Can I use Weaver 3 rail freight trucks under other manufacturers rolling stock and do the Weaver trucks allow the cars ride lower than Lionel and K-line trucks?
Joe
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While you can put Weaver trucks on other cars, the ride height will be higher than it should be because the three-rail coupler bar adds 1/8" to the ride height. Despite the overly thick side frames, the Atlas trucks have the best ride height and flexibility when it comes to mounting styles for three-rail trucks.
Thanks Matt. I was thinking because they didn't have the raised bolster it would lower the ride height.
Joe
Weaver 3-Rail die-cast freight trucks are designed so that the lobster claw coupler shank is also the "spacer" between the under frame center bearing and the truck bolster. I used Weaver trucks on all of my former 2-Rail Intermountain, Red Caboose, and some brass freight cars, by putting shim washers between the Weaver truck and the under frame center bearing. This tends to lower the car a bit.
However, I have up-graded ALL my freight rolling stock to Kadee body mount couplers, so lowering the carboy is much more important.
I agree with Matt, Atlas O's trucks are about the best ones to use for conversions in regards to overall flexibility.
Their trucks come with an adapter that works pretty well with MTH. With Lionel's new Standard O stuff you don't really need an adapter at all, you can actually use Lionel's mounting screw or a slightly longer one to work.
More modern Lionel trucks do not have the high-bolster; this may not apply to modern
Lionel low-end rolling stock. Most brands' modern freight trucks for scale rolling stock are
properly (or close-to-properly) bolstered.
The Weaver trucks will lower a car that had the postwar style trucks. One example would be the K-line ore cars. K-line used the old Atlas dies and therefore the car already has a bolster built into the underframe. When K-line put postwar style trucks on these, the cars look goofy - way too high. They look a lot better with the Weaver trucks. The new Atlas or current Lionel scale trucks will lower them even more, but are much more expensive.
John
I was thinking about the Lionel and K-line plastic trucks not the trucks on late model scale like equipment.
Weaver trucks are my favorite for many of my freight car projects. I've put them on Kline cars, MTH, and many 2 to 3 rail conversions. Atlas works good too but are more expensive and harder to find.
Weaver trucks and Kadee couplers on all my rolling stock
