Latest Version Bachmann 4-8-4 and Contact Problems

Doug Gosha Aug 18, 2017

  1. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    I recently bought a latest version of the venerable 4-8-4 as they were on sale. There have been improvements such as a new motor/drive train, blackened drivers (although I believe that to be a debatable improvement), slightly finer details on the boiler/tender body, etc.

    I have always loved the looks of these locos in spite of the many derogatory comments about them. They are just so HUGE and scream, "I am a giant, powerful railroad locomotive!"

    However, when I put it on the track, it was decidedly herky-jerky. Smooth when it did run but completely unsatisfactory. I noticed there was complete reliance on mere metal-to-metal contact between the pilot truck frame and loco frame and trailing truck frame and loco frame to transfer current.

    I added some relatively mild springs between the loco frame and truck frames and VIOLA! It runs smoothly AND consistently now.

    Doug
     
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  2. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    Glad you found success Doug. It's frustrating that these problems persist in our era. I cringe when I see Bachmann train sets being sold at top dollar in stores that contain locomotives designed 40 Years ago that will most certainly sputter and spark their way down the track. I wonder how many potential model railroaders have lost interest in N as a result of buying this stuff?

    Just a note that I really enjoyed seeing your website link! Great stuff. I remember the 1st Gen Atlas trains well, first seeing them as a kid in the late '60s at Schickler's Tobacco and Hobby Shop in Elgin, IL. (Can you imagine such a business today?) I bought a few of those Atlas kit cars and still run them today. My first set was from Arnold Rapido, a birthday gift in '68.
     
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  3. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    Thanks for the kind words. I agree about the poor design and/or execution thereof regarding N scale trains and beginners. Those are the very users who need to have their locomotives run reliably and some makers don't seem to care.

    Anyway, I should have been a bit clearer in what spring type I used and where I put them. I used coil springs a little less than 1/8" diameter and I put them around the screws between the loco frame and truck frames. The springs are mild enough that they don't affect tractive effort.

    Doug
     
  4. acptulsa

    acptulsa TrainBoard Member

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    Good job, and thanks for publicizing the tip!

    Sometimes you have to do a little engineering before you can kick back and just be an engineer.
     
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  5. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    Thanks and please don't get me wrong. I love working on locomotives but one shouldn't really have to work on a brand new one to get it to run well.

    Doug
     
  6. acptulsa

    acptulsa TrainBoard Member

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    Perhaps not. But some of us resigned ourselves to doing so forty years ago, when there were fewer alternatives.

    Yeah, Bachmann. On the plus side, no one produces a greater variety of stuff. On the minus side, no one produces a greater variety of quality.

    Ya pays Bachmann yer money and ya takes yer chances.
     
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  7. brokemoto

    brokemoto TrainBoard Member

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    It ain't just the Bachpersonn steam that has required customer-supplied quality control. MP, TRIX and RR also required it. As
    acptulsa correctly indicates, many of us understood long past that if we wanted decently running steam, we had to take what was out there and make improvements.

    One of the things that you must do, and as Original Posted did, was apply Miranda's Maxim as explained by ke: "The poor performance of many N scale steam locomotives is almost always directly attributable to poor electrical contact". Some of the manufacturers of North American prototypes have taken a lesson from the Asian manufacturers and attempted to make the idler wheels live. The construction methods that they have used have failed, as the did for the Asian prototypes. As manufactured, those live idler trucks simply do not maintain contact that is consistent. Original Poster made the contact in his consistent.

    In many cases, once you make the necessary improvements, you have a real winner. This goes double for the MP steam. MRC has attempted to dodge the all wheels live tender by making the pilots live. Sadly for MRC, this fails. As it did with the original MPs, the all wheels live B-mann tender (or the Kato, for that matter) makes a real winner out of one of these things. In fact, with an all wheels live tender, some of the models will outpull the prototype.

    B-mann has to know that its steam needs an all wheels live tender. I suspect that it has certain locomotives for sale strictly as train-set power for a simple roundy-round where the train is run at speeds that exceed the protoype, anyhow. If you want to operate these train set locomotives on a pike, you must adapt them to run under those conditions. Once B-mann puts DCC in everything that it sells, it will have to go to the all wheels live tender. (Although it is interesting to note that B-mann sells a "DCC ready" version of its ten-wheeler in HO. There is a DC version of the B-mann ten wheeler in N, but it is available only in a set. It also lacks some of the detail that the DCC version has.)
     
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  8. Cajonpassfan

    Cajonpassfan TrainBoard Supporter

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    My new MRC Mogul has all wheel tender pickup and it's a sweet runner. It plows through places where much bigger locos stall, like not yet wired #10 frogs. I'm very impressed with it.
    Otto
     
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  9. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    Actually, the white box version has superior pickup compared to the latest version but screwing machine screws, or actually too-short screws, into plastic was a definite drawback in them, along with sticking metal axles into hollow, plastic axle/gear assemblies.

    That version, however, has flat springy pieces of phosphor bronze or berylium copper bearing against the truck frames when installed and provide reliable contact. They took a step backward with the latest version.

    It seems it was fairly common back then for hobby shops to be combined with another business like a tobacco shop or, I remember some bicycle and hobby shops too. There was one in Mason City, Iowa - Ralph's Bicycle and Hobby Shop.

    Doug
     
  10. Hardcoaler

    Hardcoaler TrainBoard Member

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    Doug, I forgot about the bicycle and hobby shop businesses. We had one on our Main Street and the owner had all sorts of things inside, including a big selection of balsa and paper aircraft model kits. He even stocked lengths of fuse, which we'd use to launch our Estes model rockets instead of the prescribed electrical method. :eek:
     
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  11. Doug Gosha

    Doug Gosha TrainBoard Member

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    Haha, we did the same thing and a lot of times, the fuse would appear to go out and not ignite the solid "engine" but we were afraid to walk up to the rocket to check it out.

    We did it because the nichrome wire was relatively expensive.

    Doug
     
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