shrink tubing around the sides of the gear, then make them shrink as much as possible, creating sort of a rubber band tightening effect, clamping the gear around the axle tight.
Otherwise, if you're not good with gears like me, just buy a duplicate engine, swap gears, then sell it. Sometimes thats the only way to get certain parts, unfortunatly.
Or like others said, check out NWSL.
Hope this helps,
Charles
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Modeling the Santa Fe & Pennsylvania in HO
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Thanks for that suggestion. I will tty that. It is indeed a shouldered gear. One side being way longer than the other. will try this and see what happens.
ok update on the 2-8-4. Contacted NWSL and they sent me a gear for the engine. Was all excited until I realized that the inner hole diamater is bigger than the original. So I thought for a bit and did some digging around and found some brass tubing the the wheel axel fit into no problem. However it was slightly too big for the gear inner opening.
So I got the digital caliper out and did some measuring of gear outer daimater and drill bit dia. and found one that was close so it would have a snug fit. I drilled out the gear, cut a piece of brass tube and pressed it into the gear. Feeling proud of myself I pressed the first wheel into place then went to set it in the engine to get the placement of the other wheel and found out the gear is too big for the opening in the chasis by .01 inches. Well with a little wiggling I was able to get it in the spot needed, I eyed up the placement of the other wheel and pressed it onto the new gear. Got everything all put back together. Angels were singing, trumpents were blaring a victory song and all was good.........Until l put it on the track. wha wha whaaaaaaa.
So if you have not guessed it yet by inserting a brass tube ALL the way through the gear the metal axels of the wheels have now crossed beams and i have a short. :o(
So now my plan of action is to cut off the new gear(now ruined), cut the brass tube in half and sand it to the length of the wheel axle and buy a new gear. uggh I hate myself sometimes.