instructions for how to 2 rail a Kline passenger car

adferraro posted:

Hello,

Can anyone point me in the direction of a nice step by step guide for 2 railing a kline passenger car? In particular their midnight chief 18 inch cars? I've never done anything like this before. Or if nothing like that exists, some pointers would be nice.

Thanks,

Adam

Just my opinion but, why would you waste for time 2-railing 18" passenger cars if you are a 2-Rail SCALE guy?

Because I really really like the midnight chief paint scheme and I really don't want to sell them. I also just don't want them sitting on a shelf forever. What harm is it if on an occasional foggy night the ghostly midnight chief appears?

adam

Actually, 18" is 72' in scaled down length, and there were many real cars about that long.  

My personal K-Lines were 2-railed with a wood center sill and 2-rail trucks, but I 2- railed a bunch using K- Line 2-rail trucks and Kadee couplers.

You could simply remove the wheels, drill the bearings #41, and insert NWSL scale wheelsets.  Making the lights work is an additional problem, more easily done with the wood center sill.

You need to replace the non-insulated wheel sets with ones that are insulated so they do not cause a direct electrical short across the rails. this is assuming that you plan to use conventional DC power.  You could actually run them as is, if your choice of power was on board rc battery (dead rail). Figure out the scale diameter of your wheels and you could get replacements from someone like Northwest Short Line. Apart from being insulated, the flanges of 2R wheels will be smaller.

Simon

Simon Winter posted:

You need to replace the non-insulated wheel sets with ones that are insulated so they do not cause a direct electrical short across the rails. this is assuming that you plan to use conventional DC power.  You could actually run them as is, if your choice of power was on board rc battery (dead rail). Figure out the scale diameter of your wheels and you could get replacements from someone like Northwest Short Line. Apart from being insulated, the flanges of 2R wheels will be smaller.

Simon

Yeah, that's the part I'd be a little iffy on. How do I wire them is where I would need direction. I thought about going dead rail but that's a whole different problem. I've tested some dallee led boards and they work great with a 9 volt but where to mount the 9 volt holder is the problem. You could wire the baggage car with a battery pack and string the wires from car to car so that they all derive power from one pack, but again, a lot of work I'm not sure I want to do.

Yes, that's the problem sometimes. It does end up more work than we'd like. Sometimes I start a project like this and think it won't be that difficult. Then, I end up going much deeper than I expected. When it's all said and done, the cars are running on my layout, I forget how much I went thru to get them converted.

 Now, I plan for the worse case. I have trucks ready for the conversion. I have spare wipers ready to bend and place for power pick-up. I have a growing electronics parts supply of caps, chokes, LEDs, etc.

 You either buy stuff ready to run. Or prepare to do the conversions on what you acquire.

I can't stand flickering lights. So I choose to modify them anyways. I'm glad I'm in no rush.

Go to the electrical forum here on the OGR. There's some great posts and electrical guys that will help out. They've helped me on a lot of projects here.

https://ogrforum.com/forum/electrical-forum

I just converted 9 K-line cars from 2 rail to 3 rail. You need to buy the two rail trucks. I have seen them on ebay. Also try Bassier, they are a forum sponsor.  The cars have two wires (Red and Black) and the two rail trucks also have two wires black and red. So it a matter of cutting the wires, remove the trucks, one screw hold them in place and slide the assemble towards the middle.  Then you had to remove the c clip from the 3 rail trucks and transfer the monting plate to the 2 rail trucks conect the black and red wires. Then attached the frame back to the body and screw it tight.  They you need to add couples, with a spacing board at the right height.  I would sell you the trucks I removed but the deal I had with the guy brought the car from was that I would return them to him. 

It's not hard to do, just takes time!!!

I agree with Jim. The easiest way to 2R these cars is to use the K-Line 2R trucks.  I did that in 2004, buying the trucks from several hobby shops and then the 2R trucks became hard to find. I have seen them from time to time since then on eBay. But, with the factory trucks it's merely swapping trucks and plugging in the wires.

Butch 

They were a good deal at the time - same price as four NWSL wheelsets, and all your electrical problems were solved.  But they were Chinese prototype, not really resembling any US prototype.

If you do one car at a time you will re- discover all the pitfalls.  I believe I published the dimensions of the Kadee spacer blocks in a 2-rail magazine.

Th advantage of the wood center sill is that the trucks are isolated from each other and from the body.  The disadvantage is that two wheel pickup does admit to flicker.  My wood sills go from one end to the other, with Kadee mounts.  I throw away that plastic underbody detail thing, and start over with wood blocks.

Just do one .  Then report back, to help others.  These are good models.

What do you think about the MTH lightweight passenger car trucks? They make a 2 rail version with pickups. I was thinking about trying those.

They look accurate.  Get a pair, try them, and report back.  The big deal is how to mount them to the floorboard - but often the folks overseas use the same kinds of components for everybody.  I have moved Atlas power trucks into MTH floorboards with very little trimming.

If the MTH trucks are only a few bucks more than NWSL wheelsets, then the big deal is accuracy and all wheel pickup.  Folks will tell you that I like carbon steel wheels, but that is one of those personal things - the MTH wheelsets will work just fine.

K-line in the past offered a conversation kit to 2 rail their 3 rail trucks.  I don't know if they still do but its worth an inquiry

george bissell posted:

K-line in the past offered a conversation kit to 2 rail their 3 rail trucks.  I don't know if they still do but its worth an inquiry

Are you aware that K-Line has been out of business for quite some years now?

Thanks for the update.  There are a lot of things I don't know.  Perhaps ebay might have a conversion kit.

I like the MTH 2-rail lghtweight car trucks a lot. Not sure what the prototype is but hardly care. Best deal out there: paid about $24 per pair online. Funky mounting, but I embed a 4-40 nut in the car floor, drill out the threads in the truck, etc.