MTH Dreyfuss Driver Swap

You can go to MTH's Website, Click on Product Locator and type in Dreyfuss. This will give you most if not all the Dreyfuss engines MTH built.

I did that, hence the "as far as I can tell" statement.  I'm hoping someone has more knowledge or experience on wheel swapping.

MTH does not sell individual wheels or wheel set assemblies, only engine frame assemblies with wheels already installed. No railking engines with disc wheels have ever been manufactured to best that I know of.

The MTH Railking Empire State Express Hudson has the disc drivers.  That would require you to swap ount the entire chassis though.

Bob has the cheapest solution, unless you own a good lathe.  I converted my MTH to 2-rail and the cheapest, easiest way was to make a new main frame.

As Chuck and Trainsbob said, the item # 30-1143-0 or -1 is the RailKing Empire State Express. You can call MTH and Midges extension is 516. Give her that item # for a drive block. That's the only way you will be able to get the Scullin disk wheels. And that's if they have it. MTH has done a clearance on many older parts. Maybe another is the ps2 version of this, but I don't know if the drive block is the same and would connect like your current shell does..

Must be your lucky day.  I have a RK Empire Express engine only, no tender.   In excellent shape.  Send me an e-mail.  G

I remember that locomotive now.  It's not a bad looking one.  I did have a chance to buy one once, and have kicked myself for not doing so.  Pity it's tenderless, but email sent.  The locomotive will still look nice on my self or on the layout in a park.  Thanks!

Sinclair -

If the ESE loco (used to have one; sweet - but I went Scale with my ESE) is a PS1,

any tender, any brand with the same 4-prong conductor circuit layout (where the AC hot/AC common/DC/DC prongs are) will run the loco. PS2 has more prongs, I think (I'm more TMCC-savvy).

 

Appropriate tenders sometimes come up at auction, and later in life the ESE Hudsons

were sometimes run with "plain" 12-wheel tenders.

I did think about that.  But what I will most likely do is pull the motor so that it's free wheeling, and then once my now 10 month old son gets a tad older he can just push it around the track on the floor.  Got to hook them when they're young!  They are toys and toys are meant to be played with, IMHO.

A quick update.  Thanks to GGG, I was able to get the ESE locomotive and have taken the shells off of both.  A quick test fit shows that with a little work, the Dreyfuss shell will fit the ESE frame no problem.  On the other hand, I will have to make a couple mods to get the ESE shell on the Dreyfuss frame.  Here's a photo of the test fit.  I like it!

 

 

The prototype.

Cool conversion......I like your update better......but I have both the MTH RK ESE and Dreyfus......but will leave mine alone!!

Finished it up tonight.  Below is the final shot under power.  I took a couple of in process shots that I can post if anyone cares to see them.

 

 

Nice job. There was a kitbash just like that on eBay a couple of months ago. Same deal; the guy swapped an ESE chassis into a Dreyfuss to get the Scullin drivers. I bid on it but lost. I wound up getting a K-Line Dreyfuss instead - the K-line unit is semi-scale like the Rail King and came with Scullin drivers. The K-Line engine has TMCC. I'm going to repaint it to go with my Rail Chief passenger set. 

Nice job. I love streamlined steamers. To date, I have successfully limited myself to N&W only. If I slip up on this one, Katy bar the door. There are a lot of streamlines I like and the Dreyfus would be right near the top of the list!

 

Gilly

Looks good.  I've often wondered why MTH hasn't offered this version in Railking.  There have been several re-issues of the Dreyfuss but all have had the Boxpox drivers.  Same can be said of the Commodore Vanderbilt, prototype had Scullins and spoked wheels but model has had only spoked.