I just wonder if Kadee magnets and metal wheels and axles can be a problem? What happens when metal wheels gets close to a magnet? I have heard that Kadee sells non-magnetic wheels and axles. Please tell me about this.
Metal wheels will cause no problem when the car is posed over the permanent magnet, but metal axles should be avoided. As long as the car is in the moving train it will not be influenced by the magnet but when the car is moving by itself as in eg a yard it will stop when it moves over the magnet. All the metal wheelsets I know have nonmagnetic axles so in my opinion it is more of a theoretical than a real problem.
Hans
Ok, nothing to worry about then. Thanks for the fast answer.
Im not sure about HO, but in N most wheels come in plastic these days, I installed a couple of MTL magnetic uncouplers, and was a little disappointed as some did and some did’nt uncouple, I have read on other threads that this occurs with HO modelers also…
I has more success with the accumates than the MTL’s…
Mike…
Most metal wheels are non-magnetic from the major suppliers. (Kadee, Like-Like, Atlas, etc.) Plastic wheel sets with steel axels cause more problems then metal wheels.
Since Kadee makes the magnets and metal trucks and wheels, I’ve never heard of any problems using them in concert, or with any other brand of metal wheels. Kadee and nearly all other metal wheelsets are made of brass, which is not attracted by a magnet.
The problem you heard about is from the trucks with plastic wheels and metal axles. The axle was a piece of steel rod (magnetic) and running them slowly over an uncoupler magnet, like you would in a switching maneuver, would cause the car to jerk suddenly as the axle was pulled over the magnet. Most of the older Athearn and Roundhouse cars (among others) have this type axle.
A bigger problem for me was the steel weights inside many cars. My Kadee under-track magnets really sucked up on these cars, making uncoupling problematic. I have replaced these weights with ones cut from brass strip (from the hobby shop) and this solved the problem. I use brass since I don’t like to deal with lead for weights. Unfortunately, I had earlier purchased some Red Caboose and Proto 2000 cars, which had steel weights, and also were glued together so that I could not remove the steel weights!