Bachmann silver series

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

Are these freight cars any good?

2

Yes. They have a bit more detail and come with metal wheels. They have Bachmann EZ-Mate couplers but it’s easy to change them out with Kadee’s. They’re a good value for the money.

3

Bang for the buck, they are a good start. Also very great for trying out weathering. Better to learn on a $10 car versus a $35 car.

4

I have around 30 of them and cannot find any fault with them.

Cuda Ken

5

I suppose that depends on what you mean by “good.” The do seem to be mostly well made, but the different types vary widely in how well the basic car is executed, and the current prices have crept somewhat high considering that many of them are essentially train set cars with better wheels. Provided you don’t care about detail or accurate paint schemes too much, they’re probably fine. I did pick up a six-pack of their Bethlehem coal hoppers which I use in a unit train. The stock Bachmann couplers were replaced with Kadees due to the lack of metal knuckle springs, and one of the wheelsets wobbled badly so I replaced it with another from Intermountain or Exactrail.

6

I have found that some of the cars (tankers in my case) have a few noticeable mold seams and some flash, but that was on close examination. I will not normally be six inches from my trains when they are on the layout.

My three dome tankers do not meet the NMRA recommended weight. They weigh a little over 2.8 ounces but according to the NMRA they should weigh about 3.5 to 4 ounces depending on whether you are including the couplers in the length.

Overall I am pretty happy with them, especially since they offered some Canadian road names.

Besides, as I have said before (probably too many times by now- sorry) all you have to do if you are not happy with the details is run your trains faster![swg][}:)][(-D]

Dave

7

I just received my first silver series and I must say I am impressed. Metal wheels which roll super nice, decent couplers, cheap.

Point of view is important in this case. I am casually into the railroad thing. I’m running/building my first layout since I was a kid, have some $30 second hand locomotives, am having fun planning for sorta scale HO slotcar crossings and am sometimes annoyed with models with TOO MUCH easily broken fine detail. The one silver series railcar I have soo far seems like an excellent choice.

8

Depends what you expect of your freight cars. Among Bachmann Silver series, there are many not so correct cars, so purists do not like them. But also there are cars which are very close or correct.

For example, for a year or two I tried to find plastic HO Lehigh Valley caboose. Not interested in brass or resin. Proto 2000 ones are rare and can go expensive on ebay. So when Bachmann produced North East caboose in LV red, I googled prototypes, found that the Bachmann model is 95% similar - and one is on the way to my collection. I expect the Kadee couplers will be only modifications needed.

Also have one COSDEN three dome tanker in black, and bobber caboose for the logging train. Both of those are good looking, quality cars.

Other Silver cars are either to new, or to generic for me.

9

Of the twenty-five freight cars on my layout right now thirteen are Bachmann and most of those are Kadee equipped Silver Series cars. The ones that aren’t have been re-equipped with metal wheels and Kadee couplers except for one Bachmann trainset hopper. Of the others six are Athearn, three are Tyco, one is Varney, one is Atlas and one is Mantua. So right there most of the rolling stock on the layout at this time is Bachmann. The others with the notable exception of the Athearn cars and the Atlas car have Bachmann wheels. Of the rolling stock in the cupboard and in boxes under the layout over half are Silver Series cars. If I didn’t think they were worth it I wouldn’t have bought them.

10

One other small complaint is that the lettering on the lower part of the ends of some of the tank cars was slighly smudged, apparently from contact with the plastic box liner. Bachmann could improve on that since they have gone to the trouble of putting very nicely detailed lettering on the cars.

Dave

11

Here we are in 2014 and I finally am getting around to tuning my Bachmann Silver series cars. Yes - I am bumping an old thread! Heaven forbid!!

Here is my problem: I just bought several more Silver series freight cars. When I measured the coupler height some of them came out a bit low. With the old Athearn BB kits solving that problem was as simple as adding a Kadee washer or two to the bolster to raise the body on the car. However, the Kadee washers won’t work with Bachmann’s design. The bolster ‘center post’ ( the thing the truck pivots on - not sure what the proper name is) is way bigger than the Kadee washers. Also, both trucks are really wobbly. I thought that one truck was supposed to just pivot freely but not wobble from side to side whereas the other truck was supposed to be somewhat looser.

Anyhow, does anyone have a simple solution for shimming the Silver Series trucks? I have temporarily solved the problem by making washers out of thick paper but there has to be a more eligant solution.

Any suggestions?

Thanks

Dave

12

Don’t shim the trucks. Get some Kadee undershank couplers. These have the shank at the same height as a #5 but the coupler head is slightly higher.

13

You don’t want your trucks loose…

I tighten mine all the way down and back the screw off 1 1/2 to 2 turns.This gives the truck enough swing for curves and the wheel side to side play will do their job of helping the truck to stay on the track.

I have zero derailments by following that simple procedure I learn over 50 years ago…

14

Gidday Dave, shock horror a resurrected thread.[:O]
I checked my one and only Silver Series car, a 40’ gondola, and while the coupler height was right the trucks were wobbly. I found that I had to file down one bolster centre post so the head of the screw would clamp down on the truck.
With the coupler height issue, a thin section 3/16 washer may do the trick, if you have an airport handy, check out your friendly aircraft maintenance engineer and see if he can spare you a few AN960-10L washers to try, at 7 cents apiece (NZ) it shouldn’t break the bank, though to be perfectly honest Jeffs suggestion of undershank Kadees is the one I’ve used in the past.

Cheers, the Bear.

15

You can make your own version of the Kadee shims using punches and thin styrene (or the plastic-y stuff that report covers are made of; I do not know a common source of the fibre material Kadee itself uses) in sizes larger than Kadee offers. A set of such punches has other uses especially for building kitbashers. These are punches you hammer to use, not like a hand paper punch although some of those come with a choice of sizes of punch.

On the OT I would say that the Bachmann Silver Series has sold stuff to modelers who would not have dreamed of running Bachmann stuff on their layout 15 or more years ago.

Dave Nelson

16

I tend to only buy model trains if they match or are good stand-in’s for real train cars I am trying to model. I almost bought the Silver Series coal cars because they match some 2nd hand cars used by the D&RGW, however, the paint jobs were bogus so I passed. I would rather Bachman had used the paint job used on those ran by the D&RGW rather than slap on the incorrect Stacked Rio Grande logo. They did look decent but I passed.

17

Those are the same hoppers I have. My area is crawling with Rio Grande fans, and even at that few recognize the lettering is bogus. The scheme Bachmann should have used for the Silver Series cars was the ex-WP patchout, cars initially acquired for the Valmy power plant in Nevada. Sierra Pacific decided to use its own cars instead, and the WP hoppers were’t used for coal service until then went to the Rio Grande.

If I had the time and money, I’d like to replace my entire coal train with Greenville hoppers for the Valmy plant, VALX 80001-80070.

18

Jeffery:

Thanks. I know about the underset shank couplers. I have about a dozen cars to work on but I have only looked at three so far. They were inconsistant in their coupler heights. One required shimming at both ends but different numbers of shims at either end, another requires shimming on only one end and the third was OK. I haven’t received six of the cars yet so I don’t know what to expect with them.

I’m not averse to investing in the underset shank couplers but because the cars seem to be at different heights the ‘one size’ solution offered by the Kadee underset shanks may not solve the issue in all cases.

Larry and JaBear:

Even with the screws tightened down all the way the trucks are still way too wobbly. I had already done what JaBear suggested with one bolster center post but I’m going to go back and reduce the height of the other post because as I said, the truck is too loose.

I will see if I can find the aircraft washers on line but again, I apparently need shims of varying thicknesses to solve the problem accurately.

Dave:

I have paper punches and I used them for making the inner hole in the shim washer, but none of my punches are big enough to make the outside cut on the shim. I had to do that by hand and they are not very neat.

riogrande5761:

I am not as focused on exact details as you are. Most of the Bachmann Silver Series cars I have purchased so far fit my era and location reasonably well. I am modelling Canadian Pacific in Ontario in the late 50’s. I have six Toronto, Hamilton and Buffalo 40’ freight cars on order from eBay, four Canada Chemical Company three dome riveted tankers and a couple of undecorated depressed center flat cars. I did buy two Transcontinental Peoria 40’ freight cars which are perhaps a bit of a stretch but I couldn’t resist the green paint and the rocket on the side[(-D].

Thanks for the suggestions everyone.

Dave

19

Dave the punches I have in mind are not for paper. They are hollow metal tubes with very sharp edges and you hit them sharply with a hammer or mallet to punch out metal, plastic, wood, or cardstock. I have cut perfect holes in surprisingly thick plastic with them. The photo is from this website http://www.teskeys.com/12pc-hollow-punch-set.html

and I make many hobby uses with my set.

Dave Nelson

20

Hi Dave:

I have a set of similar punches but unfortunately they don’t go to 3/4". I think you just cost me some money![swg][(-D]

Dave

Edit:

I just purchased a six punch set from eBay which goes to 1/2" so now I can cut my shim washers nicely and neatly. I couldn’t see the need for 3/4" holes so I opted for what I hope is a somewhat higher quality set with a lower size range.