Say that fast 3 times![:P] I’m trying to quarter my old Bach 4-4-0. (I know…throw it out! yadda, yadda) If the driver crank pins are in the 12 o-clock position on the engineers side, what position should they be in on the fireman’s side? 3?, 9?
Since it’s called quartering, I’m “assuming” they should be 90 degrees off from side to side. Right?
Right.
It depends on the prototype, most railroads used the right hand lead but some, such as the Pennsylvania used a left hand lead. So in the case of the rights hand the engineer’s side would be at 12:00 and the fireman’s side at 3:00 but with the left hand lead the engineer’s side would be 12:00 and the fireman’s at 9:00.
Rick
Engineer’s side (in US practice, right side when looking forward out the cab window) should usually lead the fireman’s side by 90 degrees. If the engineer’s side is rods up, counterweights down, the fireman’s side should be rods rear, counterweights forward.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Actually I am more heartened by this quote than by the info on positioning. When this first happened to me, I thought I was going nuts. The drivers “popped” up out of position on an IHC Hudson after I had done a lot of nice work on it and went to lub it up.
It drove me so nuts that I broke it up for parts…(it was just and IHC) took the decoder out, cut off the back-up lamp and made some others look and sound good.
Then I got a Specturm Mountain Light NIB with a quartering problem and instantly asked for my money back.
Has anyone ever actually fixed this kind of problem?
Yes, you can buy a quartering tool and it will set the wheels in the correct position. For sentimental reasons I wanted to convert my first loco to DCC and get it running, an old Tyco/Mantua 0-4-0. In the process, I lost the quarting on the wheels. I tried the 12 and three and 12 and 9 positions but never got it “quite right”. So, I asked the same question and was told to get the tool. I did, it works, but now I feel quilty I don’t have more wheels to quarter. [(-D]
Tilden
Thanks all
Cisco-yes. It’s not that hard to fix if you know what your doing. They make quartering jigs to get everything timed up on multi axle engines. (not gonna spend the money on a jig for this old thing) So don’t throw your stuff away. It can be fixed.
In order to have a loco run well, it doesn’t really have to be “quartered”. As long as each set of drivers is in the same relative position as the other, it will run fine. This can be 90 degrees, or 89 degrees, or even 75 degrees!
This is because in a model, the wheels are being driven by a gear on the axle. Then the side rods transfer motion to the other wheels.
On a real steam engine, “Quartering” is done so that the loco can always start moving regardless of where the pistons may have stopped. If both pistons where at the end of their travel, no amount of steam would get them to move.
consider a 3 cylinder locomotive, like the IHB 0-8-0, they won’t be quartered, but 3rded.
But you have another set of rods helping keep sync. Too far off may yield some problems as when one rods cannot pull, the other do, and on the models, this is totally true as all drivers are not geared, so they do rely on the siderods to transfer power.
I don’t think the model IHB 0-8-0 is 3rded, I’m sure its quartered as well since your not really doing the 3rd cylinder.
UPDATE- Got it back together last night and it runs great now! Well…at least as great as this cheap little thing CAN run.[:D] Got rid of the bad wobble it always had too.
Thanks all!