I have just cleaned the wheels on several pieces of rolling stock. It appeared that the metal wheels collected less dirt and gunk than the plastic wheels did. Based on my unscientific sample I think I am going to replace all plastic wheels with metal ones. What are everyone’s thoughts about this and which metal wheels are best. I’m new to this, so any knowlege you could impart to me would be greatly appreciated. Thanks for your inputs.
Tom
If you put “metal wheels” into the forum search, you’ll get 5 pages of opinions about metal vs. any other combination.
Did you know that early passenger car wheels used compressed paper as the wheel center? The axle, bearing and tread/flange were metal, but the body of the wheel was paper…
P2K’s and KD’s
Some opinions that have been expressed in the past are that plastic wheels generate static electricity as they roll on the track, thus attracting dirt, and that metal wheels don’t.
I prefer metal wheels because of the sound they make more than any concern with dirt buildup, but I have seen some rolling stock that had so much dirt buildup on plastic wheels that the wheel rims were enlarged to the diameter of the flanges.
My personal preferences for replacement wheelsets are Intermountain, P2K, and LBF, in that order; and for replacement trucks P2K, Atlas, and Kato.
Thanks for the inputs! Looks like I’ve got some work ahead of myself.
Tom
The best wheels to use are the ones with the correct axel length. N.W.S.L. has the Charts to pick the correct axel length, type, wheel diameter and tread size.
NWSL, Atlas, Branchline, LBF, Intermountain, Kadee, ReBoxx, & P2K all make good metal wheel sets that are available as seperate parts. I like the Intermountain sets myself, and they are priced right when buying them by the box(100). The ReBoxx sets are similar and have lots of axle lengths for those ‘special’ trucks.
Kadee & P2K have a nylon or ‘engineering’ plastic axle that can get worn after time. The Intermountain’s have nice ‘needlepoint’ axle ends that are very free rolling. The ReBoxx one’s are similar to the Intermountain wheel sets.
One item you will want to pick is the ‘Tool’ for reaming out the journals in the truck sideframes - Both Micro-Mark and ReBoxx sell it. It is amazing how much better cars run after using the ‘Tool’!
Jim
Intermountian
Intermountain wheels were always my favorite, but any wheels with polished metal profiles and and axles will be your best bet. Reboxx and NWSL make wheels with different length axles that should fit a wide variety of cars.
I’ve started replacing all mine with the Reboxx wheels. You can’t buy them as cheap as let say the Intermountains, but I cannot complain because they roll so well. You can download the axel length and most common manufacturer and truck types right from their website.
Also have to second, get the “tool” for cleaning up the trucks.
Rick
I had gotten used to clean track and relatively quiet wheels during the fall. Then, for some unrelated reason, I inverted my one caboose and found that the two tail-end wheels were heavily coated with dark gunk…like they had been delegated to do the sweeps for their train. I then checked other cars in my short trains and found that most had one wheel that seemed to have an affinity for crud.
I have yet to clean my track, and won’t bother until our basement is complete over the next four weeks. Then I have some real work to do.
BTW, I used a small piece of cedar planking to scrape those wheels clean, and it did a pretty decent job, if I may say so. If a person would rather use solvents and polished only when absolutely necessary, I would advised coffee stir sticks, or any soft and clean piece of wood.
I use Intermountains and Kadees and have no trouble with either. I also like the noise they make and how easy the cars roll with metal wheels.
The Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago uses Intermountain wheels almost exclusively. Sometimes they measure distanced traveled in real miles instead of scale miles.[:D] After you run them around enough, they are brass underneath the coating.
Which wheels are Best?
The ‘BETTER’ wheels are plated solid brass or nickel silver machined to NMRA standards with RP22 flanges. The heavier wheels provide greater ‘unsprung weight’ which improves tracking.
CHEAPER are metal ‘stamped’ wheels which may or may not conform to NMRA specs.
CHEAPEST are molded plastic - which you want to replace.
ROLLING qualities (as opposed to ‘tracking’) are largely determined by the friction between the axle and side frame material. DELRIN and highly polished axle points roll so freely that the complaint is “they don’t stop”.
Importing FOREIGN products has ‘watered down’ the standards set by the NMRA and we are getting axles and wheelsets that are non-compliant, for the benefit of profit…
The ‘TOOL’ will carve a deeper hole in a non-NMRA spaced sideframe for an NMRA wheelset, otherwise the axle will just ride lower in the journal with more surface friction.
AGAIN, the ‘best’ wheels are machined to NMRA specs -NWSL, JayBee. IM has very good trucks and wheels, as does KATO and ATLAS.
Wheelsets with plastic axles (Kadee) or plastic added to the points (LL) for rolling will wear out faster, but be cheaper. I keep a couple of KATO trucks around (Delrin) to determine my standards.
I USE all JB & NWSL. MSI’s David Harrison and J. Bernier use all I.M.
A lot of modelers use what is cheapest based on their criteria. At $1.50 per axle, I don’t think adding $3 per car is expensive - when they roll better and drop my derailments to near zero.
I am going to jump on the Intermountain band wagon. I had been using Kadee wheels for quite a long time (I was happy with them), but the owner of the LTS talked me into trying out the Intermountains, and I am hooked. As stated above, the price is right when buying them in “bulk”. The only wheels that I have had some problems with are the Jay Bees. It seemed like 1 in 8 would be “wobbly”.
For most general applications, I use the Proto 2000 33’s, usually the flat black. They also come in 31’s as well I think… They cost around $8 at my LHS.
-beegle55
Gee whiz…I prefer the newer Athearn trucks with the metal wheels.I also like my old combination of P2K wheel sets in Athearn trucks.I also use plastic wheels since both metal and plastics seems to pickup about the same amount of gook.
Best is a totally subjective term. Our club switched to 100% metal wheels a few years back. After this, my assessment is Reboxx and NWSL were the best because you could match the axle length. Just be careful on tread width because many of them are semi-scale rather than RP25. We had good luck with the Proto-2000 sets except their axles were too short for many of the Athearn Blue box trucks. We bought Intermountain and Atlas in bulk for the better price, but both sets were shiny nickel-silver so we had to paint them all or they looked stupid. Kadee, makes great couplers but we don’t use their wheelsets on the club layout anymore.
What is best for you will depend on your fleet of cars.
P.S. The club converted in an attempt to keep the track cleaner. As near as we can measure it hasn’t helped at all. The wheels themselves pick up less gunk but it doesn’t seem to help keep the track cleaner. Then because of the additional short circuits and additional noise our club is now thinking about converting back to the plastic. That proposal has my vote.
I’ve had good luck with the Proto wheels on both Athearn and Accurail cars, Kadees on most anything, and definitely Intermountain on those quirky cars that are a little hard to fit. I’ve also found that if I use a little reamer called simply “The Tool” on the inside truck bearings, I can get almost any metal wheelsets to match.
I have a garage railroad, subject to all sorts of temperature changes during the year, and switching to metal wheelsets has eased the pain of major rail cleaning down to about twice a year, and I don’t notice any buildup on my wheels at all. PLUS: My locos can handle longer trains with metal wheels.
Tom
Just as a note here: RP-25 does not specify tread width; only the flange/fillet contour. I have used the 0.088" tread width wheels from Reboxx for over two years now, and have had no issues with them, on Atlas code 100 flex track and Peco turnouts. They operate flawlessly.
That’s because Kadee, like Athearn’s BB locos, uses sintered metal wheelsets. They are more porous, because sintering is a process which uses powdered metal pressed with heat into the mold for the wheel. Thus, they pick up much more dirt than cast or machined metal wheels.
Definitely true…
And when was the last 1:1 train you heard that was quiet? [:)]