Replacement Wheelsets for Hornby and other British OO scale

[simon1966]

I have just replaced all the wheels on my CB&Q, Wabash and other midwest HO scale stuff, but I have some OO scale Hornby/Triang/Dublo coaches that make an appearance on my layout pulled by a Hornby Mallard. The coaches are old, left over from my childhood modeling back in the UK. (30 yrs later I now live in Illinois). Anyway, does anyone have any reccomendations for replacement wheels for these coaches? My layout is all code 100, simply so I can run my old British stuf. If the suggestions are only in the UK, this is not a problem as I have family that can act as a forwarding agent!

Thanks for the input

[Anonymous]

Hi, you will probably need to get replacement trucks from one of the small manufacturers here in the UK. A good place to start looking would be the Scale 4 Society scalefour.org go to the site map and look under Traders and Links for compqanies who have items like that.

Another option would be replace the wheelsets and bearings adn keep the old truck sideframes. You might have a problem with this because these models predate standard axle lengths. Replacing the bearings with needle point brass insert bearings will help. This would be an option if you want to keep the original bogie side frames.

Bear in mind that the bogies which you can get here will probably be etched brass and whitemetal kits unless you want to get some newer Hornby trucks that you can stick under your old coaches. A google search should find you some hornby bogies.

hope this all helps.

neil

[Anonymous]

Simon:

Aside from the Scale4 website cited above, if you need wheelsets only I'd have a look at the offerings from NWSL ( www.NWSL.com ). They make wheelsets in several sizes, profiles and axle lengths which I think would be adaptable/good enough for your 00 trucks.

Randy

[nfmisso]

ReBoxx has a HUGE assortment of axle lengths, NWSL has only three.

[BR60103]

Check the British Railway Modellers of North America website http://home.ca.inter.net/~brmna/index.html
and look for their "member dealers".
What you do will depend on just how old your equipment is. If you have plastic bogies with pointed axles, you can get replacement "scale" wheels. If you have the old Triang with the open axle boxes, it's a bit more of a problem and you may need pointed bearings. Old Dublo with the separate bearing pieces in them can be a real problem. They may operate just as they are, unless they're 3-rail.
The other problem is that the wheels are undersize. I'm not sure, but I think they're about 10.5mm vs 12 mm for scale wheels. This makes your cars ride higher. (We are talking coaches?)
Careful with the Dublo; they're valuable.