Old Athearn

[Anonymous]

Was the answer no good, or did you lose interest?
In any event....in case I miss your appreciation.......you're welcome...[I guess].

[Anonymous]

Motor has double-ended shaft and is mounted in the middle. The driveshafts are attached to motor with small rubber sleeves. The driveshafts are supported by 'bearing stanchions' in the middle of each power truck.All 4 axles are driven by the shaft.You put the rubber bands on the shafts by sliding the driveshafts out of the rubber sleeves.All 4 bands must be on the shaft in the same direction. It is necessary to disassemble the trucks themseves to put the rubber bands on them. THERE ARE ISULATING BLOCKS in the trucks which must not be left out or switched around, because the truck frames are metal, as is the engine frame.It is easier to disconnect the leads to the frame and motor when working on the trucks.
regards/Mike

[Anonymous]

Rubberband, rubberband!
How are the electrical motor and driveline made? Driving both truck or one? Are there a picture somewhere of the inside?

[Anonymous]

Rubberband, rubberband!
How are the electrical motor and driveline made? Driving both truck or one? Are there a picture somewhere of the inside?

[Anonymous]

Lots of memories in the last two posts...I remember my Varney 4-6-0 screwdriver kit. [Paul Larson asked,in a 1960 editorial for mf'rs to stop calling every different Ten-wheeler a "Casey Jones"].Anyway, it lost a valve gear rivet on a Sunday, and wound up with a cut-off sraight pin with a bead of solder on the cut end, instead of a rivet...worked fine.I never had some of the engine makes mentioned, but I do remember my first plastic building kit, the Revell water tower. I couldn't find a water tower in any issue of MT or MR that didn't have a spout right on it, so I took the "speedboat-support rack" off an Athearn flat car, and made a frame for the spout on the side of the tank.
A piece of carved sprue, and a little fine chain, made it look like I thought it should. Still have it in use on current layout...can't stand to detail it further, since I have so little left from back then....[including teeth and hair !].
Also think one of the things that make it easier these days is the huge variety of good adhesives...the Suydam metal and wood buildings were a real challenge, when there was only solder and Pliobond to work with.
regards / Mike
regards/Mike

[Anonymous]

Hi Mike and Larry, I got a couple for y'all...Do you recall the Revell SW switcher with the clutch?
The darned thing would sit there and rev up before it started to move!! Hobbytown had a similar arrangement for their E6.

And how about the Penn Line and Mantua steam engine kits? Seems like I was always losing those little rivets for the valve gear and would have to go downtown to the hobby shop and get some more.

I still have a few Athearn metal boxcars sitting on the shelf along with some Stormbecker wood and paper freight cars. But my all time favorites were the Walthers passenger cars with the tinplate/stamped sides.

Yep!! We didn't just "shake the box" in those days much!! Take Care and Have Fun...Vic

[BRAKIE]

Who can forget the Varney drive?Yes,it rank right up there with the best.Who can forget that SW7 Varney made or the 0-4-0 "little Joe"? Was there a modeler that did not have that 0-4-0? How about Varneys 2-8-0 and 4-6-0 ? The Mantua line of steamers? Good locomotives in there day and time.The Penn-Line line of locomotives was among the best. There was a trick here with these locomotives.Some of the modelers would replace the DC60 (70?) motors with Pitman DC80s or in some cases the DC90s! Once these locomotives was built they was hard to beat in the line of steam locomotives.Remember the hook and loop coupler? How about Howell Day? Main line Models? Megow? Sudam? Red Ball? Tru-Scale? Revell? The Walters metal passenger cars? The Athearn Metal cars? Silver Streak? Just to name a few.Ofcouse Who can forget the PFM and United line of Locomotives with the high pitch whine? (Diesel drives).I also recall a working metal knuckle coupler,that never cought on.Could this been the fore runner of the KD? The X2F(so called NMRA coupler) coupler was a good coupler in its day and time that set the standard for couplers which it was meant to do.Do recall the hodge podge of couplers that was out there and came in different kits.Remember the wooden car kits that was to light and still one had to buy trucks and couplers? Remember when sprung trucks was the norm? Today when I hear a Johnny come lately complain about how loud a Athearn drive is I just shake my head and smile and think of the by gone days when all locomotives was loud And how quite that Athearn drive can be with a little TLC.Sometimes a modeler will complain that this isn't right for this type locomotive.LOL I remember when we was happy just to have a smooth running engine from the box with out having to build it or fool with the drive some to get it to run right.Are we that spoiled today with the likes of Atlas,Kato,P2K and Dare I say Athearn?

[Anonymous]

Hello Brakie !!!...good to know there are still a few of us left from the good old "50's" of HO Model Railroading!!! Getting the Pittman motors up here in Canada was difficult, so I retained the Athearn motors, trued up the commutators [in a crude but effective way, and attacked the drive belt situation in a different way. I found the Athearn shafts would "bow down", beyond the bearing stanchions [this meant the outermost two axle drives], causing a bit of slippage on those 2 rubber bands...so I wound the outer portions of the driveshafts with copper wire, increasing the diameter by about 50%, and pretty much equalizing the tension on all 4 bands.
I found the Athearn rubber bands tended to slowly disintegrate rather than just break...went to #8 from a stationary store I think.I tried the heavier O-ring type bands you mention, but they would tend to hang up on those dearly departed Rail Line X2F uncoupling ramps we had back then.You are right on about the Hobbytown drives, they were state of the art back then. I kind of liked Varney's diesel drive, too.
Got any more "Memories of the HO 1950's" you'd like to thread???....regards/ Mike

[BRAKIE]

LOL.A old HiFi drive!Man that sure brings back the memorys.Please put her on the self as a memory of model railroading history.But,Yes,she still can be ran.All you need to do is find the type of rubber band that will work and you are in business.Now, if you will permit me to share some history.What we did in the old days was buy a double shaft Pittman motor,use black rubber bands(looked like O rings I forget the name of the company)put a small piece of model airplane fuel line on the end of the drive shafts so the bands would not slide off and we could run them a long time before the band broke.By using the type of replacement rubber bands for the hifi drive they would break in no time at all.But,by using the black rubber bands they would not break that often.BTW one did not have to replace the motor,we did for better pulling power.

As for the best drive of that day,it would be Hobby Town of Boston drives which you had to build from a drive kit.

[Anonymous]

The Athearn rubber bands can be substituted by #8 rubber bands.If you double-head 2 engines, it will take away some of the 'surge and shudder'action when starting and stopping. Use a plastic drawbar, or plastic shank couplers when double-heading.
Regards/Mike

[Anonymous]

Well you know, sometimes models are avaiable for small money and.........

[Anonymous]

Yep, they can be used. They were 12Volt and would be compatible with todays powerpacks. I suppose that they were state of the art for their day but they never were the best operating locos. They would however run about 300 scale MPH!!! HAHA!! Don't know if the rubber drive bands are still available. My best advice is put them on the bookshelf and admire them as a piece of model railroad history or gut them out and run them as dummy locos. You'll be much happier with the Athearn, Atlas, Kato and etc geared locos. Take Care and Have Fun...Vic

[Anonymous]

Old Athearn rubberband drive diesel locos, can they be used, or just stand in the bookshelf