Hi Gang!
I was curious if anyone with a Proto 2000 0-8-0 has had any problems negotiating 15" radius curves or #4 turnouts? I have one but I only have #4.5 and #5 Fast Track turnouts on my layout. A friend of mine is interested in one but his smallest turnouts are #4 FTs and they come with 15" diverging radius. It works fine on 18" radius track.
Thanks for the help.
Tom
Tom, this is asking the obvious, but do you have some flex, and can you mock it up with 15" curves and do a trial?
-Crandell
I believe No.4 turnouts have a 15" closure radius (if that’s the right term) but more like an 18" substitution radius?? Anyway, No.4 turnouts and 18" radius curves are meant to work together…anything that will go around an 18" R curve will go thru a No.4 turnout and vice-versa. Unless your friend actually has some 15" R curves on his layout, it should be fine.
Tks for the assist Tom but I resolved the potential problem by replacing the #4’s w/#5’s. So far on paper it looks like it will work just fine. Since we spoke I have been looking closer to getting the P2k 0-6-0 rather than the 0-8-0. The layout is a switching layout of the Swift soybean plant featured in MRR several years ago. Typically I only will be moving two or three cars at a time. I like the looks of the 0-6-0 size wise.
Tks for everyones help and Merry Christmas to all,
Terry in Florida
I’m very happy with my P2K 0-6-0. It has no trouble on my Atlas snap-switches. It is a bit light, and has trouble pushing more than a couple of cars up one steep hill I’ve got. The engine came with traction tires in the box, but I have not installed them. I’m sure that would greatly improve it’s pulling capacity, but my layout is small and it’s really not necessary. I love the sound, too.
Mr B
Its good to know the 0-6-0 is a good engine. As mentioned I was looking at the 0-8-0 also a great runner but with my small layout (for now 14 ft x 26 in) I think the smaller 0-6-0 would look better. With no grades and small cuts of cars I think it will be a terrific little addition. I am looking at a DC version due to budget constraints and will soon install a tsunami. Once you go to sound you can’t go back as you know. Its nice being back in the RR business again.
Merry Christmas
Terry in Florida
Either engine is a good choice. TrainWorld has the 0-6-0 for under $100 at least for some road names. I would agree with smaller cuts of cars and no grades to deal with, the 0-6-0 would be the better choice.
Keep in mind that 0-6-0 and 0-8-0 switchers (both prototype and model) were designed to handle sharp curves. Either model will do No.4 turnouts and 18"R track quite well.
Well, ok, here is my answer again. (This is a topic in the archives somewhere as I remember passing this info on to someone before.)
The Proto Heritage 0-8-0s are beautiful little models with quite prototypical spacing between loco and tender. I have two and they each needed some modificaton for that part of my layout with #4s and 15" radii.
If you look closely when running through a #4 into a 15" curve you will see the loco sandlines hook into the front of the tender and force it off the track and stop the loco. This happens more often in reverse than forward since in reverse the loco and tender are being forced into one another but in forward the little extra leeway sometimes permits a trouble-free exit from the curve and switch.
To prevent this you can extend the drawbar distance with some sort of DIY system, which will not quite look right, but will give you the manoueverability, or you can snip off the lower portions of the sandlines (which is what I did for a quick fix). I’m afraid I am not so fussy as I am the only one who ever sees my layout, and with my old eyesight, that is almost an overstatement in itself. [sigh]
An 0-8-0 switcher could pull an entire mainline train by itself on the level. It would be overkill in almost all industrial settings. An 0-6-0 would be much better suited. However, from the mid-1930s on many industrial railroads switched over to the early gas/mechanical and diesel/electric “little critters” because they were perfectly suited to handle short cuts of cars and tight curves and were much cheaper to operate. They could be turned on and off at the flick of a switch, so they were ideal for intermittent use. Most early internal combustion locomotives were used in switching roles. The earliest were all switchers and used in urban settings.
Mark
I have a few Proto 0-8-0’s and they go through #4 turnouts with no problems at all, as long as they are going forward. I had to add weight to the tender to stop them from derailing while going backwards. Those tenders are so light that if you ever dropped one it would float to the ground like a feather, lol.
This thread made me curious. I have a P2K 0-8-0 as well as a P2K 0-6-0… I just used them in my steel mill complex which normally has my Athearn Baldwin diesel swtchers doing the work.
Both steam switchers performed flawlessly when I just tried them in the steel mill. The steel mill has #4 turnouts (Atlas) and curves as sharp as 16". I tried both forward and reverse with no problems. The locomotives are not modified in any way.
The Atlas Custom Line turnouts are not #4’s - They are #4.5 turnouts - a big difference here. The Walthers/Shinohara turnouts are ‘true’ #4 switches. I would suspect that the 0-8-0 will go through the switches OK, maybe some binding with the tender. As for actual curves, I suspect the distance between the cab and tender are going to be the limiting factor here. I have a P2K USRA 0-6-0 and it runs great through my minimum 22" radius curves and Atlas turnouts. It is ‘sound equipped’ and while it cannot pull the ‘world’, it makes a great ‘house’ engine for the small town I have it assigned to.
Jim