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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 25, 2013 11:24:10 GMT -5
Are we gonna see any sleeper cars with just the upper and lower berths. Regular sized windows below and smaller windows in the upper berth. The interior of these cars are just berths on both sides with curtains that close off each one. There was usually a lavatory/change room at both ends and in some cases a closet or cabinet to put luggage like and overnight bag or something of that nature in since there was generally no room in the upper berths for such things. Any change we will see some of these?
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 24, 2013 20:14:11 GMT -5
Thanks for the suggestion Rob, but I'm very unsure about trying to take one of these little grabbers apart. I did that to one of my SD 75's and ended up with such a mess, I had to send it away to have it put back together again. I don't suppose these can be done without taking it apart?
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 24, 2013 12:22:11 GMT -5
MIKADO? Isn't that a Japanese opera?
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 24, 2013 12:20:19 GMT -5
Rob. These new additions, will they be available for liveries already produced?
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 24, 2013 12:19:01 GMT -5
Hi Rob.
I want to try one more thing before sending this engine back to you. I'm going to try it with a different power pack. It probably won't make a bit of difference, but I want to exhaust all possibilities before sending it back. I also want to see if the fuel tank is the cause of the scraping. I'll let you know what I find out.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 23, 2013 12:52:14 GMT -5
I'm not sure if I have a problem here or not but I recently purchased 3 different GP-38's from my dealer. This was over a period of 4 months. The first two have run flawlessly since I put them to the rails. However the newest addition is not performing like the other two. I got this last one just about a month ago and I had not even taken it out of the package yet as I wanted to try it out on my layout at a recent local train show. Long story short, when I installed it on my main line at the show, and turned the power on, it ran very, very slowly. Far slower, almost 2/3rds less the speed of the other two fresh out of their boxes. I figured that it just needed some running time to break it in being new and all, but the longer I ran it, it just seemed to maintain the same speed. I cleaned my track, put both the other 38's on spaced about a foot apart and let them run. The slower one being in the rear, was literally left in the dust by the first two. In fact, the other two did the full layout and caught up to the third one before it had a chance to get completely around the loop. This is very distressing. I took the slow one off, and let the other two go and they ran and ran and ran with no problems at all. I added 20 cars of mixed weight to each of the other two 38's on separate lines and they pulled their loads without even breaking a sweat. As for my newest addition, I could only pull 6 cars before it would just sit and struggle. I don't know what's wrong with it. Is it possible the chassis it put together a little too tightly and is restricting the mechanism from functioning? Is it a power pickup problem, I can't be debris of any kind or the other two would have problems which they don't. I wanted to use this 38 exclusively to pull the 8 heavyweights passenger cars, but it simply won't do it. Not even on a flat surface. The max it will pull of them is 2 and then it struggles to do that. I've also noticed that this particular 38 bottoms out on one of my turnouts which the others do not. Everything looks OK truck wise, but for some reason it scraps the bottom of the trucks just enough to cause a slight stall. Has anyone got any ideas on what I can do to solve these problems?
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 18, 2013 20:35:14 GMT -5
I just want to say that Don Fedjur is the best in the business as far as repair of Z Scale engines is concerned. I have sent him my whole fleet of 16 engines over the course of the last couple of years although not all at once, and he has done amazing work on them. He does excellent work not only on AZL, but also MTL and probably others too. The guy is amazing. When he no longer does this, we will all be screwed unless someone with his capabilities and expertise emerges somewhere along the line. Kuddos to Don.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 18, 2013 20:29:25 GMT -5
I for one like like to see traction tires that one can buy separately to install on AZL trucks where the pads have worn or fallen off. It would be a lot easier and cheaper to then having to buy the entire truck assembly.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 18, 2013 20:27:33 GMT -5
wrzjeff:
The best way I found to eliminate drooping couplers on these units, is to replace the coupler that is attached to the truck and install the snow plow with the coupler already attached. It works for me and I have 5 of the grabbers. I installed the plow front and back. I have also changed out two of engines to take MTL couplers front and back. These work too.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 14, 2013 10:01:32 GMT -5
Rob: If only I had the technical abilities I would take you up on that. Howver, I do not. However for the coupler pockets you have now, they would be far too big for the idea I have. I was thinking in terms of the pockets being no thicker then maybe a millimeter or two. Just enough to capture that drawbar which would also be of the same thickness. I was thinking in terms of the thickness of a surgeons scalpal but with squar edges. On the pocket itself, outside of the rounded portion there could be two angled ridges left and right that would guide the bar into the pocket no matter what position it happened to be in. The locking pin could even be made spring loaded so that it would drop into place as soon as the bar made contact with the pocket. Or not, it doesn't matter.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 14, 2013 9:48:09 GMT -5
As a post script to this thread, I have asked a friend of mine who happens to be an engineering professor at a local technical institute to examine my problem with a view to coming up with some kind of pigtailed clip to fit securly over these couplers on the autoracks. The idea being to give the security I need to grade pulling and yet be easy enough to slide on and off for coupling and uncoupling. Yes I know it's not prototypical and it may not look all that graet either, but to get the results I want, I have to result to extrodinary measures. I can see no other alternative short of AZL doing more reserch and coming up with a stronger and more functional coupler. Is that possible? That remains to be seen.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 14, 2013 9:43:30 GMT -5
mrja:
I think if reread my info, the points you are confused about will come to light, however, in the interests of time let me give a brief summary and I'm going to refer only to the auto racks only. First, I have no knowledge of AZL's first couplers, so I have no frame of refernece on that point. My first experience with auto latch couplers was with the first two sets of autoracks that I purchased over two years ago. These 8 cars are all easy enough to couple as designed by using very little effort either by hand or by power. And they stay coupled on flat surfaces and curves with no problems. However, I was never able to pull all 8 of these cars up a 2% grade for more then 2 feet max, before they came apart. Too much weight for the couplers to hold so they separated. As for uncoupling, yes it true you have to lift one car up to uncouple it from the next. Second, as for the newer generation of autoracks, I also have 8 and these are the cars that constantly give me difficulties. As I've stated above, on flat surfaces and on curves, they do not stay coupled to each other. If I intersperse my older auto racks amoung the new ones, this problem is reduced significantly but there is still separation. Now to coupler the new autoracks together, I should be able to do the same with them as with the older racks. By holding one stationary, I should be able to couple another rack to the first one with just my fingers and using very little effort to do so. This doesn't happen. I can push and push and push exerting more and more pressure all the time but still these autolatch couplers on the newer racks, will not coupler. Even banging them together with enough force to break them doesn't work. So I have to lift one end and slide that coupler into the other. Three, separation or uncoupling is as easy as just pulling the cars apart with almost no effort at all. There is no resistance as with the older autoracks. and on grades, well forget trying to haul 8 of these new rack up a 2% grade. I'd be very lucky if I could get 2 to 3 of them started up the grade before the rest separated. And in this case, interspersing my older racks with the new ones, has limited results. I still can't pull all 16 racks up that grade. Four, as I stated above, after examining these couplers from both track level and directly above I have determined that the auto latch couplers on the newer auto racks, and indeed on the tankers and hoppers, appear to be too rigid The knuckles do not offer any sideway motion even very slight to allow another coupler to slide into it. Just comparing the couplers on the old and new racks, the couplers on the older racks appear to have more flexibility. and can be observed by manipulating both with just your fingers. This was supposed to be a brief summary, but it isn't turning out that way. Suffice to say, that at least on the tankers and hoppers, I am in the process of changing out AZL couplers and trucks with the Bowers Bucklers. You say you have no better luck with them then MTL I on the other hand, have and am having much better success with keeping tankers and hoppers coupled with themselves and other cars. Indeed, even using MTL couplers gives me a higher success rate of staying coupled then these Auto Latch couplers do. My Intermountain cars will also be changed to the Bowser's. I think the one big thing to remember in all of what I have explained above, regardless of how any of these cars couple, is the inherant weakness in these couplers. Oh it is true you might be able to pull up to 50 cars on a straight flat surface at a constant speed, but there is absolutely no way those same 50 cars can be pulled up a 2% grade without constant separation from anywhere in the consist. It just can't be done. It matter little which couplers you use and how you build your consist. Even with the heavy cars in the front and light one's in the rear, the strain of all that weight is far too much for any of these couplers to handle. AZL, MTL, IM yes and even FT, they will all separate because there is just not enough strength built into these couplers. I confess that I don't have an answer to this problem except to run shorter trains. But the 2% grade over 18 ft, is the entire focal point of my layout and running a 40+ consist of this grade from top to bottom with no separation, would have WOWED anyone who saw it happen. Obviously coming down isn't a problem. As for changing out the couplers on the autoracks is concerned, yes you are right. I'm sort of screwed there. However, I have fired off a letter to Bowser explaining my dilema and asking them if they might make a longer shank coupler in the future. I have yet to hear back from them.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 13, 2013 9:45:59 GMT -5
Hi Rob. I have examined these couplers from tack level and from looking straight down and they may be the same design or batch as on my older auto racks, but the just do not work the same. I don't know what the problem is except that perhaps they are too rigid or too tightly made. I can very easily separate two newer autoracks with very little effort using just my fingers yet I can't couple those same two racks my gently pushing them together. Yet I can couple my older racks with gentle pressure and it takes slightly more effort to separate them with my fingers. Looking at them from above, comparing the two, the couplers on the older auto racks seem to have more give or flexibility to allow for ease of coupling. The couplers on the newer generation of auto racks don't appear to have this flexibility thus making it impossible for one coupler to join with another. I don't know any other way to explain it. You guys will have to tray this yourselves and see what you come up with. As for the tankers and hoppers, I am going to swap out the coupler/trucks with Full Throttles and run with them. I've done that now with a few cars, and they seem wot work infinitely better. So this is were I'm at right now.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 11, 2013 21:00:05 GMT -5
For the drawbars, what if you made the drawbars in such a way that they could be connected and disconnected any time you wanted with just the touch of a disguised pin? The drawbar could be fixed to one car and the other end could be rounded with a hole in it. Then it could slip into a pocket on the next car, and a pin diguised as some piece of equipment on the car, could be slid into the hole in the bar just far enough to keep it in place. The pocket would be just deep enough to contain the outer most part of the rounded bar while still giving enough swing right and left on turns so as not to bind and throw the trailing car off the track, You could even disguise part of the draw bar to look like a regular knuckle coupler only it would just be the knuckle part visible and would not function.
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Post by boxcarwilly on Apr 11, 2013 20:51:18 GMT -5
I sure hope they perform better them MTL's SD 40-2'. Just make sure when you produce these units, the plows on the front and back don't extend too far down so they catch the frogs on turnouts or joints in tracks. I had to file back the plows on all my MTL SD 40's so that they wouldn't catch on anything. Now they operate reasonably well.
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