General Discussion (Model Railroader)

Hi!

I'm testing the outer main of my HO 11x15 layout.  Its wired for DCC, and the trackwork is Atlas code 100 flex.  The outer main pretty much runs the perimeter of the room, and the curves are 29 and 30 inch radii with easements.  I have fully tested 20 car freight trains, and the trackage passed with flying colors.

However, I just set out (for the first time) 5 of the Walthers Santa Fe Super Chief passenger cars.  By themselves they roll "ok", and take the curves with ease.  But as a coupled train, they just don't want to stay on the track at various times, but always at a curve.

I suspect the problem is a result of "too close coupling", but I am not certain.  I recall these cars and seemingly inherent problems were discussed on this Forum awhile back, but cannot locate the postings.  Sooo, have you had problems with them, and what did you do to fix them???

Thank you!

Mobilman44 

the diaphram springs are really stiff on those, you may have remove the roof and bend them out a bit, to allow the diaphrams to move.

Well, I don't have the cars in question, but here are few thoughts:

The diaphragms may be too stiff, the one piece recessed into the car is really a bad design in my opintion.

Your curves are also too sharp based on my experiances with 85' long cars. I know "everyone" says they work fine - maybe not really.

As all these new passenger cars from Walthers have evolved, it seems that the actual coupling distance keeps changing. Some I have seem have the diaphragms almost touching while being pulled on the straight, other seem to have a large gap - not sure why?

Curves that small, with full sized cars, really need easements.

I don't generally buy Walthers passenger cars, and many of the passenger cars I have are less than 85', but all of mine, including a few 85' long ones from Bachmann and Branchline, have American Limited diaphragms and are close coupled so they always touch. I have no problems on my somewhat larger 36" minimum curves.

What is the point of diaphragms if they don't touch? work? Or leave the cars unrealisicly spaced way apart?

We can only hope that all this movement toward more accurate models will be translated in to more accurate "right of way's", that is larger curves and turnouts so the detail of these products can really shine.

One member of our group has a lot of Walthers passenger cars, but his curves are bigger, he has no issues.

Sheldon

Mobilman,

Is it the same curve that the cars derail or is it all the curves?

Could there be a kink in the track somewhere in the curve where it's not a 30" radius?

Gordon

MM, if you can pull or shove those cars through as an engineless unit, I don't think it can be attributed to the couplers or the diaphragms.  Is the problem on any curve or just the one?  Have you verified that the wheelsets are in gauge, and that the track is in gauge?  Have you placed a straightedge atop the rails and backlit them, gotten down to railhead level with youre eyes and seen what, if any, light shows through between the bottom of the straightedge and the rails?  You may be surprised.

I run my heavyweights from Walthers through 24" curves that do include the odd hump and torsion, and I do occasionally have to fix a derailment, but just as often they go through without complaint.  This is in my yard throat on one side, so it is just past walking speed.  However, I can run those same diaphragmed cars through 26 and 28" curves just fine, and at scale speeds near 40 mph.  Above 28", I can fly through the curves.

The Walthers cars, unfortunately, are known for being finnicky and fickle.  I think the top surfaces of the frames on the trucks sometimes get hung up on items between the car frame and the trucks, and not necessarily appliances and boxes n' stuff....I'm talking about electrical contacts so that you can install working lighting.

-Crandell

You might try loosening the screw on the trucks just a tad. Sometimes they are too stiff which prevents the truck from riding the rail correctly. I did that with one of my Walthers heavyweights and worked like a charm. 

I don't have the Walthers cars but I had the same problem with my Athearn Bombardier cars.  I added more weight to them and that cured the problem.

mobilman44:

However, I just set out (for the first time) 5 of the Walthers Santa Fe Super Chief passenger cars.  By themselves they roll "ok", and take the curves with ease.  But as a coupled train, they just don't want to stay on the track at various times, but always at a curve.

I posted this on another thread, but this worked for me....

 In the instruction sheet it at the bottom of the exploded parts diagram it has a "NOTE TO MODELER"

"For Improved operations on a 24" radius curve,trim the center sill to clear wheelsets"

So on the bottom of the car turn the trucks as far left and right as they will go. The area where they touch the center sill must be cut out. Add another 1/2 " or so beyond where they touch. I just simply cut my sills to the next support bar, or about an 1 1/2" of material. I used a pair of diagonal cutters or you could use some "rail snips".

They work perfectly now on my curves. And you can't see underneath where you cut out the sill anyway, so it still looks great.

Thank you all for your advice and suggestions!!!   You guys always seem to come through!

I've made progress on the cars, finding that I needed to oil the axles (sure never had to oil Athearn axles), and loosen up one of the truck screws.  That solved most of the problems, leaving me with only a derailment prone rear truck on the observation car.  I've rechecked the trackwork, and the curve flows nicely, and the easements are fine.  Soooo, I will check out the observation car more thoroughly after I post this, and suspect it may be binding a bit on the center sill and require some minor surgery.

You know, I like the looks of the Walther's passenger cars, but I just don't understand how my old "cheap" Athearn cars ran so well (and still do), and these $45 Walther's cars are so finicky.  It just doesn't seem right.......

Thanks,

Mobilman44 

mobilman44:

You know, I like the looks of the Walther's passenger cars, but I just don't understand how my old "cheap" Athearn cars ran so well (and still do), and these $45 Walther's cars are so finicky.  It just doesn't seem right.......

Your Athearn cars are only 72' long as opposed to 85' long. Unless you modified them your Athearn cars have truck mounted couplers that are very friendly to sharp curves, and unless you added them, your athearn cars have no diaphragms to bind or put additonal pressure on the cars.

All of these things make a BIG difference in the range of curves you have. Comfortable trouble free opperation of 85' cars starts at 36" radius (3 times rule) and 4 times is better.

Remember, in real life, 36" radius translates to a curve that an 85' car would just squeak around at minimum speed.

Once you have body mounted couplers and diaphragms your are getting into the same range of physics as the real thing.

I run mostly Athearn cars, modified with working diaphrams, close coupled with body mounted couplers and while the will work on smaller curves, my minimum is 36".

Sheldon

I agree that the Athearn cars are shorter, and would have a tendency to run better on smaller radius curves.  I certainly understand that.  But my point is that the Walthers cars are finicky and should not require various adjustments to run properly on 28 inch curves.  If they were built to only run on large radius curves (w/o problems), then that should have been pointed out on the packaging.  

Hey, I guess its just the fact that Mr. Athearn spoiled us, giving us terrific value for the buck!

ENJOY,

Mobilman44

Make sure the trucks are "square". When on the rail do all the wheels set on the rail. If not, a side frame may be twisted. The screws that hold the side frame on the boolsters also provide electrical pick-up for the lights. I had a few with "burrs" in the area of the slot. A small file can touch them up.

I have a lot of Walthers cars, and have had to fix at one time or another everything mentioned above.  I recently found a case where the tops of the truck frames were hitting the back flanges of the cover of the coupler.  Shortening these flanges closer to the screws fixed that.

Another thing is rolling resistance.  Both four and six-wheel Walthers trucks use metal axles into metal sideframe journal cones, and I found oil helped sometimes, but the main problems were the materials used and the fact that the cones are cast rather than machined.  Since the slickest factory-assembled cars I had were Branchline heavyweights, I changed the trucks on my Walthers HW cars using six-wheel trucks to Branchline trucks, which use metal axles into Nylon bearings.  The improvement was amazing.  I did give up car lighting, which I didn't want anyway.  My 4-8-4's went from pulling four HW's up a 2.5% grade to pulling eight before slipping.

 With the cars like the 20th Century Limiteds that have four-wheel trucks, I tried using a truck tuner to machine the journals.  Since metal is hard to to do by hand, I used a drill.  I removed just enough so the cone walls were 100% shiney.  Then added a very small amount of light oil.  This definitely improved the trucks, but they aren't as good as the Branchlines.

The ideal thing might be to machine the Walthers trucks to accept Branchline bearing inserts (and use wipers or batteries for lighting?), but this is beyond my abilities and tools.

Hal

Mobilman: 

If I can check in here on the thread (a little late, so pardon me), my absolute minimum radius is 34" and I had a devil of a time with several of my Walthers passenger cars.  I had to graphite the wheelsets, check the wheel-gauges--adjust a few--and then I found that several of the Philips screwheads on the trucks had burrs on them that rubbed against that little metal thingie that connects to the lighting system on the underside, and after filing them down, I found that I had to loosen the screws on several of the trucks.  And after that, I found that the Walthers couplers were 'drooping' and catching the kingpins on turnouts.  So I replaced all of the couplers with Kadees, which cured the problem (the Kadees have a thicker shaft which prevents the droop in the Walthers coupler pockets).

I won't even go into the number of drills I broke on that stupid ABS plastic before I finally said, the Hell with it, I don't NEED those teeny-tiny little grab-irons, LOL!

By the time I finished, I realized that in this day and age, RTR does not mean a darned thing, at least as far as these cars are concerned.   But when they start running well, they're darned good cars.  I just wish a little more care had gone into producing them in the first place.  IMO, for the price, they should run well right out of the box.

Tom   

Thank you Tom - and the rest of you as well!

I also had to adjust some of the coupler "hoses", but that is a pretty normal thing to do on most any car.  I still haven't found the gremlin in the rear truck of the observation car, but its just a matter of more trouble shooting.

Thanks again,

Mobilman44