Has anyone here tried to add weight to a Proto 2000 2-8-8-2 to improve the pulling power? If so how was it done?
The front cylinders are pretty big, but I don’t see a practical way to get weight in them without destroying the look of the engine. The boilers is packed with a light weight metal and electrical jiggers. Theres not much room for anything extra.
But I heard LL will be coming out with replacement tire equiped drivers for the Heritage steam locos. I guess enough people complained about their steam engine’s tractive force sucking somthing fierce.
One thing I see a lot that gets overlooked when adding weight to a steam loco…Make sure it’s BALANCED.Just because you may be able to get a pile of lead in the cab,doesn’t mean you should put it there,unless you can put an equal amount on the front.Weight within the area of the driving wheel axles is always okay,but be careful of hanging substantial weight past the axles,especially any real distance from the axles,it will only screw it up.you want the loco to actually be balanced,or at least be close to it,in the middle of the driving wheels.
I’ve no experience with that particular loco, although most of the Proto stuff I’ve seen was a little bit on the light side. I have one of their 0-8-0’s, which, according to the review in MR, weighs 14.5 oz. and supposedly pulls rather well, at least on straight track. Mine would not pull a test train of two loaded hoppers and a caboose up the ruling 2.5% grade on my layout; the caboose weighs 4oz., the hoppers 8 oz. each. I was going to get rid of the loco because of this poor performance, but at the time I was doing a make-over of a similar loco for a friend, really just restyling and detailing it to look like a CNR switcher. It ended up looking so good that I wanted to make one for myself, so I set about trying to improve its pulling power. I managed to add 2 3/4 oz. to it, balanced at the centre-point of the driver wheelbase. I run straight D.C., so there’s no decoder taking up valuable space, and I removed the headlight and all of its associated wiring. I filled the domes with lead, then cut off the front part of the factory weight and replaced it with a similar, but larger (no light, etc.) weight cast in lead. The air tanks are new: brass tubing, filled with lead, and I added a small block of lead on the cab floor. The improved version will pull 4 loaded hoppers and a caboose up the same grade, a total of 38 oz. While this is not where this loco will be used, all of my locomotives are tested on this same hill, with the same types of loaded cars and the same caboose. This is useful when determining which engines are best to assign to move a train over the division.
You should be able to get quite a bit of weight into something that big: just make sure that it’s balanced around the mid-point of the total driver wheelbase. I made a balance from a piece of heavy brass sheet, wide enough and long enough to hold my longest loco (don’t use the tender when balancing). I simply soldered a piece of brass tubing across the bottom of the sheet, mid-way between the ends. Put the loco on the bal
This 20 oz loco is claimed? to have a drawbar pull of 47 FREE rolling cars on level track per MR
Additional weight should be balanced over the middle of the driving wheelbase to achieve maximum adhesion.
Anywhere else will make it counter productive.
I don’t own one.
The onlt real place to add weight to any of the new P2K steam is to add low-temp meltable metal into the cylinders and domes. It IS possible, but requires a complete disassembly, which isn’t easy. Besides that, the only real way to add weight is to replace most of the details with brass parts.
I have an Y6B 2-8-8-2 Rivarossi,I guess I’am just lucky,It pulls just fine!![^][:D][8D]
JIM
Have you considered powering one or both of the tender trucks? The increased tractive effort should be a lot more dramatic than adding an ounce or two here and there inside the engine.
TIRES are a manufacture’s CHEAP way of achieving traction.
They AGE and can render your product OBSOLETE.
TIRES deteriorate over time + Neoprene and rubber-based product’s don’t like oil.
TIRES cut back on electrical pickup (insulated wheel’s.)
TIRES break under stress.
TIRE replacement’s require sideframe removal or side rod removal (steam).
TIRES require permanent channels cut into wheel circumference to accomodate .
TIRE REPLACEMENT’s can become difficult to find down the road.
I thought about the adding powered trucks to the tender, but I have sound in both of mine and I don’t want to lose that. If they come out with the traction tires, I will probably try those, even though they have some drawbacks.
If the loco body is so difficult to remove and then to reassemble, would it be reasonable to use a fine tool to cut off both domes, fill them with lead, and then re-attach them and touching them up to look good? Or are we asking for headaches?