Coupler and wheel question


macjet

Member
1) Will the Kadee 5 work as a replacement on Proto GP38/60 locos? Or do I need something else.

2) My LHS has been selling me Intermountain 33" metal wheels for replacements. However when I read the find print on my ACF 3 bay covered hoppers it says that they are equipped with 36" wheels. What do I need?

Rookie questions I know but thanks for the help.
 
Kadee #5,58 or148 will all work for your loco. Proto 2000, Branchline Trains and Athearn all sell 36" wheels for frieght cars priced at between $9.00-$10.00. Ron
 
As a general rule of thumb (its by no means perfect) covered hoppers have 36" wheels. 33" are more for boxcars.
 
As a general rule of thumb (its by no means perfect) covered hoppers have 36" wheels. 33" are more for boxcars.

Aargh! That's not what they told me. My LHS said 33 freight and 36 passenger. I guess I'll have to re-replace all those Accurail wheels.

Thanks for the info!
 
I'm not too concerned with weight. But if I'm going to replace the wheels I might as well replace them with the correct ones.

No real loss. I've got several old Athearn and Roundhouse box cars that need new wheels.

Here is a new problem:

All equipment in P2K.

I bought two new locos this week. Both GP38-2's, one SF and one RI. The walking deck on the nose of the SF is more rounded where the RI is square and has a drop down deck for walking from one engine to another. The problem is with the SF. The rounded deck up front causes problems when I pair it up behind my GP60. The decks are too close and rub in the turns. The front of the SF looks like it needs a longer coupler. Does Kadee make such a thing? The couplers that came with this engine are the same length. I don't think the decks shoud be touching.
 
What material do you normally use for weights?.

I have some flatrack cars, which have a metal plate sandwiched, but as for tanks I cannot sandwich anything, maybe I can drill a hole from the bottom and throw in some lead shots to get some weight.

How much should the cars weigh approx ( in grams better, but if not I will convert :) )

like 20', 30', 40', 50', etc etc ??

I guess these will be having different weights according to size, am I right?
 
Maxitrains, NMRA (National Model Railroad Association) here in the states recommends going by the size in inches, rather then its scale length. Google says .5 ounces = 14.1747616 grams, so, a 50' boxcar is approximately 7" long, it should be 4.5oz, or 127.572854 grams. At that, I think a Maxi III well is about 8" which makes it 5oz. The Maxi II should be the same, Maxi I, about 4.5 (it only had 40' wells).
 
...The front of the SF looks like it needs a longer coupler. Does Kadee make such a thing? The couplers that came with this engine are the same length. I don't think the decks shoud be touching.

Hey, this is a question I can actually answer. Yes! :D

Check out the Kadee website. I had to do the opposite and bring an old F7B in closer to its mates, and went with a #7 short - worked like a charm. In your case a #36 would give you some extra length, plus there are underset or overset ones if you need to adjust coupler height.

Mark
 
Hey, this is a question I can actually answer. Yes! :D

Check out the Kadee website. I had to do the opposite and bring an old F7B in closer to its mates, and went with a #7 short - worked like a charm. In your case a #36 would give you some extra length, plus there are underset or overset ones if you need to adjust coupler height.

Mark

Thanks!

I'm starting to see the need for under and overset couplers. My Kadee coupler height gauge came with some washers but I've got one engine that is going to need to be lowered and one raised. The cars seem to be all over the place. It's going to take forever to get my fleet up to par.

Now to the weight post above. I thought I remembered reading that HO cars were 1 oz plus 1 oz per inch. Is that correct or is it 1 oz plus 0.5 oz per inch?
 
As a general rule of thumb (its by no means perfect) covered hoppers have 36" wheels. 33" are more for boxcars.

After some time, my mind clicked on this topic about wheels. I need to change some of my box cars wheels since they are plastic and I don't like them. I keep reading and reading your post , and I was wondering if the 33" & 36" are the diameter of the real wheels or something else.

I noticed that on some of my old LIMA trucks ( cars ) I have large wheels, but on the newer ones, they are small. is that how they are is real, or it was something that was like that in old productions?

And what should I be looking for, since I have a large assortment of long and short cars, (from 20' till 50' )

Thanks
 
After some time, my mind clicked on this topic about wheels. I need to change some of my box cars wheels since they are plastic and I don't like them. I keep reading and reading your post , and I was wondering if the 33" & 36" are the diameter of the real wheels or something else.

Thanks

Yes, the 33 inch and 36 inch referred to is the diameter of the real wheels. If you want to run prototypically, you would need to research the particular car and find the specs for it. For example:

http://www.rr-fallenflags.org/el/frt/eeb-094a.gif

In this diagram you can see that all measurements for that particular Erie car
are listed. In one of the wheels it says 33" so that car had 33" wheels.
 
I use pennies for internal weights. They're cheap, a penny per! :D

Some of us go to the tire stores and get a bucket of used tire weights. One of my friends then goes outside and melts them and casts his own, into various sizes. This is somewhat dangerous, due to the fumes. Which is why he does it outside, in an open area.

Back to pennies, for a 40' Athearn Blue Box boxcar, with P2K wheels and Kadee couplers along with the supplied weight, it's 8-9 pennies to bring them to NMRA. :D

Kennedy
 
I have a short writeup somewhere that talks about freight car wheels, but apparently it's not on this PC. But, 33" wheels are for cars up to 100tons, 36" for above. If your cars are 40-50' types, then most likely you'll be needing 33" wheels.

Now, the next question is, flat back or ribbed?

:D

Kennedy
 
The reason you might have gotten the 33" freight/36" passenger statement was because all the packages of Kadee 36" wheels I've seen say they are passenger wheels.
 
Thanks!


Now to the weight post above. I thought I remembered reading that HO cars were 1 oz plus 1 oz per inch. Is that correct or is it 1 oz plus 0.5 oz per inch?

I'm wrong. NMRA shows 1 oz plus 0.5 oz per inch of body length.
 
My KaDee couplers #5's arrived about a week ago, and I only changed a few couplers so far. But the problem now is HOW the heck do these couplers work to disengage, I tried to put a magnet under thte track, but still no action, I also tried a SPEAKER's magnet 5" dia. and still no go. Could someone kindly explain to me how this should work?

BTW, how should I fasten a KADEE in its box, if the car itself doesn't have a screw or bolt, I guess U will say, buy some 2mm bolts and nuts!!!??
 
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Generally #5 or one of the new whisker kind will work for most situations. I use Kadee couplers on everything. The clones are all substandard.
As for wheels sets turned metal ones are the way to go. Personally I use Kadee trucks correct tor the car. I have a unit grain train made up of 40 covered hoppers 18 are Accurail 18 are MDC/Roundhouse and 4 are Walthers. All have Kadee 513 rollerbearing trucks and are weighted to 5 ounces per car.
I use a modified NMRA standard for weight. A minimum of 3.5 ounces is required and a maximum of 7 ounces. I use 1 ounce per 10 scale feet of car length. A 40 foot car would weigh 4 ounces. All cars under 35 scale feet still must weigh 3.5 ounces.
 



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