@Lou1985 your friend must be some sort of slack *** .....we’ve been waiting to see that stack since the last update.....what gives??...🙃
Pat
@harmonyards posted:@Lou1985 your friend must be some sort of slack *** .....we’ve been waiting to see that stack since the last update.....what gives??...🙃
Pat
Yeah guy works slow. Takes his time. Probably has more profitable things to do 
.
@Lou1985 posted:Yeah guy works slow. Takes his time. Probably has more profitable things to do
Nah, ...I heard he’s a slacker,....I’d fire him if I was you....probably sittin drinking coffee, trolling the forum....the loser...
Pat
@harmonyards posted:Nah, ...I heard he’s a slacker,....I’d fire him if I was you....probably sittin drinking coffee, trolling the forum....the loser...
Pat
Guy needs to get back to work.
Transplanted a lionchief board from a small switcher into a single motor RS3. Added a 9.6 volt battery to make this a deadrail loco. Results not as planned. It works but barely. Now to troubleshoot, bad motor, bad lionchief board, insufficient power.
After many months away, I have finally gotten back to my 2/3 finished, scratch-built Union Station. I installed lighting yesterday and ordered the Miller Engineering "Union Station" sign today. There is still much to do, but, I now have a bit of time to devote to the project again.
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I'm working on some coal and ore loads,and I will also be repairing a K Line PRR caboose that took a dive from the shelf layout.
@necrails posted:Transplanted a lionchief board from a small switcher into a single motor RS3. Added a 9.6 volt battery to make this a deadrail loco. Results not as planned. It works but barely. Now to troubleshoot, bad motor, bad lionchief board, insufficient power.
I don't own any Lionchief locos but don't they run off 18vac track power ? I would guess 9.6vdc will not get the job done. j
@JohnActon posted:I don't own any Lionchief locos but don't they run off 18vac track power ? I would guess 9.6vdc will not get the job done. j
They run on either AC or DC(not both together) but I don't know if 9.6 volts is enough.
LC will run on 9.6V DC, but the smoke and for LC+, the couplers will not function. I did a Camelback and started with a 9.6V battery pack. The result was it ran OK, but it didn't have a great top-end speed. That was not a problem, but the lack of smoke and electrocouplers was, so I put two battery packs in.
LC+ Camelback Upgrade to Battery Power
This is before I start the day, not too messy...yet
Making lights, many more to go
Printing Remote Holders
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Nothing major- I re-wired a Williams Shark in series over the weekend. I've done several Williams engines, this was the first one with the wiring soldered to the board. All the others must be newer and have plugs for the motor wiring. The newer one's have tru-blast horns too so that must be why the boards are different.
Bob
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Back in August we had a thread "What should be the relationship between a worm and a worm gear ? " As is common the original post, about gear lash and depth of tooth engagement, started to wander and ended up about ratios. It prompted me to dig out four Williams Samhongsa built locos a PRR L1s Mikado, PRR B6 0-6-0, N&W "J" and a Jersey Central 4-6-0 Camelback. Also built by Sam. a Weaver PRR M1a Mountain. I found some things which some may find interesting. All the Locos have basically the same gearbox but the final drive ratios were either 21:1 or 42:1. The difference between the two was that the 21:1 box uses a double helix worm and the 42:1 uses a single helix. The worm as well as the worm wheel with skewed teeth were the only differences between the two gearboxes. One thing I found ironic was that the two locos which one would consider mainline high speed passenger or fast freight locos, N&W J and PRR M1a had the 42:1 gearbox and the locos which would be considered plodders for freight and commuter passenger service had the 21:1 gearbox which would give them a much higher top speed. It is one of those things which make you scratch your head. One can imagine the guys in MD. and PA. on the phone requesting a "HIGH SPEED " gearbox in the J and the M1a and the guys in Korea listening through a translator hear " HIGH RATIO" I think the same problem exist when oval track racers talk to dragster guys. Well thankfully the two gearboxes are easily swapped. So I pulled the 42:1 boxes out of the J and the M1a and swapped them for the 21:1 boxes on the PRR B6 and L1s Mikado. So while off the locos I decided to open the clam-shells and take a took inside and found one more surprise. I had bought all five of these locos from different sellers over several years. However the worm wheels in the J and the L1s were the wrong worm wheel. The worm wheel from the 42:1 gearbox out of the N&W J should have been in the 21:1 out of the PRR L1s and the worm wheel from the L1s should have been in the gearbox from the N&W J. I had been very careful when disassembling to keep parts from the two locos on two separate tables while removing them from the loco pulling apart and cleaning. I used a red and green marker to mark all the parts before I made the photos. It was not till I was setting up the first photo that I noticed the problem with the worm wheels. The Skew angle on the teeth of the worm wheel was wrong for the worm in their respective gearbox. However it did not seem to affect performance in any meaningful way. They may have run louder than the locos which had the correct worm wheels but with the loud Mabuchi 550 motors who could tell. Never mind that the Samhongsa gearbox is no where near a precision device. When I got to swapping the boxes in the Weaver M1a Mountain and the Williams PRR B6 both locos had all the correct parts. Well, they did have that 550 Mabuchi. After test running all four locos involved in the swap I was happy with all but the L1s Mikado. Remember it was one of the locos which ended up with the 42:1 gearing and the Mabuchi 545 which I installed in place of the 550 just did not turn fast enough to achieve the 40smph I was hoping for. I had two likely candidates for motors a Maxon coreless and a Mabuchi. I was hoping to use the Maxon but could not install a flywheel on it but may at some point try again. I want to use a tach reader for cruise and I did not have a drill bit that matched the shaft diameter to drill a brass rod for a step-up spacer to mount the flywheel. I was able to make a spacer for the 385 Mabuchi shaft to allow mounting a MTH flywheel off a Pittman. It took four tries to make a spacer that is concentric but the flywheel is on and running true. it is much heavier than a typical flywheel for a 385 motor and will coast over three feet when cutting power at 12v The 385 Mabuchi I used is good for 12,500 rpm about 55smph at 12v and is faster than I actually wanted it has a static resistance of 2 ohms so stall current at 12v will be 6A ,just fine for most TMCC motor driver boards. If you look at the photos you will see that I mounted the 385 in a magnetic shield from a Mabuchi 550 motor I lined the shield with 1/8" thick foam tape so that the motor floats in the foam not touching any metal and I lined the firebox with more of this foam tape. When the body is on you cannot hear the motor but you can hear the gearbox. I had been planning on selling this loco but was so happy after installing the 385 that I decided to keep it and set about dressing it up with a few details. These Williams brass locos left the factory rather naked and I always hated the big gap between the rear truck and the frame and all the detail they left out. I almost forgot in my attempt to isolate the frame and boiler from any motor vibration I used thick wall silicone tubing between the flywheel and the gearbox which worked well at low to medium speeds but when running flat out the tubing would stretch in the middle and cause a low frequency vibration that the foam suspension could not filter out. I inserted a piece of 1/8" brass tube inside the tubing and the problem went away. So far I have about a third of the plumbing that I plan to install and nearing start to the right side of the loco. I just added the photos and I'm sorry if I got some out of order. I got tired of writing and did not give an explanation of everything though I think that most are self explanatory but I don't mind answering questions. j
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For Me, rebuilding a Lionel UP GP7 6-28567. Complete basket case. Started with a stripped chassis. Now I'm waiting on 3 screws to power it up.
At the PRND&L, we are forced to do most of our painting outside – which means when the weather is nice. Once we get to late fall and winter, it's time to letter the rolling stock waiting for finishing touches.
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For those who had read my screed on gearboxes and the mods to my Williams PRR L1s I have added photos of the process. j
@JohnActon posted:For those who had read my screed on gearboxes and the mods to my Williams PRR L1s I have added photos of the process. j
John, ....I like what I see!...love the added details!...great work!,......I do believe that’s the first I’ve seen of your work.....at some point in time, I’d like to see some of your diecast repowers you’ve done like that Hudson you mentioned that I think you said resides at your brother’s house???.....love to do some head to head comparisons on a level playing field, ......however, a Williams chassis just ain’t it...but you did do a great job taming the beast, and the external upgrades, I really like!...
BTW, have you heard from TedS lately?....I haven’t seen him reply lately.....some of us would like to know that at least he’s ok!...
Pat
@harmonyards posted:John, ....I like what I see!...love the added details!...great work!,......I do believe that’s the first I’ve seen of your work.....at some point in time, I’d like to see some of your diecast repowers you’ve done like that Hudson you mentioned that I think you said resides at your brother’s house???.....love to do some head to head comparisons on a level playing field, ......however, a Williams chassis just ain’t it...but you did do a great job taming the beast, and the external upgrades, I really like!...
BTW, have you heard from TedS lately?....I haven’t seen him reply lately.....some of us would like to know that at least he’s ok!...
Pat
Pat, you mention Ted I was thinking about him last night when I went back to read what had transpired on that first discussion on the 42:1 Samhongsa gearbox. Just looked and his last post to the forum was 9/28. Hay Ted, how you doing ?
I've already spent more time on that L1s than it is worth so I guess it's too late to sell it. When I finish the plumbing It may end up over at my brothers house. Funny I can't remember him ever buying a train and he has a pretty impressive collection. After a divorce in 85 I stored my layout in his basement and eventually we pulled it apart and built an around the wall layout. Seems like I go over there and end up repairing things rather than running trains. I bought a MTH UP Veranda loco on eBay last week that just arrived. It suffered some damage in shipping. I have to make pix and contact the seller. j
John,
Never ever thought about adding the sound deadening to the loco. Great idea!
Ron H
Well that Premier FEF I got a couple months ago is fully functional. It came to me with no worm shaft, motor mount, motor, flywheel, or wiring. I added all the missing parts, upgraded the motor to a ball bearing 9234 Pittman, and added a PS3 steam kit. I modified the sound file with the whistle from the just released Premier Big Boy. Came out pretty nice.
@Lou1985 posted:Well that Premier FEF I got a couple months ago is fully functional. It came to me with no worm shaft, motor mount, motor, flywheel, or wiring. I added all the missing parts, upgraded the motor to a ball bearing 9234 Pittman, and added a PS3 steam kit. I modified the sound file with the whistle from the just released Premier Big Boy. Came out pretty nice.
Love it!!!
George
@Ron H posted:John,
Never ever thought about adding the sound deadening to the loco. Great idea!
Ron H
Ron the most effective sound deadening change was getting rid of the 550 motor Though the foam tape certainly does not hurt. With that 42:1 gearbox you really don't need the torque of the larger motor the 385 is more than enough. There is a 395 Mabuchi that turns at 12k and though I don't need it they are cheap enough and easy to swap I may buy a couple just to give it a try. j
bought this second hand and got what i thought was a fairly good deal. It was so dirty that i had to remove the shell and wash it to remove the caked-on dirt/dust. after a bit of a service and cleaning it runs great
Since I just had a addition added for my trains and have moved everything out of storage I'm pulling each engine, cleaning and oiling it and then running them on the oval I have set up for testing.
Frank
Got this thing running. Came with no boards, minimal wiring, no motor, and no driveshaft. The only wiring in the locomotive were the 10 pin connectors on each end of the wireless drawbar. I ended up combining a spare PS2 3V harness from a Railking 2-8-0 with what was left of the Yellowstone harness. It was a bit of a PITA, and took awhile, but it works. I installed a ball bearing 9434 Pittman in the locomotive and a PS32 board in the tender. It runs well and is massive. It's larger than my Premier AC6 Cab Forward and has less than 1/4" clearance in several spots around my layout. So no more articulateds for me....
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Good job. No motor, etc.... to intimidating for me!!!
That feeling you get when you realize the PS2 5 volt board on your GG1 isn’t toast. Instead it was the switch that got inadvertently set to Pantograph instead of Track. Phew! 😄
All the Locos have basically the same gearbox but the final drive ratios were either 21:1 or 42:1. The difference between the two was that the 21:1 box uses a double helix worm and the 42:1 uses a single helix. j
Would it be possible to change out the worm in the Williams Challenger then? Is that why it's so slow and so loud?
anything available like this?
@Engineer-Joe posted:Would it be possible to change out the worm in the Williams Challenger then? Is that why it's so slow and so loud?
anything available like this?
Joe yes you can change the worm but the helical idle gear should be changed with it. However I had two locos with a mismatched worm wheel and they ran OK. A month or two back I posted a message that I had found a former engineer with Samhongsa in Korea who told me he could arrange for a short run of those gearbox parts but I would need to order 25-50 of them and likely mail one of the worms I wanted reproduced to him. I was hoping you would see the post but management at O gauge forum took my message down for what ever reason. Regardless I don't think I could get 25 orders in the first place so I did not pursue the issue. I don't know if the gear set you link to would work. The worm looks like a single helix to me. A double helix is the key to the 21:1 ratio. Joe you know what would be cool ? If you could install two 385 or even 395 motors in your loco. A motor for the front and another for the rear set of drivers on your Challenger. I think another problem you had was an eccentric "out of round" flywheel. Which is all too common on the Samhongsa locos. I have had to struggle with that flywheel problem. I turned to MTH flywheels with a spacer bushing between the flywheel and the motor shaft and their hard to make. I had to make one and it took me three tries to get an acceptable concentric one. Something I considered was a Mabuchi 385 motor from a diesel with a flywheel already on it. Just pull the worm off. That's a bit of fun also. It's a sunny day outside, think I'll go work on the Veranda. j
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My flywheel wasn't perfect. At the suggestion of a post here, I removed it and used a piece of tubing to run the engine without the flywheel. It still sounded horrible at higher speeds. It only sounds good below 20MPH. So I abandoned the engine. It sits on a shelf now without a control board inside. I put that inside an Allegheny that had a blown board set.
Our grandson said it was his favorite engine and he always wanted to see it run. He likes the grey Challengers from UP. I have one in one gauge and he always wants to run it. All this prompts me to get it running again someday. I should buy a MTH version but I decided no more!
I have several engines on the shelf waiting for work and attention. I have more engines than I can run in a decent amount of sessions.
Thank you again and I hope someday to get a worm set to fix it!!!
I wonder if NWSL had any fixes?
If it were possible, I'd buy the balance of the gear to make the order move forward. I don't know how much that would cost?
@Engineer-Joe posted:My flywheel wasn't perfect. At the suggestion of a post here, I removed it and used a piece of tubing to run the engine without the flywheel. It still sounded horrible at higher speeds. It only sounds good below 20MPH. So I abandoned the engine. It sits on a shelf now without a control board inside. I put that inside an Allegheny that had a blown board set.
Our grandson said it was his favorite engine and he always wanted to see it run. He likes the grey Challengers from UP. I have one in one gauge and he always wants to run it. All this prompts me to get it running again someday. I should buy a MTH version but I decided no more!
I have several engines on the shelf waiting for work and attention. I have more engines than I can run in a decent amount of sessions.
Thank you again and I hope someday to get a worm set to fix it!!!
I wonder if NWSL had any fixes?
One of these days Joe we’re gonna cure that thing’s ailments and make a fine model out of it....I know we tried the motor route, and failed, so at some point we need to get into those gear boxes,.....does that Williams have captured axles, or can the geared axle sets drop out the bottom?......to be sure there’s got to be some NWSL gear boxes somewheres!.....even if I’ve got to machine the one end of one the worms for a coupler system between the two,......we just need a way to tame the beast,.....
Pat
I don't know much about the guts of it. I glanced but didn't know what to do. Now thinking about it, it would need two gear boxes reworked?
Having dual motors would be great.
@Engineer-Joe posted:I don't know much about the guts of it. I glanced but didn't know what to do. Now thinking about it, it would need two gear boxes reworked?
Having dual motors would be great.
That’s not happening Joe, ....but when we can get some real gear ratios, then you can put in a monster motor that’ll do the deed,....and get away from the 10,000 RPM + Cessna motor in there now,....that model needs to be down around 18-20 to 1, and then she’ll play nicely with your grandson,....I’m still curious if that thing has captured axles, or if it’s got bearings and caps ..one tell-tale if it has a spring loaded suspension system, ie; the drivers are free to float about, ....then this becomes a much easier task sans finding the parts,.....drop out axle sets means we can work on setting up the gearboxes while not having to handle the chassis so much,...
Pat
I'll go look again!
It appears each axle is held in by the bottom cover?
it looks like each axle bearing has a flat surface that rides on that cover? I have to look closer to see if all that's correct.
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@Engineer-Joe posted:I'll go look again!
I’ll reply to this one so I’m not dragging pictures all up and down the thread,....that’s got a bottom plate, that just made the job a whole lot easier,.....those geared axle sets will come out the bottom, and can be serviced on the bench,.....all we need now is a couple gear boxes in a much more reasonable ratio,.....even if they’re singles, no worries, ....to be sure I can figure out how to machine a stub shaft out the end of one of them, then we’ll borrow parts from the RC guys, they have 4mm telescoping universal joint drive shafts in a dizzying array of lengths, ......this is a doable project, ....just got to find gear boxes,......compounds would be best, so you don’t see the drive shaft sitting just above chassis height....
I thought after the motor tobago you’d parked that thing, .....I’m glad you’ve revived it,....I don’t like quitting,....😉
Pat
I looked anyways and here's one cover off for now.
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@Engineer-Joe posted:I looked anyways and here's one cover off for now.
Yep, ...those axle sets will drop out the bottom once the gear box bottom covers are removed,....I wouldn’t take a thing apart until you source a pair of gear boxes, ....that’s going g to be the hardest part,.....NWSL would have been the answer, buuuuut,.....so they’ll have to be scrounge sourced,.....the good thing about drop out axle sets like I mentioned, now we’ll have way less a chance disturbing delicate parts on those chassis halves since all we need to do is surgically get in there and remove just those two geared axles.....and it’s hard to exactly tell, but it even looks like we wouldn’t disturb any linkage and rods, as the eccentrics aren’t on the geared sets as well,.....I like surgical strikes,....pinpoint work, get out before damage can occur ,.....😉
Pat
Here’s what I’m currently working on
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