Date
1 - 11 of 11
Central Valley 5' Arch Bar trucks.
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Denny Anspach <danspach@...>
I unearthed my cache of these handsome trucks and tested their rollability on the Reboxx Rolltester as follows:
(0-5 Not Acceptable. 6-10 Poor. Good/Acceptable 11-15. Very Good 16-20. Superior 21 and up). OEM wheels: 6/7/6: Borderline unacceptable/poor. Reboxx 1.025" wheels: 10/11/10: just barely above the poor, but in the /goodacceptable range. Reboxx 1.030" wheels: 9/9/10: Almost acceptable, but still poor. Minimal sideplay, however. Lubrication caused no improvement in rollability. The appearance of these trucks with their new narrow wheels was improved to an exponential degree. With their projecting exposed narrow wheels , these are the trucks I will use on Al Westerfield' s fine new Summers Ore cars until something better comes along. Now, if I can only adapt the Kadee brake gear to fit these 5' trucks.... BTW, if one was to stock up on only one length of Reboxx wheels, 1.025" would seem to a worthy bet, with some 1.020" and 1.015" axle sets on the side. These (1.025") are the consistent best for the popular Accurail AAR trucks (maximum rollability combined with minimum axle sideplay. Ditto with Branchline trucks). Brian Leppart's fine Tahoe trucks are sized to best use the the Reboxx or Intermountain nominal 1.015" axle lengths (but the current new IM production of 1.007" axle sets introduce excessive axle sideplay). Denny Denny S. Anspach MD Sacramento
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Denny
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The problem with the "roll tester" is that it can't measure how the trucks perform with a car on them. On my workbench I have an incline and just let the car roll as far as it can freely -- typically 5 to 7 feet for a good free roller, 10 feet for an exceptional roller, and lesser distances mean that it needs work. What did you lube them with? Tim O'Connor
I unearthed my cache of these handsome trucks and tested their
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Denny Anspach <danspach@...>
Tim O' C. writes-
The problem with the "roll tester" is that it can't measureI am certain that Tim's solution works just fine, but it is more cumbersome IMHO (I used the same method before purchasing the Rolltester) . In my experience, the rolltester results are pretty reproducible and track well enough to real operations, and the tester itself is pretty compact. On occasion I also test trucks with attached lead weight. I am surprised that only on occasion will the presence or absence of weight make any significant difference. I use LaBelle 108 as lubricant. Denny
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Gene Green <bierglaeser@...>
Tim,
What sort of grade is your inclined track? I have about 18 feet of track on an incline of approximately 1 1/2%. If I let a car go on that grade it is going fast enough to knock the coupler off for sure and maybe do even more damage. Of course, having the track end at a solid wall may contribute to the damage. My point really is that a 1 1/2% grade is way too steep for any meanful test unless there was a really long - 100 feet? - level track for the car to coast to a stop. Another party to this discussion made the point that testing the truck alone and testing trucks with a car might yield different results. Gene Green
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Anthony Thompson <thompson@...>
Gene Green wrote:
Another party to this discussion made the point that testing the truck alone and testing trucks with a car might yield different results.Sure, and different cars with a specific truck might yield different results; but what we are evaluating is truck vs. truck (or more usually, wheelset vs. wheelset in a particular sideframe. Why not directly compare them? Seems sensible to me. Tony Thompson Editor, Signature Press, Berkeley, CA 2906 Forest Ave., Berkeley, CA 94705 www.signaturepress.com (510) 540-6538; fax, (510) 540-1937; e-mail, thompson@... Publishers of books on railroad history
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Gene Green <bierglaeser@...>
--- In STMFC@..., Anthony Thompson <thompson@...> wrote:
<snip> Why not directly compare them? Seems sensible to me.Tony, You are probably right. There are no absolute standards for rollability, anyway. It is all relative. I just need to rig up some test method that will work for me and which will indicate which truck/wheelset combinations are better and which are worse. The Reboxx test gizmo is relatively high priced for me and occupies a lot of real estate that I don't really have. Gene Green
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Don Burn
Years ago Ed Ravenscroft (sp?) had an article in Model Railroader (I think 61) on his hump yard. He had a simple tilt track he had made that would test trucks based on the grade. His was specific but I suspect you could make one with spacers to see try various grades.
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Don Burn
----- Original Message -----
From: "Gene Green" <bierglaeser@...> To: <STMFC@...> Sent: Tuesday, January 13, 2009 5:46 PM Subject: [STMFC] Re: Central Valley 5' Arch Bar trucks. --- In STMFC@..., Anthony Thompson <thompson@...> wrote: <snip> Why not directly compare them? Seems sensible to me.Tony, You are probably right. There are no absolute standards for rollability, anyway. It is all relative. I just need to rig up some test method that will work for me and which will indicate which truck/wheelset combinations are better and which are worse. The Reboxx test gizmo is relatively high priced for me and occupies a lot of real estate that I don't really have. Gene Green __________ Information from ESET NOD32 Antivirus, version of virus signature database 3762 (20090113) __________ The message was checked by ESET NOD32 Antivirus. http://www.eset.com
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Spen Kellogg <spenkellogg@...>
Gene Green wrote:
I can't speak for Tim, but I use both the roll tester and an inclined track for my cars. As Denny Anspach has said, the roll tester is a very good indicator for determining how trucks roll. His criteria is similar to my experience. One additional comment, cleaning the track with isopropyl alcohol can have a positive effect on how a truck rolls. Once I have trucks that I consider "tuned," i apply the trucks to a properly weighted car and put it on my incline. My test track is six feet long (on a plank) with a short incline about one inch high at one end so that about five feet of track is flat. The other end has a piece of foam rubber to act as a stop (no damaged couplers yet). I am satisfied if the car reaches the end, but a good rolling car will rebound about a foot or so. A lightly weighted car does not perform as well. When not in use, my incline sits in a corner taking up very little room. Spen Kellogg
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Robert <riverob@...>
Like a Stimp Meter:
http://www.leaderboard.com/GLOSSARY_STIMPMETER Rob Simpson --- In STMFC@..., Spen Kellogg <spenkellogg@...> wrote: I can't speak for Tim, but I use both the roll tester and aninclined track for my cars. As Denny Anspach has said, the roll tester is a very good indicator for determining how trucks roll. His criteria is similar to my experience. One additional comment, cleaning the track with isopropyl alcohol can have a positive effect on how a truck rolls. Once I have trucks that I consider "tuned," i apply the trucks to a properly weighted car and put it on my incline. My test track is six feet long (on a plank) with a short incline about one inch high at one end so that about five feet of track is flat. The other end has a piece of foam rubber to act as a stop (no damaged couplers yet). I am satisfied if the car reaches the end, but a good rolling car will rebound about a foot or so. A lightly weighted car does not perform as well. When not in use, my incline sits in a corner taking up very little room.
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Gene Green <bierglaeser@...>
--- In STMFC@..., Spen Kellogg <spenkellogg@...> wrote:
<snip> One additional comment, cleaning the track withSpen Kellogg Spen, I, too, use alcohol to clean track but I wasn't aware that cleaning the track improved the rolling qualities of freight car trucks. That's a nice bonus. My son uses those little cards (surely they have a name)that are used to clean credit card reading machines. There's nothing to spill, he says. Gene Green
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Gene
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The track is laid on aspen "craft wood" along the back of my work bench. One end is not nailed down at the end, so I can shim it upwards 1/2" to 3/4" easily to make a grade about 3 feet in length and then the car rolls on the level after that. There is no point in a constant gradient -- I only want to see how far each car rolls freely relative to other cars. I use this same track for bench testing locos and DCC programming. Tim O'Connor
Tim,
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