Taking Apart the WBB 44-tonner - converting it to series motors

Another great post Lee.......

While I may not buy one soon....great to see inside and the wire fix!!!

Thanks

Lee

Overall not an electronics person, what benefit do you expect from this conversion?

Steve

Suprised to see motors in truck blocks.

Leaves lots of room for ERR Cruise and Sound and maybe even a larger speaker. 

What about Electro-Couplers? Original couplers appear to be body mounted with little room between mount and truck.

How easy is it to open the truck blocks to gain access to the motors? 

Are there traction tires?

You sure were quick to connect those motors in series, Lee!!  Thanks for the demo.

Larry

Thanks Lee,

Although i'm planning on an ERR Mini Commander in mine, your pics saved me a lot of time as to getting it opened up and sorting out the wiring.

jackson

I find the easiest was to deal with those tab mounts is pull it back with a screw driver, then slip a heavy toothpick into the slot to hold it back. Do this to all of them, after any screws are out, and the body usually pops right off.

Steve, as Lee said in his original post:   Those who have one, unmodified, with the motors still in parallel, will appreciate how much slower it is running.  this is the very first time I fired it up and I think with practice I could adjust it slower still, but this is a good speed.  

Nice video of the layout. Fascinated by the trains on display around the room. Makes my four engines feel like I have a long way to go!

Cheers,

-Richard

Well done Lee. thank you.

Lee, I'm impressed... You don't waste anytime before you get into these projects. This isn't the first time you've been the FIRST person to make a post about some sort of modification you've made to a newly issued product.

I admire your willingness to repaint, kitbash, modify, and improve trains to your liking. When I saw the photo of your mini-GP from the RMT BEEP shells placed on a K-Line S-2 frame, I was impressed. I had thought I was the only person who had done such a thing.

And for those who consider themselves unqualified for such projects, all I can say is you never learn until you get started. Begin with something simple, like a Plasticville kitbash, and as your skill level (and confidence) begin to rise, you might surprise yourself in how much you CAN do.

Yes, there are some real skilled modelers on this forum, but don't compare your abilities and work to theirs. Use their project ideas as a goal or aiming point, and work to your own level.

And of course, guys like Lee and AMCDave, make some project a little easier to approach as they have walked through them with posts about them on this forum.

Here it is on the workbench (cluttered because I interrupted another project in mid-stream to do this).

That's funny... you always seem to have 3 or 4 things going on at the same time.  Thank you for sharing.

I have a WBB switcher I hated because it it ran so fast.  If you lowered the volts to get the train to run anywhere near the correct speed the sound would not work.  I upgraded it to PS2 and swore I'd never buy a WBB  ever again.

You may have given me reason to consider them again.  If this is a common issue, why don't they wire them in series at the factory?

Ron

Excellent work, Lee. Looks like there's a lot of room in the interior for a TMCC board. Also looks like the shell can be insulated from the chassis so it can be used as an antenna.

Thanks.  This is very useful.

Very nice project.

All those convenient plug-ins.......ready for the Bluetooth upgrades.

Lee how about a video without the train noise in order to get a better idea of the sound file. I would like to know if it's as good as the one paired with the Bachmann N-scale version.

Dave

The other thread I have, sort of a review of the 44-tonner, has a video of it running, as it is here.  The problem as I discuss in my comments on it in that other thread is that I can't hear the motor noise when it is running - its not much loader than the wheel/roling noise the loco makes.  At idle its okay, but . . . 

Nice work Lee. You inspired me to order one in the PRR scheme rather than wait for the MTH model.

Brad

Thanks Lee. Very nice tutorial. Do you know why the manufacturers wire the electronics in parallel? It seems to me they should do it in series and if anyone wants a speeder they can rewire it.

Since I haven't seen mine yet, is the body diecast or plastic?  With those tabs, it appears that it's plastic.

^ ^  This relates to my question.  

Any chance you did any sort of load test before changing to series?  While I think this is a nice, quick and dirty way to slow the engine, and I've seen quite a few threads about doing this on various dual motored locos, wouldn't the end result be a significant loss of pulling power, as from the motor's point of view they are only getting half voltage?  It may be a non-issue if the thing has plenty of pull anyway.  The idea piqued my curiosity as I've been fiddling here and there with a Pulse Width Modulation device to slow conventional engines without significant loss of pulling power. 

Lee, any chance of describing how this could be done with a dual motored K-Line S-2 diesel switcher? Thing runs like a jack rabbit.

You just need to cut one motors ground and the other motors positive wire and connect them. 

So instead of the first motors ground being a ground, instead it is a hot lead which will then power the next motor and that motors ground will complete the circuit. 

I think I will do this to my Lionel NJ Transit switcher. That thing is just ridiculously fast in parallel.

I think you miss the point.  The issue isn't pulling power, but rather jackrabbit starts.  As long as you have the track voltage range to get the motors up to a decent voltage in series, you'll still have plenty of pulling power.  The issue being addressed is the fact that you can't start low enough in the power curve to have good low speed performance.

See this post,

https://ogrforum.com/t...n-series-1#lastReply

Well, that was more or less, what I was asking.  I was just curious, if it significantly reduced pulling power.  As for the voltage range, I would expect most people to max out around 18VAC, which would put about 9 volts to the motors  in series.  The only loco I have to play with on this is a NW2 switcher I added a second motor to, and it tends to stall when pulling 2 or 3 post war cars at anything less than 10 volts. I'm not attacking the idea, just looking for more information.  

It's certainly locomotive dependent, but for most DC motored locomotives, by the time you have 9V on the motors, they're flying.

Yes, in theory, wiring the motors in series reduces the maximum amount of power the loco can produce: so if you intend to routinely pull 60 scale reefers up a 2.5 % grade, I would not wire the motors in series.  (You won't pull that many with the 44 tonner anyway, it doesn't have the traction).

Electric motors are  very non-linear things in some regards.  Most of the time, mine never run hard, as one can determine like this: run the loco with no train behind it.  Then run it at that same voltage with the train.  If it runs about the same speed either way, and mine always do, you are not working the motors hard, you are running them under conditions where they back-EMF, so to speak, is defining the RPM they run at.  

Even when pulling 25 scale reefers or flats and gondolas - or nine to ten 18" passenger cars, a typical two-engine diesel is working at only 25% - 40% of capability.  I view this a good thing  This means it is running cool and will have a long, trouble-free lifetime. 

With the 44 tonner, I don't think you can work the motors hard.  I tried to get a photo of this you could see, but could not: when pulling nine scale reefers and a caboose, as in the video below, if I start it at 14 volts, it spins its wheels for a second or two until it gets going: in other words, at 14 volts, even with its motors in series, it has more power than traction. 

And let's remember it is a switcher, and a tiny one at that.  If I had a E9 that was going to pull a full twelve-car Super Chief, I might not do this series mod, but a switcher will a) never go fast, and b) won't pull a lot of cars.  

In the video below, the 44 tonner is running at 8 volts, and using about 1 amp doing so, according to my ZW-L gauges. It will run slower, down to 7 volts, but below 8 volts, I can hear the sound volume, which is low under the best of circumstances, drop a lot.  Above 8 volts more voltage doesn't seem to increase volume, but between 7 and 8 it increases noticeably.  I view this as its slowest satisfactory speed, and it pulls these nine reefers and caboose around curves and up a slope (60 inch here) as much as two degrees with no problems. 

At eight volts.  Not a great video but I was operating the power supply with the other hand. 

As far as being prototypical goes, i never saw the F.J.&G's #30 (44 ton switcher) pull more than 5 cars and a caboose at one time; and if those cars were heavily loaded, it couldn't pull all 5 up a steep grade.

jackson

Why doesnt Williams wire them in series from the factory if they run better that way?

Thanks Lee for posting how to do that, I always wondered and want to do that to my Williams Engines.

Does that affect, any future ERR upgrades?

Any ERR upgrades you do would require complete rewiring in any case, so I don't think this is an issue.

The correct fix would be to gear them lower. That would not only slow them down but also increase the torque.

ERR cruise won't work with motors in series but the engine will run slower with cruise even with parallel motors.

Pete

The key question is, are the motors compatible with cruise operation.  Has anyone slowly rotated one to see if it "cogs" noticeably.  That usually precludes using cruise.

For a switcher, we probably don't really need cruise, but I want it...

Yours looks great in the video, Lee.  I really like the Zebra stripes.

Well, they turn smoothly.  They appear to be the same size motor as in 'Streets vehicles and clown cars and I do not feel perceptible cogging (I'm pretty sure I know what you mean) but I was feeling it by turning the flyweel with my finger with the gears and wheels still attached, and that might mask it.    

They have a very small flywheel and the thing runs slowly, smoothly, but, on my BEEPWorld loop, it really slows going up, and racse down, the slopes - it really varies speed with slope more than most . . . more than a BEEP by a good deal.  Not sure what that means vis a vis for cruise (other than it is needed) although it occurs to me it means a good deal of throttle variation would be required .  I'm under the impression that cruise systems work with about a three volt band for control variation.  I would think that would be enough, but . . 

Only way to see how well cruise goes is to try . . . and the worst that will happen is that you waste some time, then remove the boards after it doesn't work and use them somewhere else and have to run the loco witouth it.  (I realize the worst that could happen is to ruin the loco, burn out the boards, and make a mess of the whole thing.  But I sort of doubt you'd let that happen!

Lee, I wanted to thank you for a very nice, clear response, and the video was icing on the cake.  Thanks for taking the time.  

Lee, since you have an executive background, is there any way we can get you elected as Lionels new CEO?