Wheel Corrosion (?), Broadway Locomotives


R

railandsail

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This is the second Broadway (BLI) locomotive I've experienced this phenomena with. Look at these attached photos of a Blueline RSD-15 loco I had sitting on my workbench at my layout in the basement of my former house.

The wheels have corroded badly to the point that the loco fails to make electrical contact in order to run. It will not run in this condition, and the tracks are clean nickle-silver.

In contrast look at the photos of the Broadway E7 and AC6000 locos sitting in this same environment for 1 year, and 3 months respectively...clean wheels with no sign of corrosion. (in contrast the RSD-15 had only been there for 2 months).

1) Has anyone else experienced this corrosion effect??
2) Is it just confined to certain models, and/or certain periods of production?
3) Could it be due to a change in vendors within China that produced certain models, and/or a change in vendors that supplied the wheels??
4) Could it be a change in the metal materials utilized by the manufacturer??

At any rate this is a totally unacceptable situation to experience, particularly since I intend to take a lot of my trains to a hot, humid environment in Thailand.

And I am even more concerned now about the fair number of Blueline locos I've purchased recently that are still stored in their original packaging. and not exposed to the open air.
 
E7 and AC6000 wheels in contrast

same enviroment, longer term....clean
 
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Steam Loco

I had a somewhat similar problem about a year ago with a 2-6-6-4 BLI steam loco. The drivers appeared slightly corroded to me and I sent it back to the factory for their inspection. They said 'no problem' and reset the defaults on the decoder, and sent it back. It doesn't run that badly, but then it has a lot of wheels to make contact with track that might be masking the individual wheel problem(s)??

I'm still leary of this wheel problem. It just doesn't look proper
 
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I've never seen corrosion like that on a BLI locomotive or any other locomotive, for that matter. I've only seen that green colored corrosion on brass. Assuming the wheels are supposed to be nickle silver, that would indicate the amount of copper is too high and the amount of zinc is too low to prevent the corrosion. I think this is a manufacturing defect and I'd contact BLI and show them your pictures. You deserve either a replacement locomotive or one of another model if all the RSD-15's have this defect. The steam locomotive wheels just look like they need to be cleaned but the wheels on the RSD-15 are defective.
 
UP2CSX said:
....Assuming the wheels are supposed to be nickle silver, that would indicate the amount of copper is too high and the amount of zinc is too low to prevent the corrosion.
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Someone else mention that to me as well. It does seem strange in this world of high copper cost that a manufacturer would put in too much copper?

UP2CSX said:
The steam locomotive wheels just look like they need to be cleaned
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These remaining photos I had of the steam engine were not so good. In real life these wheels had a more white-ish appearance than shown, and even on the sides of the rims in addition running surfaces. It looked like old 'pot-metal' to me at first.
 
UP2CSX said:
I think this is a manufacturing defect.
Click to expand...
And if this turns out to be the case, how many other locos of theirs could have these faulty wheels??

Do I need to open up all my new boxes of trains and submit them to open air for some period of time to find out which ones, or will the manufacturer have traced this problem back to which locos were built with these defective wheelsets??

And I wonder what the interchangability is with their wheelsets and which locomotive models?

I remember when LifeLike (Proto 2K) had a problem with the gears on their wheelsets that split from being too tight of a fit.
 
I was going to comment on the color indicating too much copper, but it seems Jim beat me to that...
 
I've discovered another 2-6-6-4 steam loco with exact same problem (friend with shop took it in), and some more problems with Blueline diesel units. I'll post photos soon.
 
i have a old atlas or athearn H.O.ac440cw with the same problem
all my wheels look like car battery terminals. i soaked them in
thinner and scrubed the clear coated them. i'm into n scale now
 
Made me dig into my roster as I have quite a few BLI steamers. No problems here. Some of the engines are about 3 or 4 years old now. No sign of "the plague".

Since your engines seem to be newer models, I hope my older engines are not heading in the same direction as to the corrosion.

I do have a couple of OLD Mantua engines that have brass wheels. I "aged" them with a blackening liquid after cleaning them and have had no problems since. I have the bottle around here someplace and don't recall the name of the stuff. But, if I remember correctly, it came in a 4oz bottle. I've had the stuff for years and will probably have it when I die. You just don't use it everyday. I'll TRY to find it and post the brand name and the ingredients.

Bob
 
'Battery Cable' Wheels

bigford said:
i have a old atlas or athearn H.O.ac440cw with the same problem all my wheels look like car battery terminals. I soaked them in
thinner and scrubed the clear coated them. I'm into n scale now
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I saw another reference to this problem with those older Athearn wheels just a few hours ago, but forgot to bookmark it.

So the question is how did the 'battery terminal' wheels work with providing good electrical contact with the rails??....like battery cables and posts that are in this condition??
 
Only Certain Models??

stationmaster said:
Made me dig into my roster as I have quite a few BLI steamers. No problems here. Some of the engines are about 3 or 4 years old now. No sign of "the plague".

Since your engines seem to be newer models, I hope my older engines are not heading in the same direction as to the corrosion. Bob
Click to expand...
I had only seen reference to this problem with the Norfork Western 2-6-6-4 class locos of theirs. It was reconfirmed to me when I saw this same model steamer taken in by my friend's train shop a few days ago. Wow, I said this loco has the same problem as mine. It is a troublesome sight.

I will have to say that it does not appear to interfer with the running of the loco (electrical contact) to the extent that it would appear to. I don't yet know what to make of that.

Certainly the closely associated problem with the diesel engine's wheels is much more serious, as here it truely interferes with the running of the train...sometimes not starting at all...not running due to poor electrical contact.
 
i found the loco in its box in my mom's basement after
moving out 5 years ago. the crud looked like the top of your
bettery terminals. and was all over the truck details after the
cleaning i tried to power the loco from the wheels but got nuthing
the motor will take power from the brushes but not the wheels:(
 
bigford: Sounds like you need to dis-assemble the trucks and get some sand paper...

are you plannign on keeping the unit to run, or display, or are you looking to sell it?

There are plenty of good webpages out there that go into overhauling the older athearn engines. (I've done quite a few myself, they are relativel easy to work on...)

also... you CLEAR COATED the wheels? that's your problem... if you painted them clear, then they will not be able to pickup any electricity from the rails...
 
Inquiry Email to Loco Manufacturers

...an email I sent out to various manufacturers of locos and wheel sets:


Dear Sirs,
I have been experiencing some significant problems with locomotive wheel corrosion on some Broadway Ltd locomotives, one steam loco so far, and several diesels.

I have been trying to do a little investigating on how the best wheel construction is made, and what constitutes the best materials.

I would really appreciate at the very least a short note from each of you as to your preferred construction materials for wheel-sets in HO products.

I have started several discussions on some forums, and included photos of some problem wheelsets for review.
___________________________________________________
...one reply thus far:

Best for what?

The best for traction is sintered iron, like Athearn used to use. It has some downsides in that it corrodes and traps organics which gunk up the track.

Solid nickel-silver has excellent appearance, doesn't corrode, but is a bit slippery.

Steel has excellent appearance, corrodes like the real thing, and good traction.

Brass is inexpensive to make, corrodes, fair traction, doesn't look great (older MDC steam locomotive drivers).

What you are asking for is proprietary information, and it would be very surprising if you received any answers from the manufacturers.
 
Penn Central. I've owned many brass models, including some well into the 2000's with actual assembly dates, where the plating did start to come off some of the wheelsets in maybe 30 or 40 hours run time. The Aristo Dash 9's I owned were brand new, state of the art large scale engines about 5 years ago--their plating only lasted 10 hours on average before it started coming off--though it could have something to do with using their stainless steel track. And my BLI USRA mikados, brand new right now, are starting to show a little plating loss on certain wheel flanges at something like 25 hours.

I can assure you that plating loss on locomotives is not a problem limited to "the past". Also, I know some fine brass collectors who will be the first to tell you that the plating being worn off the wheelsets--though it may reduce the collector value of a model--is not a big deal--that even with brass showing completely on the wheel treads, most engines have years of life left in them.
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I could be made to believe that if the 'plating' were just coming off the wheel's tread surfaces alone that things wouldn't be so bad,.... BUT
Penn Central. In so far as plating "improving electrical contact"--perhaps that may be true to some modest extent--but I was always told it was more for cosmetic reasons (because brass tarnishes). I'm no plating expert, but whenever you coat one metal with another, there's always the chance of the outer coating coming off
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I think most of us can remember how good electrical contact was when using brass track :rolleyes:
I believe most of us prefer nickle silver track these days :rolleyes:
 
Portal said:
My very first, and oldest, loco is a BLI Hudson. I have perhaps 3 hours running time on it, but on powered rails the total would be 150 or more. I had some intermittent connectivity issues with it in my staging area about one month ago and inverted it to clean contacts and powered wheels. I was dismayed to find that all of the drivers show the metal worn through to what appears to be a much more coppery metal beneath the chrome-like coating. This is not good news to me.
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PennCentral said:
Forgive me, but I just have a hard time seeing a problem here.

If the plating is worn, so what, the wheels should still last for many, many years. If you got 150 hours out of the plating--great--I'm getting 25 hours out of some Blueline engines before it's worn off some wheel flanges.

John
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Are you really content to put up with this short of time for wheel wear??

And I'm not just talking about the plating coming off of the tread surfaces, BUT THE WHOLE WHEEL.

Look back at those wheels on that IHC steam loco that I posted above. That is over 6-8 YEARS on that layout. And there are two of them I run double headed (even more 'slip' possibilities). THAT IS WHAT PROPER WHEEL SETS SHOULD LOOK LIKE in my opinion
 
Nickle Prices...interesting that there was an almost triple price increase a few years ago...
http://investinmetal.com/?page_id=4

Nickel is a metallic chemical element in the periodic table that has the symbol Ni and atomic number 28.

Nickel is a silvery white metal that takes on a high polish. It belongs to the iron group, and is hard, ductile, and malleable. It is mainly valued for the alloys it forms, particularly steel alloys and superalloys. Sixty five percent of the western worlds supply of nickle is used in stainless steel.

Nickel is one of five ferromagnetic elements.

The US five cent coin is not ferromagnetic, due to the fact that it is mostly copper.
 
Reply from Atlas

railandsail said:
I would really appreciate at the very least a short note from each of you as to your preferred construction materials for wheel-sets in HO products.


___________________________________________________
...one reply thus far:

Best for what?

The best for traction is sintered iron, like Athearn used to use. It has some downsides in that it corrodes and traps organics which gunk up the track.

Solid nickel-silver has excellent appearance, doesn't corrode, but is a bit slippery.

Steel has excellent appearance, corrodes like the real thing, and good traction.

Brass is inexpensive to make, corrodes, fair traction, doesn't look great (older MDC steam locomotive drivers).

What you are asking for is proprietary information, and it would be very surprising if you received any answers from the manufacturers.
Click to expand...

Atlas replied:
Atlas locomotive wheels are machined from brass, which is then nickel
plated. The plating prevents pitting of the wheels due to arcing.
 
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