I was operating my mth 765 berkshire when I noticed the traction tire had came off.Being this the first time for this locomotive.I put it back on but this time.I put denatured alcohol on the tire and it has so far stayed on.Give it a try guys and girls.
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Interesting, what do you think the alcohol did to keep the tire on?
It will come off again. Whenever a traction tire comes off from a wheel, throw it away and put on a new tire. No glue, no Bullfrog crap, just a new tire. If you loose a tire on a Lionel engine, try to get hold of the same tire from MTH to replace your tire. This subject has been beat to death.
I agree with MARTY. Replace them with the MTH tires, they seem to last longer.
Do traction tires have a shelf life? MTH steam comes with a spare tire. When the original finally falls off the loco should the spare still be good, or will the rubber material become more brittle with age? Just wondering. I have not had to replace a tire yet, but when the time comes I'd hate to use a spare that will fail soon after.
Yes they have a shelf life, especially if you live in a hot, dry climate. I'm constantly changing tires on engines that sit for months at a time. They dry out, split, crack and then come apart while running. Keep spares on hand. Just like tires on an RV or trailer, they usually rot out before we can wear them out.
I have a climate control train room and never have seen an issue. I have seen the Lionel tires crack but never the MTH tires. I have trains in Florida and have never had an issue. I am inside the AC but I know what that heat does to trim outside on cars. I can see this possibly an issue if you have a hot dry train room.
hokie71 posted:Interesting, what do you think the alcohol did to keep the tire on?
May have made the tire tighten up.Most of the time once the tire comes off.You can put back on but it will come right off.Maybe I got it to stay on because it did not get pulled out of shape.
Marty Fitzhenry posted:It will come off again. Whenever a traction tire comes off from a wheel, throw it away and put on a new tire. No glue, no Bullfrog crap, just a new tire. If you loose a tire on a Lionel engine, try to get hold of the same tire from MTH to replace your tire. This subject has been beat to death.
O.k. now that it is some thing I never thought of.
Laidoffsick posted:Yes they have a shelf life, especially if you live in a hot, dry climate. I'm constantly changing tires on engines that sit for months at a time. They dry out, split, crack and then come apart while running. Keep spares on hand. Just like tires on an RV or trailer, they usually rot out before we can wear them out.
I try to keep an eye on the locomotives.If I see a locomotive slip I stop it right there.Because that can pull the tires out of shape.
Well Marty all my trains are in the house, climate controlled with an AC, our layout is inside the house, climate controlled, with an AC and we have that issue even with MTH tires. They are rubber, and living in the Southwest is not the same as Florida. Just because you haven't seen it, doesn't mean we don't have the issue. Stop by any time, and we can show you 
We call it dry heat for a reason, even if it's 78 with the AC on.
Do these tires have numbers, or do they spec out by diameter or engine/product number? If I have a Lionel engine how do I know what MTH tire to order? Ted
Part #'s.. scroll down to "DE" numbers
Ive never bought parts there but its a good ref. list.
Laidoffsick, I do not doubt you. Your creditibility is great in my book. This is something I have not seen. I get to see many tires in my travels. My train room is climate controlled and I have not seen that. I will run this by Jason at MTH and see if he has any input.
I have experienced the heat in the southwest many times. The only tires I had with me were the Goodyear tires under the car. I would like to visit your layout if I am ever in the area.
I have a question about the tires that do go bad. Are they on engines that have been sitting on a track while in storage vs sitting in a box. My interest is if the tires get flat spots from sitting on the rails instead of in a box where the weight is on the metal rim not the rubber tire? I just installed a wall of shelving to display my trains and wonder is setting them on the rim is better than on the rubber tire?
Yes my tires get flat spots from sitting on the GSD shelves. They sit for months and sometimes a year or more. 9 times out of 10 for me, if they engine has been sitting for a long time, the tires are dry, cracked and flat spotted. I just change them during the maintenance process before running the engine again. Otherwise we find chunks of tires all over the layout... steam or diesel.
I have talked to many and nobody else sees this. Let your car sit for a while and you will get flat spots on the tires. Run the car a bit and they are gone. Flat spots, yes it can happen. Cracking, might be a southwest thing if you see it on MTH tires. I have never run into it with an MTH tire. I have MTH diesel tires from PS-1 engines that were removed from the box and labeled. They are factory new. When I service a locomotive, new tires are always put on. I slit the bad ones with the Xacto. Again, I am talking about MTH tires. Over the years, Lionel has had some nasty tires. I have seen them cracked out of the box. My locomotive roster has many locomotives, mostly MTH. I do have about 70 Lionel Legacy engines. When I buy a Lionel engine for myself, I slit the tires and put MTH tires on.
My layout is 34 years old and over the years I may have found three tires on the layout. I have a friend who found them everywhere. When he put his tubular track together, he never removed the burr at the joint. When I assembled my track many years ago, I hand filed every joint. My friends problem was the metal burr picking the tires apart over time.
I do a large number of repairs and have lots of tire stories. My observations are as I stated and I have never worked on tires in the southwest. Anything is possible with toy trains.
OK Marty, help me save some time and money here then, tell me what the problem is. I just got home, took this engine off my shelf.
This is an MTH engine, I serviced last Aug 10th (2016) including new MTH tires bought from GRJ in bulk directly from MTH. I ran this engine less than an hour at the San Diego 3 Railers on solid Atlas track. It has been sitting on a shelf in my climate controlled house for 10 months.... 10 months, and less than an hour run time on Atlas track.
The rear truck has flat spots from sitting. Sure, not bad but they will get worse the longer it sits. You will notice them when it runs.
Same engine, front truck. Tires are 10 months old and you can clearly not only see the cracks, a big chunk fell out on one wheel just sitting on the shelf. The chunk is laying there on the shelf. Notice the flat spots as well.
I have bags of tires I bought from John because this is the norm for me. Steam, diesel, Atlas, Lionel, MTH, Sunset... it don't matter. Gargraves, Atlas, Ross... don't matter. Amount of run time...don't matter. All my tires do this after sitting on the shelf or sitting on the layout. The tires on my Lionel Challenger crumbled sitting inside of the roundhouse on the layout for 6 months.
So what in the world is going on?
Just a suggestion but; have you ever given any thought to placing a humidifier in your train room. I realize this sounds counter productive with AC but; as I recollect from time spent in west Texas and New Mexico; they used to run what they referred to as swamp coolers. They chilled the air but, they also raised the humidity level inside the house.
Curt
well the layout is in the middle of the entire house, so it's not just a room. My display shelves are in all the hallways. We have lived in Arizona, New Mexico, and California... swamp coolers don't cut it when it's 110 outside, they don't produce cold air like a good old fashioned AC unit
I remember as a kid living in Ohio everyone had dehumidifiers....... if we only had that problem in the desert 
I've never seen new tires to that Doug, that's pretty bad! I can see the flat-spots forming, but the cracks and tires falling apart are pretty worrisome!
I've gotten used to it at this point John. That's why my email to you that day said, "give me every traction tire you can spare"
My boat trailer went through 3 sets of tires in 5 years, not because of wear, because of dry rot... granted the boat trailer sat outside. The traction tires are thin, but still rubber, they just don't seem to like the dry air here. I can go upstairs and pick any engine on the shelves, and they will all look like that if I haven't replaced them in the past 6 months. They dry out, crack, and break into pieces.
New plan Doug, don't put tires on until you're ready to run. Obviously, the dry air is the killer. I have engines that have been in the box for years, I take them out and away they go, no problems with the tires. Now I know why they make so many tires, it's for people that live near you! 
Well we are moving, but back to New Mexico so the air ain't much different, although ABQ is a mile high. The dry air is just thinner
Does anyone know what size tire the TMCC AC-9 uses? Then I can use the chart referenced earlier to get my replacement.
Measure the wheel diameter at the tread where it contacts the track. Then use the next smaller size on this chart. If you have a 27mm wheel, use the 25mm tire.
I would use a 29mm or 31mm. If you are ordering just get a few pairs of each since they are cheap.
Speaking of AC9's, here's my Sunset AC9 I just went to measure the wheels (about 33mm) and look.... the tire already had a blowout just sitting on the shelf. Haven't touched it in months.
Move to PA, those issues will be behind you.
I refuse to buy the cracked out tires as being recent unless you have some sort of crazy climate situation. I have never seen that in my life on recent tires. Would you be opposed to me throwing your picture at Jason at MTH. None of us are above learning what needs to be changed. He would have the answer if anyone would. I have always been a strong advocate of the MTH tires. Not so with Lionel tires. I love the operation of the Lionel Legacy diesel trucks with MTH tires on them. I am a big fan of recent Legacy locomotives.
John, if I did not have my layout I would move to PA in a second.
Sure Marty go ahead and send the photos to who ever you want. They are all 10 months old, in fact I have 5 other engines I did the same day last August. 3 Dash 8's and 3 Dash 9's I replaced the tires on for the trip to San Diego last August.
It's not often that I can offer advice, I usually come to the Forum for advice. However, when it comes to traction tires on diesels I've found the prototype solution - if the unit is an MTH Premier, replace the wheelsets involved with solid wheels. I've also found that I could replace the wheelsets on my Lionel ALCo S-2. It would be very nice if the same option was available for steam...
Will MTH tires fit on Williams engines?
Laidoffsick. Have you ever considered storing your new tires in a jar filled with distilled water. This will postpone the dry rot effect until their put to use. If the air out there is that damaging, I'm sure that same damaging air is inside the plastic bags your tires are stored in. I would also apply a thin layer of mild oil, like baby oil, to an engine's tires when it's placed on the shelf. Wipe it on with a Q-tip so that none of the oil gets between the tire and the rim. The film of oil may also help prevent the flat spot from forming. The air out there is probably contributing to the rubber's memory, to the location where the weight of the engine was applied, and drying the rubber into that position. I do not believe the oil will cause the rubber to swell. I've cleaned up rubber tires with alcohol that were soaked with smoke oil. The stems of the MTH smoke fluid tubes sometime get bent over and crack open when the Styrofoam lid is pressed down on them (wish MTH would correct this problem). They worked fine when installed. I believe the tires may be made out of Neoprene like transmission O rings and seals.
Marty. Great advise on filing the track joints to help prevent tire damage.
At a buck a piece for new tires, I'm not sure any method is worth it. Course, LOS and many others have lots of engines, so the money could hit three figures I guess. The car guys use this stuff on weather stripping, but I have no idea if it has an application on traction tires.
The fine print. "Conditions and maintains weather seals around doors, windows, and trunk lids with an easy-to-use built-in foam applicator for simple and mess-free application. Prevents rubber from drying and cracking due to oxidation, extreme temperatures, and UV exposure. Maintains elasticity/flexibility. Restores dried weather seals to original condition. Reduces wind noise due to dry seals. Prevents seals from sticking in freezing temperatures with an anti-freeze agent. Solvent-free, water-based formula."
Replace a tire with a tire. Guys, these are your trains and you can do whatever you want. Keep in mind if you glue the tires on (bad move) you may be the guy who has to chip that crap off some day. A tire properly installed will last a very long time. Enjoy the day.
Marty
Marty Fitzhenry posted:I refuse to buy the cracked out tires as being recent unless you have some sort of crazy climate situation. I have never seen that in my life on recent tires.
I will say, the ones that Doug got from me were right from MTH within a couple of months, so they're as "factory fresh" as MTH sends them out.
Marty Fitzhenry posted:John, if I did not have my layout I would move to PA in a second.
Bring it along, you'd be a great neighbor with that layout! Of course, Alex would have to make you a new model house to match your new digs.
I've got a N&W y6a (2156 i believe) and once in roughly 18 months, it comes out at Greenberg's Toy & Train Show. The consist is roughly 87 two bay hoppers (approximately 1/2 of the cars being die cast) with real coal loads that I've made for them, an auxiliary water tender and caboose. I've learned that it is best to replace tires before I even highball it, because the rubber stretches on the wheel after sitting in the box for that long period of time and will come off pretty quickly. As far as the tires being dried out or cracked on MTH's , haven't experienced that, but Lionel's tires don't stack up with my earlier Lionel loco's. By the way, I have never used anything to extend the life of the rubber tires, remove & replace. Also, you may find that there are some brands that make vinyl, don't expect the locomotive to be a brute puller with the kind of load like I put on mine;you'll see a lot of wheel slip and be disappointed when your displaying to the public.
Steam Forever
John
Coordinator for the Raritan Valley Hi-Railers
N.J. Hi-Railers member
Hello John. Good to hear from you. I get to see many engines and have seen fat tires on some Lionel steam engines that will not let the drivers turn, because they hit the break shoes. This is not a knock on Legacy steam locomotives because I am a big fan and have many.
I've had a number of those too Marty. I had difficulty understanding how they get shipped that way. Doesn't anyone look at stuff like that anymore?
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