Dump Cars with " Realistic" Dumping?

Look at the Lionel postwar 3359, I believe it was copied from the real thing.

Here's a youtube I found.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo19unJYRI4

franktrain

 Try this from the MTH website....

http://www.mthtrains.com/sites...d/vid/30rs17314v.swf

The MTH cars dump nice and slow. Very nice mechanisms.

I have the MTH dump cars and they work nice and smooth and dump complety every time. The K line are smooth but not high quality, they don't always work and the coal dump doesn't empty completely and the side gate hangs up.  I don't need the radio control because I'm only going to dump in a specific place. My opinon get the MTH you will like them. I use lionel coal with Mikes. Premier or Rail King there the same.

Clem

Thanks for all of the input everyone! The MTH looks like a winner, especially since a forum sponsor has a brand new one for half MSRP, and its in the correct roadname

 Just as a follow up, received my Railking dump car today. The car is larger and heavier than I expected, dumping action is great. I'm very pleased, thanks "all" for the recommendation!

Adding an ERR Mini-Commander for TMCC control, and dumping anywhere on the layout, is an excellent upgrade for these cars.

As for these dump cars, I believe that they were used for dumping ballast and gravel along right of ways (to supply work crews) AFAIK, coal was always delivered in a hopper car and doors opened at the hopper compartment bottoms over a trestle to dispense its load below. The dump cars are prototypical but only for delivering gravel in certain circumstances.  

Speaking of dumping...  I have some nice Lionel 3-bay die cast hoppers with spring-loaded trap doors at the base of each bay.  Has anyone figured out a way of rigging something to open these trap doors on a layout to release a load of "coal"?

   Bob A.

Those trap doors should have a plunger at the bottom that is activated (pulled down) by an uncoupling track electromagnet. I have a set up where two electromagnets sit on the tracks on a coal yard trestle. I activate them, the door open and the coal load drops down just like in the old days.

Right on... I spent  a summer as a brakeman working with these cars on a bank widening   work train.   Consist ..   2 engines Gp-9s, Jordan spreader, about 10  air dumps and our caboose .  Work equipment guys had a  shovel spotted were  we loaded the dumps.  These thing  would almost dip over if the loads got stuck on an unload.  Scary.

 I had a good summer, lived in the caboose and  went fishing at every little creek along the right of way.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDvrks6nJng Here you go Bob.As Dennis was describing.Nick

 Neat.. Are you going to have it on a slight grade with an electric coupler at the end  like the Lionel (can't remember number 456? )   coal ramp.  Do you need reachers to spot the   cars so the  center rail  roller of the engine doesn't drop down. Good stuff.

Rick, where did you find a cheap one?

No pictures?  I have been laboring under the impression that all side dump models in O Scale were just tinplate caricatures.

Nick - Thanks for the video; good work.  But mine don't have plungers.  They just have tiny spring-loaded doors at the base of the bays, and they don't swing down, but off to the side.

   Bob A.

would like some product #'s of these dump cars.  are there lumber and coal ones

thanks

Don't do this with your O-gauge dump car.

The photographer has no idea how this BN side-dump car came to be in this position between the track and US 59 in NW Missouri.

Photographed by Bill Hakkarinen, March 31, 1998.

The dump car was designed too good; it dumped itself! 

You did this on a side dump car ? I'd like to see a picture of that if you have one...

Not really that difficult to add TMCC to these cars, here's an older Lionel log dump car that I converted.  I've done barrel cars, spotlight cars, coal dump cars, etc.

Teens were tired of tipping cows.

That is very cool John. If I was still into operating cars I would do some of those. Somewhere in a box I have a small unit train of log dump cars.

At around 5m30s of this video, the logs are dumped so they can be sawed. The dumping is actually somewhat smoother than how I recorded it.

But I like this video of the Shay itself better:

Alex

Electirc RR no longer sells the kit, but you can find the instructions for converting the MTH log/dump cars here.  You just need to scrounge a center rail pickup.

The diagram for converting the Lionel coal dump car is here. HOWEVER, modern versions of the car have extra protrusions in the car body that make it difficult, if not impossible, to fit the Mini Commander in.  Find a frame from a postwar 3459/3469.

I found that I didn't have to use the plastic tubing for the frame to be isolated from the trucks. But if you are using modern trucks, you may have to remove some paint before the axle ends make good electrical contact with the truck frames.

The Lionel log dump car is easier;  the Mini Commander is just stuck under the car.  Covered with black electrical tape it's not very conspicuous. 

I didn't even bother with the tape, you hardly know it's there unless you're looking under the car.

In response to some earlier posts about unloading the operating hoppers with the plungers, here's another option, if you can find one:

http://www.lionel.com/products...neID=&CatalogId=

I found one in a hobby shop a few years ago and it was a highlight of my recently torn-down layout. Worked perfectly, though engines didn't like to go out on the trestle (I just used spacer cars). I'm figuring out right now how to fit it into the new layout I'm currently building.

Derek