i have been thinking lately about something i have heard somewhere. it is about the wheels in that the metal is better then the plastic ones for general running of the cars. is this true? thanks.
Yes. Metal is definitely better. Louder but better. The general exception is the 'blackened metal wheels which pick up more dirt. Polish the blackening off the wheel tread to end that problem.
metal all the way.rambo1…
Metal for sure…and with a good tuned truck, they will roll forever
There are a few members of the forum who leave plastic wheels on their rolling stock and have no objections, but I am not one of them.
I have replaced all of the plastic wheels with Intermountain metal wheels on all of my freight cars and all of my passenger cars.
Early on, I left the plastic wheels on the cars, and I had nothing but trouble with dirty track. Worse, the metal wheels on the locos picked up black gunk from the rails. In my opinion, the plastic wheels drag on the rails and leave a residue, black gunk, on the track.
Rich
Sean,
I think you’ll find that the consensus is that metal wheels are definitely the way to go, with one exception: Kadee wheels are made out of sintered metal - that is, metal powder heated and compressed into molds. This make the wheels porous, and they will pick up an amazing amount of crud. I’ve had them collect so much stuff on the wheel, that the flanges are buried. Makes the wheel derail, immediately.
Metal wheels pro and con:
Pro: good electrical pickup
stay cleaner longer
more realistic looking, when properly painted (nice shiny tread)
Add weight low on the car for better tracking.
when the axle length is correct, and the journals are properly prepared (the “tool”), roll more freely.
Con: Noisy (but then real trains aren’t exactly stealthy…)
Plastic wheels:
Pro:
quiet
cheap to make (for the mfr.)
Con:
with metal axles, are often out of gauge
with plastic axles, often have molding “flash”
Collect more rail “crud”
unrealistic color
light weight
There are probably a bunch of faults and benefits that I haven’t mentioned, but you can start with those.
All of my wheels are metal and almost all have been replaced with wheel sets made by Proto 2000. The rims of these wheels are a bright silver, similar to the wheels on real railroad cars. I remember before I changed from plastic to metal wheels, I found some wheels that had so much crud on them, that like someone said, the flanges could not hold the wheels on the track. When I inspect my cars now, I never find wheels that have anything on them; so, I can say with absolute certainty that both the track and your wheels will stay cleaner with the bright silvered metal wheels.
Agreed…I will add select quality wheelsets like Intermountain or ExactRail-I’ve use both with excellent roll ability results…
Metal for all the right reasons
What I heard was true. Thanks for the input. What would be a good brand of metal wheels?
Several are quite good. I’m assuming HO…
Intermountain and Exactrail are virtually identical and work in most trucks. Athearn and current production from Atlas and Walthers are also fine (i.e. if these are already on a car they should perform and look OK). I still have a lot of Kadee wheels, most of which were polished to deter crud buildup, but I don’t buy them anymore in favor of machined wheels. Proto 2000 are also cast like Kadee, but have a smoother surface that doesn’t attract dirt like Kadee. I’ve encountered several of these that wobble on the axles and thus deliver unacceptable performance, so I hesitate to recommend them although most shouldn’t have problems. I’m not impressed at all with the machined wheels from JayBee or the cast ones from Branchline.
Kadee wheel sets are not ‘sintered iron’ If you polish/buff the treads, they are shiny! I think you may be thinking about the old Athearn ‘BB’ wheels on engines. Those were sintered iron, and did pick up a lot of dirt/crud. Back in the 70’s/80’s, I replaced them with Jay Bee or NWSL n/s replacement wheels.
I gave up on Kadee wheels due to the soft engineering plastic axles that are poor performers in the ‘rolling’ department. The P2K wheels also have engineering plastic ends, but they are tapered and roll much better than the Kadee wheels. The ‘best’ rolling wheels I have found are I-M wheels - very consistent quality, and good performers. I-M wheels in a plastic side frame that has been ‘fixed’ with the ‘Truck Tuner’ tool are the best rolling trucks I have.
Jim
I use both but prefer plastic. [swg]
Wayne
Sean,I favor the Intermountain wheel set and my second choice is ExactRail-these come in bulk packages for around $60.00(discount) for 100 pairs or enough for 25 cars…
IMHO the Walthers P2K wheels doesn’t have the roll ability of the IM and ER wheels.
These wheels come in 33" or 36" size.
Contrary to Larry, I like and use the Proto 2000 33" wheels on my HO rolling stock. Haven’t tried the ExactRail wheel sets yet but will have to give them a try sometime.
Tom
Seriously I have a heck of a time getting the P2K wheels to roll freely down grade when mounted in a Athearn truck.I’ve used Reboxx “exact socket tool” and still my IM and ER equipped cars out rolls the cars with P2K wheel sets.
I dunno…Maybe I’m not holding my tongue right when I’m using the tuner? [*-)].
I have purchased a few used freight cars with metal wheels that had tons of crud built up on the treads, so it isn’t quite true that they won’t get dirty. However, given the amount of dust that was present of the roofs of the cars, the layouts they came from likely suffered from a severe lack of maintenance. However, most used metal wheel sets seem to be pretty clean, at least in my experience.
By comparison, almost every used freight car I have purchased with plastic wheels has had some build up on the wheels and in many cases it was huge. I replace the plastic sets with metal anyhow so the condition of the plastic wheels doesn’t matter to me.
I think the real bottom line is that if you have a lot of ‘dirt’ on your track you will naturally get a lot of build up on your wheels regardless of what they are made from. So - keep your track clean! Now if that is news to anyone I have some swamp land in south Florida…[swg][(-D]. (No offense to those living in swampland in the south of Florida!)
Dave
I have some plastic wheels and rather more metal wheels. Most of the metal wheels and all of the plastic wheels have RP25 contour tread/flange profiles. However, some of my metal wheels have flanges with rhomboid profiles, or thin, tall pizza cutter flanges. The ones of that ilk which I haven’t replaced are under the cars in my derailment test train, ready to point out even the slightest defect in my trackwork.
My rails are gleamed, and I run a couple of John Allen-style slider cars. I haven’t had any problems with crud build-up - but I do have a regular inspection schedule.
So, which wheels do I prefer? the round, in-gauge ones with proper profiles…
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
I am in the process of replacing all of the plastic wheelsets on my rolling stock. I, like many others, am strictly using the intermountain wheels which maybe explains why there is a shortage at times.
I buy them in the 100 pack. My LHS will match any online price I can find. In fact the last time they were out of the 100 count pack, they sold me the 12 packs @ the same per axle rate if I bought at least 8 packs (96)
I dunno, are prototype wheels metal or plastic? 