I recently bought 2 walthers kits which built 2 n&w hoppers. the interesting thing about these kits is that they came with an assembly to build trucks for the cars with working suspension springs. these are very nice and I was wondering what year these came from, and what other kits came with these? I am loving these kits and would like more.
These are plastic kits in white boxes with blue lettering? They are from the 1980’s.
You must be a youngster if you have never seen sprung trucks before. Back in the dark ages of the 50’s and 60’s most all HO freight trucks were sprung. Some still are today. Kadee and several others still sell sprung trucks.
If fact, Walthers still lists the very same trucks that came on those cars in their current Catalog.
I use sprung metal trucks on most of my equipment. My 40 years of experiance in this hobby has shown me they are better.
Sheldon
Thanks for the info! i am pretty young compared to most modellers. they did come in white boxes. do you know of any other kits with these trucks that i could get my hands on?
In fact some people overweight their cars to get more action out of their sprung trucks, Kadees are probably the best still readily available.
The springs of rigid trucks are more realistic looking than those with real springs. The real springs on models look decompressed.
Mark
Maybe they are more “accurate” in size, coil count, etc. But sprung trucks are equalized and run better and smoother based on my 40 years of experiance. I don’t build static models, I build operational models and as such put operational compromises above appearance.
For this reason I don’t use semi scale wheels, semi scale couplers and install sprung metal trucks where possible.
My Kadee truck/Intermountain wheel set combination has proven to be the most free rolling and smooth tracking truck I have found. And, the added mass down low improves operation in a number of ways including making equipment roll more realisticly (see the latest Scale Rails for a great article on the effects of scale proportion).
Sheldon
I’ve operated on HO-scale layouts using un-sprung trucks with a half-dozen or more operators, and all-day sessions result in no derailments except for operator error. In my experience, the effect of sprung trucks over decently-made, non-sprung trucks on operational reliability is only psychological. Now, sprung wheels on long-base locomotives is another thing.
Mark (who once thought 50 years ago that sprung Central Valley trucks were the greatest)
I’m with Sheldon on the advantages of sprung trucks.
I equip all my rolling stock with Kadee sprung trucks before they ever hit the rails.
In the mid-1980s I decided to try sprung trucks on a few balky, derailment-prone cars. The differences amazed me. Derailments dropped WAY off, and the lower CG these trucks gave the cars vs. the plastic trucks & wheels they replaced improved the cars’ resistance to stringlining, and reduced the fast, unrealistic rocking motion of some cars. Also, the wheels don’t pick up the gunk plastic ones do.
Probably the particular cars I put the trucks on had really bad trucks originally, based on the cars’ performance, but the improvements were so dramatic I decided right then to go the full route with trucks, and I’ve never looked back.
Even in HO, the non-rigid sideframes of all but the stiffest (like Old Pullman) sprung trucks will follow, to some extent, small variations in rail height. Rigid sideframes won’t do this at all.
My trackwork has improved dramatically over the years, and maybe I don’t need sprung trucks anymore. Maybe just replacing wheel sets is enough. But I would rather spend a few dollars per car and install sprung trucks than spend the time reaming out journal bearings in plastic, rigid sideframe trucks, then install metal wheels.
Two points -
My free rolling tests with the Kadee/Intermountain combination are fact, not psychological - they roll even better and more freely than the best of the plastic sideframes, allowing longer trains per any given loco.
And, there is more to “performance” than just staying on the track.
Sheldon
I have never bought any replacement trucks with springs but I have bought several cars with spring trucks already on them. I do not know what brand the trucks are, they have several different stlyes. In my experience with them they have caused problems because the trucks flex and then get stuck with a wheel up in the air which soon leads to a derailment. I am considering replacing these trucks with solid ones.
Were there some spring trucks that were of poor quality? Does this problem with sticking ever happen to Kadee trucks? Is there an easy way to loosen the spring trucks so that they flex easily? Where is the best place to get replacement springs? (I have tried Kadee coupler springs but they are not the same.)
When I switched to HO scale in late 1987-early 1988 Walthers had just taken over the Train Miniatures line of HO freight car kits maybe a year or so before, and was issuing the kits (with improved decoration) under the Walthers name. The first kits I bought had the trucks you describe, but by maybe 1990 they had switched over to solid trucks. As I recall the sprung trucks were kinda hard to get together and to have operate well, and I think all the cars I had with those trucks eventually got replaced by Walthers later solid trucks.
The Walthers line at that time had a flat car, gondola and woodside reefer, and several different versions of 1910-20’s boxcars including all steel X-29s and cars with double and single sheathed wood sides, some with wood ends and some with steel. I imagine many of those kits would have the trucks you’re looking for.
BTW it’s too bad the Walthers boxcars were discontinued or cut back to just the X-29; for a steam era modeller it was great to have that many variations in an inexpensive ($5.49 IIRC) kit.
Actually the very best trucks are sprung and equalized such as the old and wonderful Central Valley trucks. Those things hugged the track. I have seen them selling for fabulous prices at swap meets.
A trucks can be sprung but not equalized, in which case you need rather soft springs to get the flexibility advantage. A truck can also be equalized yet not sprung (some brass locomotive tender trucks are examples): one sideframe or both of them are mounted with small screws or rivets to the bolster and can move a bit. All other things being the same, to my way of thinking the equalized truck is the Cadillac, the sprung truck is the Buick, the rigid truck is the Chevrolet.
Way back – way WAY back – Athearn had metal trucks that were not solid but were not sprung either. There was an odd nub of hard rubber that if you squinted just right sort of looked like two springs. I have to think that any such rubber nubs have long since deteriorated completely and are long gone. Those trucks did not roll all that well - nor did they roll all that well when Athearn used real springs either. I suppose the rubber nub was very slightly flexible.
And if the quality and NMRA standards are not up to snuff none of this matters all that much. There are very good tracking a nd free rolling trucks with no springs or equalization At one time in the 1960s a very very cheap line of freight cars, “Crown,” came on the scene – these were Hong Kong knockoffs of the Athearn line imported, I think, by Mantua even though Mantua’s name appeared nowhere on them (I think the address was the giveaway). Packaging was a sheet of cardboard and a plastic bubble around the car. They generally sold for $.99. They actually had sprung trucks but the springs were so taut and the trucks in all other respects were s
That is a something to note, that all sprung trucks are not the same. One truck that has a following besides those mentioned is Kilgore (probably misspelled).
I don’t see how whether a truck has springs or not has anything to do with free rolling. Free-rolling is dependent on factors other than springs.
Anyway, glad you’re happy with your trucks.
Mark
As Dave pointed out, its not just or even mainly the springs, its EQUALIZATION - puting all the wheels on the rail with relatively equal pressure/weight all the time.
This combined with proper car weights (not too heavy or too light) and the lower center of gavity provided by metal trucks, makes cars track better, smoother, etc.
The specific combination of Intermountain .110" wheelsets and Kadee sprung/equalized trucks (preferably the self centering version because of their more precise kingpin design) provides all the benifits of equalization and low center of gravity in a truck with superior rolling qualities.
This is not to say other trucks, including plastic rigid frame trucks, are not also very free rolling and operate very well.
BUT, any notion that sprung trucks are somehow inherintly inferior or substandard has no basis in fact.
There are good and bad versions in both designs. The best sprung trucks do offer operational advantages over rigid trucks, no matter how small those advantages may seem to some.
Sheldon