I have a 0-4-0 with a slope back tender and I would like to know who made it and when. It has a plastic boiler shell with a weight stuffed into the inside of the smokebox. It has an incandescent front lamp and a Jewel for the backup lamp on the tender. The cast metal frame has an open frame motor with plastic gears. The tender is all metal and has a sticker underneath that says made in usa. The trucks are solid metal and pickup power from the right side of the track.
I’ve been thinking of putting a decoder in it as it runs terrible on my DCC layout. I would also like to remotor it even though it is obviously a cheepo. If I did get a better motor, I will try a sound install when I go DCC with it.
It’s probably a Knapp unit and was made sometime before 1945; or maybe it was 1942; or maybe 1909; or maybe 1997; or maybe 1963. I don’t know by I’m sure that CNJ831, our foremost authority in model railroad history, will clear this question up muy pronto!
Well, let’s see. I think Athearn had an 0-4-0 at one time and I know Mantua made a very similar sounding engine. Those are the only two I know of that would have been made in the USA. A picture would help.
If this engine doesn’t run well on DC, I would not even consider putting a decoder into it. DCC is not a cure-all for a poorly performing engine.
Mantua/Tyco made an engine like the one you are describing, and I think Model Die Casting did, too many, many years ago, but the MDC model was all metal. I have both and would never consider putting decoders into them. They both sit in a locomotive museum on the club layout.
Bruce - Over the years a bewildering number of 0-4-0’s, most with slope-backed tenders, have been produced that could more or less answer to the basic description you provide. However, the plastic boiler and plastic (quite possibly actually nylon) gears does suggest that a good canditdate would be Mantua/Tyco. With a photo of the model I’d be able to ID it exactly but, short of that, it’s largely going to be guess work.
That’s a Tyco/Mantua shifter probably from the 70’s or newer. Not the best running locomotive but not the worst. Changing to DCC may or may not be worth the effort.
The locomotive in the pictures is almost certainly a Mantua/Tyco. Probably from the middle to late Sixties. The Laird crossheads and the mountings for the crosshead guides are a dead giveaway, as is the location of the headlight. Ditto the bell design. The tender may be older than the locomotive itself. Later model Tycos had a plastic tender body with a metal frame. If the tender picks up current from the right side of the track, the wheels are all reversed. The tender should pick up from the left side and the locomotive from the right. (The rule: “Engine from the Engineer’s side, Tender from the Fireman’s side.”)
The jewel in the tender light was common to many locomotive models back then. Early Mantuas had a higher mount for the headlight and with a solid Boiler casting had no way to light the locomotive economically, so they also had a jewel in the loco light. When Tyco bought Mantua, they made plastic boilers and moved the light down. Though why they didn’t just center it is beyond me. I always have thought that half-way down positioning was pretty ugly, but that’s just me, maybe…
I agree with Scott. I had one of these Mantua shifters in my younger days. The detail fidelity is very poor, as you can tell first by looking at the giant headlight. The motor was really poor quality and the open gearbox allowed the engine to pick an amazing amount of junk from the roadbed and mangle the gears. There has to be a better locomotive to spend your money on for a DCC system.
There were knock offs of the Mantua/Tyco engines (Model Power had one) and I suspect your identical IHC engine is one of the knockoffs (and not made in USA). If the tender is metal then it is almost certainly Mantua. Later they changed the castings.
Mantua had an 0-4-0 and 0-6-0 that used the same boiler, cab and tender. They had an 0-4-0T and 0-6-0T that also shared boiler/cab casting. All of them had I think the same motor. Supposedly the Mantua catalog had valve gear kits as aftermarket parts. They pulled well. The kit versions were quite cheap. The engines (or parts) are still seen at swap meets.
If you get an early production Mantua the motor is actually pretty good, although it can need some adjusting to get the gears to mesh just right (the old trick is to tighten the screw that holds the motor when a sheet of paper is between the gear and the worm gear, then carefully remove the paper and the spacing will be just right). If the motor is mounted with the gears too tight to each other the engine will hardly run at all and the motor may burn out. Many swap meet versions of these engines have damaged motors
The commutator sometimes needs polishing – a rubber pencil eraser might be the right tool. And sometimes the brushes get an accumulation of gunk. A toothpick soaked in rubbing alcohol should take care of that.
That’s a old Mantua from the 60s.The jewel was more then likely added by the modeler.You see placing a jewel in the headlight and tender backup light was a common practice years ago.
OK, Bruce…Cutting through all the posted guesses, the typical misinformation to be found here and downright B.S., the following is what you have. It’s a Mantua (or Tyco - they offered identical products at the time) 0-4-0 Shifter II. This engine was introduced in June of 1967 and was available in (among others) Santa Fe markings, with the metal tender and jewelled back-up light, selling R-T-R for $15.98 MSRP. The model with the metal (zamac) tender didn’t last all that long, giving way to one with a plastic rendition before the close of the decade. So, this is the period during which your model originated. Gotta say gmcrail and Brakie came closest to the truth.
go DCC with it.