Looking for comments from anyone who has replaced the Bachmann shay gears with the NWSL metal gears. Skill level required, horror stories, good idea or not?
I have done it, and it is more or less a necessity as the original gears are more or less crap. I found it quite easy to make the replacement as the instructions are very straight forward. I made one thing different from the instructions regarding the rear axle´s installation as i found it easier to reverse the order of installation there. A little bit of precision is however a must. Now it runs like a dream, much better than before! A drop of oil now and then is all it needs.
I consider the price of the NWSL gears to be very good, as the loco would be crap without them, unless you want to pay $20 to Bachmann for new (faulty) gears every time the originals break.
i’m getting some sent to me along with the bull gears for a round house shay also i would imagine if the instructions r very clear they shouldn´t be so hard but they do recommend or mention that these are intermediate skill level. i just might start a post on these two projects.
I made the convertion on mine. The first two trucks weren’t very hard to do, but the rear truck was a little more challenging. Bachmann made the end of the rear truck shaft into a sort of square shape to hold the drive coupling on better, but it’s hard getting a gear over it. You might want to round off the end a bit with a file, and then glue or epoxy the coupling in place once the gears are on. Another thing I found is that each gear should have a dot of liquid super glue on the flat side to hold it to the shaft better, because my gears liked to wander a little. But the work is all worth it, because you’ll get a smooth running and reliable Shay.[:D]
Thank you for the replies. A set of gears is on order.