Not sure if this is in the right spot, but im looking at a some steam engines and im wondering if it would be possible to drill a hole on the drawbar to make the gap between the engine and tender more realistic. I understand this would make the minimum radius bigger if I did this but i would try to keep the other holes if i can.
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Yes, your thinking is correct; in fact I think some tenders have come with 2 holes in the drawbar for just that flexibility of realistic distance VS curve diameter. I would just place the engine and tender on your sharpest curve and figure carefully where you can drill the hole.
Well, one way or another I have done this quite often. Not always by drilling a hole - sometimes by bending things or shortening pieces, but yes, you adjust the gap and it increases radius. Lionel locos with the infrared link are a bit sensitive to this but if you do not alter the clip where the tab from one fits into the slot in the other, that keeps the pieces aligned well enough.
It is possible - very likely - that you over compensate -- you try to reduce the gap of, say, an O-36 loco tighter but so it still runs on O0-72, only to find that it won't run on anything tighter than O-84. Be conservative at first.
Yeah I would have to make sure if I modify the drawbar that it would run on 0-72. I would like to keep the other holes so i can always change the gap but I plan on doing this to some Williams Scale Steam Engines and some Lionels possibly.
For my MTH locos I bought a piece of brass that was about the same thickness as the original drawbar, cut it down to the length I wanted, drilled the holes and grinded it down to look like the original. by making a new drawbar that was about 3/8" shorter it improved the look of the engine greatly.
For those who want to go around corners with model trains, surely some brilliant mechanical engineer could come up with drawbars that would extend when going in to curves? This is the only way for true realism on straight track. We almost had such a system for Daylight passenger cars, but the project was abandoned when the promoters figured out it would be a great way to go broke.
Picture two drawbars, with a clever release mechanism triggered by rotation, or even a servo motor triggered by a proximity switch?
Even 2- railers have these problems. My articulated coach would not go around O-148 curves with prototype spacing. I had to add an eighth of an inch to the diaphragm area.
For those who want to go around corners with model trains, surely some brilliant mechanical engineer could come up with drawbars that would extend when going in to curves?
Lionel has already done a great "operating adjustable" drawbar, and it was installed on their one and only model steam locomotive, i.e. the Milwaukee S-3 4-8-4 model. Now, the issue is to get Lionel to offer that same adjustable drawbar on other steam locomotive models!
For those who want to go around corners with model trains, surely some brilliant mechanical engineer could come up with drawbars that would extend when going in to curves? This is the only way for true realism on straight track. We almost had such a system for Daylight passenger cars, but the project was abandoned when the promoters figured out it would be a great way to go broke.
Picture two drawbars, with a clever release mechanism triggered by rotation, or even a servo motor triggered by a proximity switch?
Even 2- railers have these problems. My articulated coach would not go around O-148 curves with prototype spacing. I had to add an eighth of an inch to the diaphragm area.
For those who want to go around corners with model trains, surely some brilliant mechanical engineer could come up with drawbars that would extend when going in to curves? This is the only way for true realism on straight track. We almost had such a system for Daylight passenger cars, but the project was abandoned when the promoters figured out it would be a great way to go broke.
Picture two drawbars, with a clever release mechanism triggered by rotation, or even a servo motor triggered by a proximity switch?
Even 2- railers have these problems. My articulated coach would not go around O-148 curves with prototype spacing. I had to add an eighth of an inch to the diaphragm area.
A much more mechanically simple solution would be to use what Kato has used in the past for their N scale Daylight passenger cars and Bachmann with their HO scale Acela train. In fact, Lionel adapted this very same technique recently with their scale S3 Northern as well as on their scale 89' autoracks.
Basically it's a Y-shaped, spring-loaded slot system where the drawbar resides within the Y-slot where dead center would be the bottom of the Y. The spring maintains the necessary tension and helps the drawbar/coupler to self-center. When it goes around a curve, the drawbar travels "upwards" from dead center along either the left or right fork of the Y-slot as it swings, depending on the direction of the curve. This allows the coupler or drawbar to "slack itself out" so that it will extend further out, increasing the gap between the locomotive and tender as it goes around a curve yet also maintaining a small a gap as possible between cars/ engine/tender. Once the engine and tender are out of a curve, the drawbar or couplers return back to the bottom of the Y, thus pulling the tender (or car) back to its original close-coupled position.
This is what Kato's self-adusting couplers look like underneath their Daylight cars:
Lionel's recent S3 Northern and their scale 89' autoracks use an identical method to maintain close-coupling between engine/tender and cars respectively both on straightaways and curves. Definitely would involve some heavy modification but would be much less mechanically complex than using servos and/or multiple drawbars.
If you are going for as close as possible, remember to allow for compression when it comes to a stop. I just shortened the draw-bar on a semi-scale Hudson and when I chop the power if the engine is in a curve the corner of the cab will touch the tender slightly due to compression that I did not take into account when measuring. Albeit, I was going for absolute minimum draw-bar length.
For those who want to go around corners with model trains, surely some brilliant mechanical engineer could come up with drawbars that would extend when going in to curves? This is the only way for true realism on straight track. We almost had such a system for Daylight passenger cars, but the project was abandoned when the promoters figured out it would be a great way to go broke.
Picture two drawbars, with a clever release mechanism triggered by rotation, or even a servo motor triggered by a proximity switch?
Even 2- railers have these problems. My articulated coach would not go around O-148 curves with prototype spacing. I had to add an eighth of an inch to the diaphragm area.
A much more mechanically simple solution would be to use what Kato has used in the past for their N scale Daylight passenger cars and Bachmann with their HO scale Acela train. In fact, Lionel adapted this very same technique recently with their scale S3 Northern as well as on their scale 89' autoracks.
Basically it's a Y-shaped, spring-loaded slot system where the drawbar resides within the Y-slot where dead center would be the bottom of the Y. The spring maintains the necessary tension and helps the drawbar/coupler to self-center. When it goes around a curve, the drawbar travels "upwards" from dead center along either the left or right fork of the Y-slot as it swings, depending on the direction of the curve. This allows the coupler or drawbar to "slack itself out" so that it will extend further out, increasing the gap between the locomotive and tender as it goes around a curve yet also maintaining a small a gap as possible between cars/ engine/tender. Once the engine and tender are out of a curve, the drawbar or couplers return back to the bottom of the Y, thus pulling the tender (or car) back to its original close-coupled position.
This is what Kato's self-adusting couplers look like underneath their Daylight cars:
Lionel's recent S3 Northern and their scale 89' autoracks use an identical method to maintain close-coupling between engine/tender and cars respectively both on straightaways and curves. Definitely would involve some heavy modification but would be much less mechanically complex than using servos and/or multiple drawbars.
The American Flyer Y3 also uses the same butterfly bracket arrangement.
Marklin, Fleishmann and Rocco began making it pretty much standard in Euro HO since the late 1980's-early 1990's on their locomotives, passenger cars and freight cars.
Rusty
The arced slot is interesting.
I did the extra hole in the drawbar to shorten the gap on one of my Imperial Railking Big Boys. I then changed to the straight plug tether as well, This required I slot the front of the tender to allow the tether to slide on tighter corners.
This engine now has a minimum curve somewhere between O-42 and O-54. It derails the tender on O-42 switches but is happy on O-54.
BUT It LOOKS Much better !!! Just need to add the drop plate and it's good.
Very nice, but that looks like a 2-Rail Scale locomotive staged on 3-Rail track. How well does it negotiate 072 curves?
Hot Water
It is a 3rd Rail PRR M1b mountain 3 rail locomotive designed by them for O72 curves.
Does not like #4 switches all the time but no problem with the O72 curves.
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