I have numerous HO freight cars of mixed type & manufacturer that I have inherited from my grandfather. Most, if not all, of them have plastic trucks & wheelsets & horn-hook couplers. I am looking to upgrade them all to metal wheelsets for improved performance. I have seen wheelsets in 33" & 36" sizes with flat backs & ribbed backs. What size would be appropriate for freight cars & what is the purpose of the different textured backs?
To the best of my knowledge most freight cars use 33" wheels, 36" are for passenger cars. I think I have seen that some modern cars use smaller wheels, but if most of your things were your grandfathers, probably not too many models of modern cars. Most folks don’t seem to change sideframes, just the wheel sets. Many recommend using a “truck tuner,” a double ended reamer, on the sideframes. They are available from Micro-Mark, Walthers and most good train hobby shops. As to the backs, the ribs are cooling fins I believe, however, I think newer cars used flat back. Don’t know when the prototype changed styles, I think it had to do with better steel for wheel construction.
Are you going to change couplere styles? Most seem to recommend Kadees, either the old standby #5’s and there are a couple of newer styles “whisker” and one with a more prototypical size head. There are several manufacturers that make knuckle style couplers, you are not limited to the Kadees, but as I said a lot of folks recommend them.
Good luck,
I’ve upgraded a bunch of old freight rolling stock to Intermountain 33" metal wheelsets. Haven’t had to replace any trucks. Also added Kadee whisker couplers. I can’t tell you about the ribbed vs non-ribbed backs - maybe someone here can jump in.
Here is my limited understanding of the issues surrounding your question. First, the 33" size is correct for (almost) all freight cars until you get into relatively recent equipment. Ribbed back wheels were made of cast iron and needed the cooling fins to keep them from overheating and breaking up. I believe the ribbed back wheels were allowed up until the mid 1940’s (someone please correct me if I am wrong) but the steel smooth back wheels came into popular use in the 1930’s.
As for the couplers, the first thing to note about horn-hook couplers is that you will have to use the skewer method to uncouple because they are not magnetic. Kaydee #5’s have proven to be very reliable but they are not to scale. They do have the advantage of being very strong so you can run larger trains without breaking couplers. Beware the plastic coupler! The #58 Kaydees are more prototypical in size. There have also been suggestions that the newer whisker couplers require less magnetic force to uncouple. No coupler will be reliable unless you take the time to make sure they are all the same height and don’t droop. Kaydee sells washers to put on the bolsters to raise the coupler height as well as an array of couplers with off-set shanks to correct extreme situations. In my experience, most cars straight from the manufacturer have the couplers mounted too low requiring the use of washers. Kaydee sells a coupler height gauge which makes measuring easy, and they have just released one that is non-conducting so you won’t blow up your layout if you forget and put the gauge on a live track. I have mine mounted on a 12" piece of track on a board so I can pick the whole thing up and see very clearly how the coupler sits. If the coupler is sloppy in its box, a small piece of styrene glued to the lower lip of the box will keep the coupler in line.
Steel wheels are definately worth the money. If the new wheels run freely in the original trucks than the trucks should be fine. Note
i think some of the later “jumbo” as in 100 ton plus capacity cars do use 36 inch wheels. the 28 inch wheels were used primarily to get the clearance height down on tall cars or cars that carried excessive demention loads.
grizlump
Cars with a capacity of 70 tons or less use 33’ wheels. Cars with a capacity of greater than 70 tons use 36" wheels.
So that 65 ft long covered hopper needs 36’ wheels.
The 70 ton PRR H21 open hopper needs 33" wheels.
Athearn 40 ft 50 ton boxcar needs 33’ wheels.
Hello “KyleMan,”
Ribs or brackets (as the wheelmakers called them) on the backs of railcar wheels were use to reinforce cast-iron wheels and are typically not found on steel wheels. Here are some significant dates relating to cast-iron wheels and brackets:
1850 – “Double-plate” design for cast-iron wheel patented. These wheels had a hollow around the hub between inner and outer webs – the “plates” – and were typically cast with reinforcing brackets on the inner face of the wheel. Double-plate wheels with brackets were ultimately adopted as standard by the Master Car Builders Association and later the American Railway Association (predecssor of the Association of American Railroads.)
1928 – The ARA introduced a single-plate cast-iron wheel design without brackets.
1938 – Brackets were added to the ARA’s single-plate cast-iron wheel to reinforce the rim and flange.
1948 – Double-plate cast-iron wheels were prohibted from interchange after Aug. 1.
1953 – Single-plate cast iron wheels without brackets were prohibited from interchange as of Jan. 1.
1958 – Cast-iron wheels were prohibited from interchange on cars built or rebuilt after Jan. 1.
1970 – All cast-iron wheels were banned from interchange as of Jan. 1.
This information is from Chapter 6 of the book, Coal Cars, the First 300 Years, by Martin Robert Karig III, which is probably the best published history of the development of freight car trucks and their components.
How numerous is numerous?
I am just in the process of reconditioning many older (dare I say cheaper) rail cars I picked up on Ebay. If I chime in with my [2c] please don’t be put off the task you have ahead. I have really enjoyed getting into the whole business of r&ring these things so that they work well.
Changing to metal wheels is worth it for many reasons. Also I just ran a train with several flat cars just switched over and the “clickey-clack” has become very authentic…I hadn’t thought of that, but it is a noticeable difference.
- They are not cheap when doing large numbers. The best price I could find by searching out bulk packs online comes to about 65 cents US ea. not counting shipping/handling and taxes. For me that worked out to 85 cents each delivered to my door. My local hobby shop is far away and recently raised the price of a dozen from $9.69 to $12.69! If your numerous means my numerous, that added up to over $400 for all the metal wheels I would have needed.
If you can walk into a nearby hobby store and buy bulk packs for around 65 to 70 cents per axle, I think that is good for you.
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I am doing mine in stages therefore. I spent about half that total amount and am converting all cars that obviously don’t roll as freely on my hill test, and all with dirty, misshapen and broken plastic wheels.
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I add them automatically to any car with old deep flanges which often can ride up on switch plates and rerailers.
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I automatically add them to tank cars and passenger sets, and flat cars…types of cars that really can use the extra smooth/clean tracking ability with the added weight of the wheels down low.
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To the consideration of size. What has been said before in this thread is correct. However, I a
Definetly go with kadees. As for wheelsets, P2Ks are good. I haven’t tried intermountain’s, but I like branchline’s the best since they can be found in bulk on ebay (I’ve bought 100 for $40 bucks, there is a seller who has a pack of 300 for $80 bucks)
Dave H, so I guess that means my FMC hoppers and more modern PS box cars (the Railbox box car) should have 33s and not 36s. Great, now I have to get more 33s.
Uncoupling track sections for horn hook couplers used to be available. Not sure if they still are, but eBay might have some.
As time and money permits I would change to KDs for better appearance and operation.
One thing with wheelsets, if you plan to change to KDs or similar with magnetic uncoupling, use non ferrous (no steel or iron) wheel sets (wheels and axles). Other wise the magnets attract the wheels with interesting but unwanted effects.
Enjoy
Paul
Stainless steel is virtually non magnetic. It has been an acid test for so called stainless steel items to attempt to stick a magnet to it. True stainless will NOT be attracted while phony highly polished steel in the white will.
Rich