MANTUA 2-8-2 MIKADO

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Kusojiji

Kusojiji

RANK AMATEURS OF THE MODEL RAILROAD FORM MEMBER
Been on a Mantua lump of metal hunt lately. Found this Mikado on fleabay. Was supposed to be running, but the valve rod was bent and hanging, so it bound up the mechanism right away.

MIKADO RIGHT SIDE.jpg


So, first thing I did was take everything apart for inspection and cleaning. Tender came with some interesting curvy brass washers.
TENDER WASHER CLOSE.jpg


Then the keeper plate came off to check the bearings. Everything looks good.
WHEELS RUNNING GEAR.jpg


This has the same open frame motor that I had on the 0-6-0, but this one runs much more smoothly. No coffee grinding on this one, but it draws .25 amps. After pulling out all the animal hair from the wheels and motor, gave them all a squoosh with the WD40 contact cleaner.

HEADLIGHT MOTOR.jpg


Oiled up the bearings and put the rolling chassis back together. The cylinders have a lot of corrosion on the rod side, which probably led to the bent valve rod. After straightening the rod and drilling out all the corrosion from the holes, it all went back in smoothly. Added some oil to the cylinder and valve rods. Will have to address the corrosion though. Rustoleum perhaps?
ROLLING CHASSIS TEST.jpg


The headlight is on my chopping block. This thing barely lights up. Want to replace with an LED, so doing some research into what that encompasses. I believe this has a regular bulb in it and a lense in the front. I think I can just pull the thing out from the bottom.
HEADLIGHT.jpg


Will be replacing the motor, not sure with what yet. The NWSL motor that I received for the 0-6-0 is no good. It is very coggy and seems to have been sitting on the shelf for a while as it sounds bad and takes a lot of power to get spinning. I may try the 1020 coreless and hope it has enough power to move this thing.

More to follow.
 
Headlight change to led was not so hard as I thought. The bulb came out without a fuss. My big influencer was not needed.
LIGHT BULB.jpg


I also managed to pull the light lense out of the front. I think the light probably would have been better without the big air bubble in the plastic.
LENSE AND 5MM LED.jpg


So I took some measurements and designed a simple mount. I will use a 3mm warm white led. The chassis of the Mantua loco provides positive voltage from the track. The tender provides the negative.
LIGHT CAVITY.jpg


The led fit nicely and provided enough light at 2.7 volts. I will add the same resistor value that I did for the 0-6-0.
LED INSTALLED.jpg


LED POWER ON.jpg


Next, probaby tender light.
 
For the tender, had to drill the hole for it. A little bit off center, but since I can't see that close, good enough.
TENDER LIGHT DRILLED.jpg


Made a lense for it out of 1.5mm fiber. Had to squish it a lot to get the head to fit. Used a lighter and a big chunk of metal to make it flat.
TENDER LIGHT FIBER.jpg


Used PVA to set it in place.
TENDER LIGHT FIBER INSTALLED.jpg


Then printed out a mount for the led. It is a tight fit and won't move. Luckily it lined up correctly.
TENDER LED MOUNT.jpg


Tested good.
TENDER LED LITT.jpg


Next step, rear kadee coupler. Need a spacer for it since the screw is so tiny as compared to the kadee.
 


While searching for a viable motor for this beast as I don't think the 1020 coreless has enough power, I remembered that the Mikado is much wider in the body cavity than the 0-6-0. Gave my last Kato motor a try and after grinding down some of the casting flash in the body, it fit. This is going to be difficult to measure for the motor mount.
KATO MOTOR IN SHELL.jpg
 


Kusojiji said:
Been on a Mantua lump of metal hunt lately. Found this Mikado on fleabay. Was supposed to be running, but the valve rod was bent and hanging, so it bound up the mechanism right away.

View attachment 238319

So, first thing I did was take everything apart for inspection and cleaning. Tender came with some interesting curvy brass washers.
View attachment 238320

Then the keeper plate came off to check the bearings. Everything looks good.
View attachment 238321

This has the same open frame motor that I had on the 0-6-0, but this one runs much more smoothly. No coffee grinding on this one, but it draws .25 amps. After pulling out all the animal hair from the wheels and motor, gave them all a squoosh with the WD40 contact cleaner.

View attachment 238322

Oiled up the bearings and put the rolling chassis back together. The cylinders have a lot of corrosion on the rod side, which probably led to the bent valve rod. After straightening the rod and drilling out all the corrosion from the holes, it all went back in smoothly. Added some oil to the cylinder and valve rods. Will have to address the corrosion though. Rustoleum perhaps?
View attachment 238323

The headlight is on my chopping block. This thing barely lights up. Want to replace with an LED, so doing some research into what that encompasses. I believe this has a regular bulb in it and a lense in the front. I think I can just pull the thing out from the bottom.
View attachment 238324

Will be replacing the motor, not sure with what yet. The NWSL motor that I received for the 0-6-0 is no good. It is very coggy and seems to have been sitting on the shelf for a while as it sounds bad and takes a lot of power to get spinning. I may try the 1020 coreless and hope it has enough power to move this thing.

More to follow.
Click to expand...
Well I'm glad you had no problems getting the side rods and valve gear back in! I messed one of mine up and have stayed from removing them since! 😅
 
Is the tender body plastic or cast? Plastic body leave lots of room for a Tsunami decoder, if desired. Glad you bought this one, as the last thing I need is another Mantua Mike! I only have sixteen, not counting the ones I've kitbashed into 2-10-2's (2, requiring a pair of Mike's) and three 2-10-4's. Some are DCC, some still DC. Oh, then there is one Mike that I took off the lead and trailing trucks, and put on a switch engine pilot. (The Burlington actually did that to one of their O-2's. Never repeated that!) No room to run them all on my 14' x 14' folded dogbone layout. As to motors, some have Canon coreless motors (now out of production), and some other can motors. I need to attend a meeting of Mantua's Anonymous! Oh, and then there are Mantua Pacific's...

Seriously, Mantua steamers are some of the best HO scale locomotives, even as they came originally! Yours looks great! I've seen some criticize the straight-top boilers of these as being "unprototypical". They never looked at Burlington O-2's and O-3's, nor MoPace Mikados! If one insists on a USRA boiler, the Mantua Pacific boilers can be made to work with a little adjustment of the mounting holes to fit the Mike chassis. Also, IIRC, Bowser or somebody had a USRA boiler casting.

Anyway, great job! Have fun with it. Just be careful. They can become adictive!
 
Last edited:
trailrider said:
I only have sixteen, not counting the ones I've kitbashed into 2-10-2's (2, requiring a pair of Mike's) and three 2-10-4's. Some are DCC, some still DC.
Click to expand...
Oh, he only has sixteen...🤣 I would be happy just to have one or two more!
Only kidding, really I agree. Despite the fact that they don't have tons of detail, they are great runners and make awesome conversions. Should share some of your work sometime trailrider.
 
trailrider said:
Is the tender body plastic or cast? Plastic body leave lots of room for a Tsunami decoder, if desired. Glad you bought this one, as the last thing I need is another Mantua Mike! I only have sixteen, not counting the ones I've kitbashed into 2-10-2's (2, requiring a pair of Mike's) and three 2-10-4's. Some are DCC, some still DC. Oh, then there is one Mike that I took off the lead and trailing trucks, and put on a switch engine pilot. (The Burlington actually did that to one of their O-2's. Never repeated that!) No room to run them all on my 14' x 14' folded dogbone layout. As to motors, some have Canon coreless motors (now out of production), and some other can motors. I need to attend a meeting of Mantua's Anonymous! Oh, and then there are Mantua Pacific's...

Seriously, Mantua steamers are some of the best HO scale locomotives, even as they came originally! Yours looks great! I've seen some criticize the straight-top boilers of these as being "unprototypical". They never looked at Burlington O-2's and O-3's, nor MoPace Mikados! If one insists on a USRA boiler, the Mantua Pacific boilers can be made to work with a little adjustment of the mounting holes to fit the Mike chassis. Also, IIRC, Bowser or somebody had a USRA boiler casting.

Anyway, great job! Have fun with it. Just be careful. They can become adictive!
Click to expand...
The tender is plastic and yup, there is a lot of room in it. I don't plan on doing DCC on this as I'm starting to think of DCC as a money pit.

That's quite a collection you have. Stretching the frame and body to get the 10 in must've taken some precision tools. That's awesome! Would love to see them.

I've seen some of your posts from years back.
 
Kusojiji said:
The tender is plastic and yup, there is a lot of room in it. I don't plan on doing DCC on this as I'm starting to think of DCC as a money pit.

That's quite a collection you have. Stretching the frame and body to get the 10 in must've taken some precision tools. That's awesome! Would love to see them.

I've seen some of your posts from years back.
Click to expand...
I have written an article that I may submit to one of the magazines (need to add one more photo). As to precision tools, I do have a drill press for some of the work. Otherwise, a hacksaw and "armstrong" power, plus files of various sizes. Which is why I call the article, "Hacksaw Conversions". Oh, yes, a vernier calipers helps get the positions of screw holes the right distance between the frame and boiler halves.

I'll try to post some photos in the near future.

Oh, dang it, Dennis461, now you got me looking at ebay stuff again! There are some cheap Mantua 2-6-6-2' parts for sale. They are for the logging Mallet's, but maybe, with a little bit of work... ;-D
 
I did say it was going to be a pain to make the motor mount. Final angle is 19 degrees. The Kato motor touches the motor mounting boss that the original motor used. Luckily, the Kato motor has a long enough shaft.
MOTOR MOUNTS.jpg

FINAL MOUNT.jpg


There's quite a lot of space inside. The good news is that massive flywheel will fit.
MOTOR IN BODY.jpg

MOTOR SPACE.jpg

FLYWHEEL.jpg


Next up - backhead and firebox flicker. This one is going to need my previous design to be stretched.
 


You are all claiming rank amateurs, but you are all digging in and trying to fix poor runners, I would say that’s a long way from rank amateur, sourcing parts fixing bits….my non runners get painted and weathered and end up looking what they are non runners
I salute the lot of you :)
 
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