About 1 month ago I bought 4 of the Bachman Amfleet cars to be pulled by my Atlas Amtrak Dash8 in "pepsi can" scheme. The tran consist is 4 amfleet coaches, 2 MHC & 1 roadrailer. The problem is this; the wheels on the Amfleet cars seam to not roll well causing a drag & a strain on the engine causing the train to stop as the engine sits there & spins its wheels.If any one has these same cars have you had this problem? Im not sure how to fix it because of how the wheels fit into the trucks. I like how Bachman has reworked the cars but they dont roll well. I was afraid to buy these bacuase, well...they are Bachman! But I really wanted to build this train, & at $22.00 per car I would like to get them to roll.....not drag. Ideas please. Thx in advance.
I know that they have been an issue in the past, and I don't have any yet. Most of it appears to be the wipers used to light the cars. There are fixes out there that include removing the wiper and a couple other tweaks.
The only problem is that if he needs Amfleet I cars, Bachman is the only way to go (The Kato cars are Amfleet II). I took the electrical pickups off and they rolled way better. Two engines can pull 12 cars. If you want the lighting, that is not a great solution... but I tint my windows so I didn't care, plus I think they look toyish when lit up. Think there are some solutions that will improve the rolling SLIGHTLY and allow you to keep the cars lighted. I think if you do Amfleet search on here, you will find it (I know the "New Bachmann Amfleet Cars" thread has some info, see post 25 specifically). Chris
Simple: Remove the wipers. If you prefer that the cars stay lit, then remove one wiper from one truck and make sure the opposite wiper is removed in the other truck, so that the remaining two wipers can still get power from each rail. You'll still have some drag, but at least you've improved it by 50%.
These are nice looking coaches but, the design of the trucks makes them not easy rolling (no needle point axles we're all accustomed to!). I've heard the Kato trucks are only slightly better. Like MetroRedLine, I, at first, removed the lighting contacts from one truck on each of my cars which improved things marginally. Not really liking the lighting, I removed the contacts from all the trucks. Then I snapped the axle sets out of the truck and made sure the areas where the axles turned were free of any molding flash, applied a little MT "Greas'em" (powdered graphite) and re-assembled them. Operation was markedly better, though not perfect. Since beisdes four coaches I normally tow/push a bashed "cabbage" (ex Life Like F40), I usually run two P-42's on my 3.5% grades.
No. The Kato trucks use their proprietary snaps to secure them to the body. On top of it, the Kato trucks are not prototypical accurate to the Bachmann Amfleet I's. Probably the biggest problem is that Kato will not sell you their Amfleet trucks a la carte for at least two years. While they are listed on the site, Kato will not sell them to you unless you send in an entire Kato Amfleet II to have the trucks replaced to prevent people from retrofitting the Kato trucks onto the Bachmann cars. This is what I along with a few others I know have been told by Kato when we tried to do the very same thing.
Some ideas from a thread on Railwire may help... http://therailwire.net/forum/index.php/topic,23899.msg233085.html#msg233085
The Atlas Amtrak dash 8 is a poor puller to start with, I'm guessing due to lighter weight because of it's smaller tank as compared to it's freight brothers. Coating one wheel with BFS helps greatly with tractive effort. Adjusting the pickups on the cars will also help.
Pre BFS would slip with 4 cars, but three cars was standard weekday load for this train, with 4 or 5 on the weekends, so it worked out. Post BFS, no slip with 5 Amtubes, slips with 6, but 5 + MHC or 3 roadrailers OK. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vvffd8nT1o8 yes, I know I typo'ed B 39 instead of B 32
Thank you all for your comments on this issue. I figured I was not the only one with this problem. river eagle, I will try your suggestion first. Incadently, I put only 1 of my Kato Gen P42 on the point of my consist & it pulled it with no hesitation...it is a Kato!! I really like my Dash 8 & it would have been nice to get that to pull my new consist. I will try the comments in this post. If im still not happy I will more than likely retire my Dash 8 & get a Kato Gen P42...just like in real life I guess.
get a couple of buddies to go in with you and split the cost for a jar of Bull Frog Snot, one will do all the locos in Colorado, and apply to one wheel of the front axle on the rear truck. It really works!
river_eagle It appears you have replaced the swiveling Bachmann couplers with a fixed, body mount coupler. What coupler did you use and what's your minimum radius? Charlie
I think it was a 2004, but it was a while ago, the tightest radius I have is around 15" lower diaphram tab has to be trimmed to clear screw.
either method works equally well, and I only did the end cars, as they run as a set and the rapidos work well for these cars both in function and coupler distance. the second method if applied to all cars would give closer coupling distance than the body mount method.
I've done the above method for modifying the Bachmann coupler arm to screw in a MTL coupler. My main problem is drilling the hole in the above step. How do you get it centered properly? ALL my attempts, no matter how careful (I use a pin vise to drill the hole), always end up with the hole too far off towards the edge. The result is a screw that is partially exposed to the side. I need to use CA to keep the coupler from falling off. Please tell me your secrets!
