I am seekong some advice on how to weight the earlier versions of the Walthers 75’ Trailer Train flat car. They seen to have no place to add the needed weight; the center sill is too shalow even filling it with laed shot. These were originally offered many years ago, and I happen to have three. Any help would be appreciated.
You are correct. Bringing this car up to weight is a special challenge.
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I managed to get mine up to 6 ounces, empty, which is standard weight on the STRATTON & GILLETTE for any car 60 feet or longer.
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I cut a weight 1 1/4" by 8 1/4" from 1/32" sheet lead and put that in between the car bottom and the center sill of the frame. That is the unpainted weight in the picture below. I also added 8 smaller pieces of lead to fill in the cavities that were not populated by the air brake reservoirs.
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You cannot see it in the picture, but I filled in the cavity in the center sill with lead wool. You would be hard-pressed to get this model any heavier.
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It also has Kadee metal sprung trucks.
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This created a problem becuse it lowered the frame away from the deck. Now the car rides a little too high. Also, the ends of the support pieces are visible, and they should not be. I circled these in green in the picture below. I could have altered them to be hidden, but opted not to.
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I also had to use a Kadee #29 coupler with a long overset shank to get the coupler to the correct height. I opted for the long shank coupler so the car would work on my 24 inch radius hidden curves.
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The ride height and the visible support ends do not bother me. They cannot be easily seen when the car is running. I think the long length hides the extra ride height. It is only really bothersome when it is coupled to ano
I have a better question: why? Why weight them down at all? They run just fine “as is” in my 25+ years of experience running them.
I have built over 30 of these cars (at least…maybe more). I haven’t done a thing to them other than add metal wheels and Kadees, and they run fine. I can run them mixed in with regular cars or a solid consist of TOFC’s and have yet to have any trouble, even back in my high school days when my layout had sharp curves.
Important tip: put tape or .005" thin styrene on the factory-supplied weight above each inner axle; otherwise you’ll get electrical shorts from both metal wheels hitting the metal weight at the same time.
Kevin, most of my 800 car freight car fleet has Kadee trucks with intermountain wheel sets, never had a short yet?
Now, other brands of metal wheel sets, with shorter axles, may pose a problem…
Been doing this for more than decade, and still runing old stuff like Central Valley sprung trucks that came with all metal wheel sets with just one wheel insulated that I have been running for nearly 50 years.
DISCLAIMER:
My trains are not running around any sharp curves (except slowly in a few industrial areas). Mainline curves are all 36" radius and larger.
This was a hotly debated topic on this forum many years ago when I first talked about it. A whole list of “experts” told me it simply would not work. After much scientific debate, several others spoke up and said they had been doing the samething.
Here is the thing, sprung trucks require the axles to be short enough to allow the equalizing “flex” of the truck, but long enough to hold it in shape.
Don’t ever use REBOXX wheels in Kadee sprung trucks in the sizes they recommend, they do not work. They are too long. Sizing axles for rigid trucks and sizing them for sprung trucks is completely different - REBOXX got it wrong.
BUT, I don’t and won’t use semi scale wheels, so REBOXX is no
Looking at your version, that surely is a fine looking model.
The bridge plates you used are suitable since you opted for longer shank couplers, but as built these cars never had the “short” plate or long shank cushion couplers.
I can’t say if any ever received such mods, because most were removed from TOFC service quickly after 40’ vans can into use. TTX used these flats for heavy equipment and such once the 85’/89’ cars came along.
But as a fellow freelancer, I say good for you, it looks great.
Sheldon,
That is probably the case. My example is based on the factory-supplied truck and adding Jay-Bee, P2K or IM wheelsets (I’ve used all three). Your replacement trucks may have just a slightly thicker bolster, or a slightly taller truck sideframe that keeps the wheels from touching the metal weight.
Or it’s due to DC vs. DCC. With DCC, short circuit protection is measured in milliseconds. With DC, one can usually power through a quickie short like both wheels brushing the weight at the same time whereas DCC shuts down just about instantly. You may not even notice it.
To find out, just take one of your 75’ cars with some miles on them and look at the metal weight right above the inner wheelset. If you see any kind of shiny spots or black marks right where the flanges go, then there’s something going on. I’ve noticed this on my fleet. Not every car, mind you, but I’d say over 50% of them rub the weight going over track bumps.
Adair Shops, the aftermarket weight outfit, has a page on their website offering special inventory reduction sales on discontinued weights for models no longer made.
The page mentions a Walthers 75’ intermodal flatcar kit.
For cars difficult to get up to weight standards I routinely replace any supplied sheet steel weight with sheet lead (which I paint - and wash your hands after handling). Sometimes I need to run the lead through a roller so that it matches the steel thickness. One old trick to add a bit of weight is to wrap solder around the axles.
Paul, I doubt they are shorting because the Aristo throttles are pretty sensitive to shorts almost like DCC. Brief short circuits send the throttle position to zero, longer shorts blow the automotive fuse on the base receiver.
Just a reminder, the Aristo throttle is a full voltage pulse width modulated signal. My power supplies are regulated 13.8 volts at 4 amps. Each throttle has a separate power supply. The throttle is designed to handle up to 10 amps, so it has good internal and backup protection.
I am aware of that. The link was a carryover from when the flatcar was actually available – it was a link to the car not the weight. But the weight itself – not the car – appears to be available from Adair shops.
Dave Nelson