Bought a new run 2-8-0 Bachmann Spectrum U.P. 2-8-0 with a DC decoder in it. My first Bachmann! Now, I knew before hand it wouldn’t be like a P2K or a BLI. But, come on, while it is VERY quiet, even more so when it derails, I’m not sure I can live with the following problems:
The tender’s front trucks don’t even contact the track. Tried bending the metal bar between loco and tender, but it didn’t help. Tried moving the loco wires to the decoder so that there is less pressure on the tender, but that did very little. What did work, somewhat, was putting 2 ozs. of weight in the coal bin over that front truck, which now allows some light contact. There’s got to be something causing this besides weight, but I can’t tell from looking at it.
The loco itself rarely will derail during my test runs today. However, the tender trucks can only track straight track, or left hand curves, because the trucks will only turn about 1 degree off center in one direction, but about 25 degrees or so in the other. So, my 30 inch curves are not good enough and I likely would need about 96 inch curves so the tender could track. A close inspection shows that the top of each truck has a tab that goes up to make contact with a little box (on one side for each of the trucks) on the bottom of the tender. It’s not left over flashing, but looks like it SHOULD be there for something. Does China per chance, have only left turning curves for their trains?
So, anyone else have these problems and hopefully solved them?
I also posted this to the Bachmann/Rivarossi user group on Yahoo.
I wonder if the towbar is elevated because the rear drivers and the frame, or mounting, are not properly tightened. When you look at the loco, by itself, on a kitchen counter or flat surface, does the rear of the loco seem to rise? If so, then the towbar is elevated by that much.
Is the pintle on the tender vertical? Is it clean, smooth, and does it sink into the towbar aperture all the way? Maybe either the aperture needs to be reamed slightly, or the pintle needs to be smoothed?
Has the tender frame been shoved, tightened too much so that the shell has come over the frame? If the shell and towing pintle are connected, then maybe the shell is too low on the tender frame.
Can the truck be loosened on its mounting somewhat?
That’s about all I can think of.
As for the derailing loco, a photo of the truck and tender would help immensely. I have found that the longer a loco is in the drivers, the more sensitive it is to kinks in the track, mostly at joins, and especially where joins are on curves close to the lower radius limit of the loco. Too, the tender riding piggyback at the rear of the loco may be placing too much weight on the rear drivers, and therefore elevating the front truck…or at least lightening it to the point where the slightest track irregularity causes it to leave the rails.
Just one thing else to check - Spectrum engines have an apron that is connected to the rear of the cab, it then sits on the top of the deck of the tender. If you aren’t careful when you connect the engine to the tender, that apron can get stuck below the protruding deck of the tender, which will lower the cab end of the engine and lift the front of the engine up.
Some of the things to check for include making sure that the drawbar is not restricted by the maze of wiring between the loco and tender. this can not only affect the turning ability, but can also force the front end of the tender to lift off the rails. As wjstix notes, the apron plate that is hinged at a point near the rear of the cab floor needs to have its free end resting on the corresponding projection at the front of the tender. Even in its proper place, this can sometimes restrict the ability of the tender to follow a curve. If this occurs (usually on small radius curves), reposition the plate so that it merely hangs vertically from its mounting wire, or remove it completely.
The tender trucks each have two small nubs, moulded just outboard of the circular part of the bolster that the screw goes through, projecting upward from the truck bolster. These contact two projections on the sides of the mounting bosses moulded into the underside of the tender floor, and are intended to prevent the trucks from becoming accidentally turned completely around and thereby screwing up the electrical pickup. (As you will note, the front and rear tender trucks pick up current from opposite rails.) If you turn the loco/tender combination upside down, with the drawbar and all wires in place, you should be able to pivot the front tender truck to the same degree as you can the rear one. Another possible cause for concern may be the drawbar. I own six of these locos and at least one of them has two holes in the tender-end of the drawbar. This particular locomotive is being modified to match a certain prototype, so it’s apart and not possible for me to check, but there’s a chance that if the hole closest to the loco was used to obtain close coupling, then the rearmost end of the drawbar might not clear the lead axle on the front truck, unless one were to exercise care to ensure that the drawbar was positioned above that axle.
I hope this will help with your problem. As you might suspect, I think that these
Thanks for the many responses on this. The apron isn’t a problem, it is down and out of the way. neither is the peg on the tender for the drawbar from the loco .To get the front TENDER trucks down, I loosened it as someone suggested, but that didn’t help. I then bent the drawbar down at the engine and then leveled it again at the tender. That semed to help a little. What really helped was putting 2 ozs of lead in the coal bin and another ounce over the oil tank. WAY too much weight for a car the size of this tender, but, it keeps the trucks in contact with the rails.
However, the nubs mentioned to keep the trucks from getting flipped around–that remains a problem. The TENDER trucks still tend not to track right hand curves very well. The problem is the designers prevented the trucks from turning on right curves the same amount as left curves. A left curve and the trucks can turn around 25 degrees to the left. A right curve and the trucks are restricted from turning more than about 1 degree to the right, resulting in frequent derailments. The problem is basically very poor engineering. While the idea to prevent flipped around trucks is great, they didn’t think it out very well. The nubs, rather than being paced in the middle of the truck to allow the same distance of turning the trucks regardless of curve direction, they put the nubs on one side and basically RIGHT NEXT to the stop on that side!!! So, you get a lot of turning for one curve direction and basically no turning for the other. It’s like having to drive your car using only left hand turns to go anywhere. Not very practical.
The dealer said this is a new run of this model. Maybe that’s the problem? Doctor Wayne noted 2 mall nubs for EACH TENDER truck. I have only one nub for each truck placed on one side as described above.
All of the above suggestion will help - check each one. The tender is light. I have never had problems running forward, but pushing freight cars in reverse has caused the front truck to derail as you describe. I added some ‘stick-on’ weights to the walls of the tender in the front area and that resolved the problem(after making sure the wires were free to move. My engines came with a ‘spiral-cut’ white insulation wrapping the the wires - even that was too restrictive. I removed the insulation and painted all of the wired ‘black’…
Thanks guys, for your help. Seems like weight takes care of the tender front truck raising up. Sure wish I knew why those nubs are restricting the turning of the trucks though.
Ken