Derailing? Check those wheels.

hello guys and gals.......

I have a set of Amtrak aluminum passenger cars and 2 cars out of 8 had "out of round wheel" sets , the axles were straight !!! I bought those cars mint in the box. I will have to replace the wheels but not sure what kind to use?

Tiffany

Hello Tiffany….What brand of cars is it and how old?

Clem

hello clem k..........

The cars are made by Lionel and # 19100 to 19106 plus extra 19105 car. The cars are made in 1989.  Even the Lionel GG1 couldn't pull the darn train on 0-72 track so I purchased the Williams F-3's and it walked away with the whole train !!!.  I was planning to pain the blue stripes on the window areas all the way across like the lionel postwar blue striped Santa Fe passenger cars.  2 out of 8 cars have wobbling wheels but axles are straight. The Williams F-3's are the Blue and Silver colors. Any ideas about painting the blue stripes color wise ? How are you been lately ?

Tiffany

Excellent post. At October's York, I was on the hunt for an MTH Premier Amtrak Reefer (really a boxcar cataloged as a reefer) to go on my Amtrak train. It was only done once in 1996/7 so it was hard to find. I found a NIB unit in the blue(?) hall. Anyway, got it home and replaced one of the trucks with an MTH flashing red ETD truck and noticed on curves the original truck kept derailing the rearmost axle. Huh...start looking at the track, etc and thought it was just operator error until it kept coming off. Once I started looking at it, I noticed the entire truck frame was bent enough to lift one side of the truck off the track. I was able to whack it and bend it back enough to keep it on the track but it will need to be replaced eventually. Since it usually stays on the track I'm in no rush to replace the truck. Regardless, sometimes it IS the car and not the track. Don't overlook some things. 

I believe that all Lionel rolling stock from the early 70's on, uses the same fast angle wheels on an axle with needle bearing ends in all freight and passenger trucks. If the car has metal trucks then the truck frame must be pushed open (expanded) a bit to allow the wheel/axle assembly to drop out. If the trucks have plastic frames they can be pried apart by hand and new wheel sets lubed and easily put back. It just became obvious  that bent axles or wobbly wheels can cause derailments. It sure sounds like Lionel is using very soft steel for their car axles. If the axle can easily bend upon packaging or handling then the rolling action of cars need to be monitored.  

Hello Dennis LaGrua..........

I agree with you that Lionel uses soft steel axles to cut cost and I am looking for a way to up grade to better wheels and axles sets. Any ideas ?

Tiffany

Great timing for this thread.

I have a Sager place observation car that would randomly hang up

on 0-42 curves. I did the usual oiling ect. Then when I put it on a piece of straight

track and pushed it, it felt like random binding.

To make a long story short, the wheels were so bad that the whole

truck would sink between the rails. Especially on curves.

I'm surprised I didn't see and shorts. Not wanting to play any game with this

thing I ordered new trucks.

Luckily they were only $12 so not to much pain on this repair...

I bought a 5-car passenger set a few months back and had 2 of the 5 derail.  What I found was 2 wheelsets on 1 car and 1 wheelset on the other car weren't even in the sideframes   Couldn't tell it from the side or above.

Also had a piece of flange broken off a wheel on a K-Line truck, didn't seem to affect anything but I didn't give it time to either.

I had done some work on Weaver troublesome trucks  awhile ago.  Base cars, mostly coal cars, come with plastic side frames and couplers.  The next step up, if  you replaced the trucks was die cast side frames, and couplers.  It was interesting to note that in most cases the flange spacing, original plastic truck frames, was too close. Problem was at switches/crosses, where there was additional rail pieces, used to channel the wheel sets, through the switch.  With the flanges too close together, the wheels would ride-up, on channel pieces and de-rail.  Fix was to spread the wheel set.

Another interesting project was related to the paint on the metal wheels.  New/out of the box trucks with a fair amount of paint, when run for an extensive time, saw the paint clump-up on the wheels, causing a wobble, already mentioned. The paint clumps had to be scrapped/sanded/clean-off the wheel sets.   

The axle/wheel problems seem to be a very recent occurrence so it can be assumed that either Lionel started using very soft axles a while ago to save money, or the foreign subcontractor switched to using substandard materials to save cost or some defective batches were used.  I tell you the axles removed were so soft that you can easily bend them in half by hand. There is little to no hardness there. It is easy to see how problems can develop in handling, packaging, and during assembly.

As for a solution, since I never experienced this with USA made MPC product so I took a few wheel sets off some 70's -80's parts cars and used these as replacements. They seem stronger than the Chinese.

I'll say it again. Observe your train running along the track. If its not running smooth or derailing, don't always blame the switches or tracks, first check those wheels and axles.

I too have a Sager place that derails on one GG switch. I corrected the side to side motion but thanks to this tip I will check the wheelsets.

I have fixed derailing problems due to post war trucks being bent and due to post war wheels and/or axles being worn.  I have had several post war cars with metal trucks where the truck frame was bent out allowing the wheels to spread too far apart.  The wheels would climb the frogs on 022 switches.  I used pliers to bend the sides of the trucks inward so there was no end play in the axles.  

I have a tender with 6 wheel trucks that had worn wheels and axles.  This allowed the wheels to get too close together and the tender would derail.   I replaced the axles and flanged wheels.  I didn't replace the unflanged wheels or their axles.

I have a tank car  that had the axles worn out.  Once again, this allowed the wheels to get too close together and derail.  I replaced the axles.

Two of these cases were caused by no lube on the wheels.  

I have noticed that the spacing on the wheel sets also determines stability on the rails. Most often the spec as measured between the wheels (inner flange to inner flange) is 1.04- 1.05"  If it deviates much larger or smaller than this the derailing becomes more apt to happen.

If you see derailing in spots, first check for a bent axle, then get out the digital calipers and check the inside measurement at a few different rotations. If all is well then check for high spots on your track, switches by rolling a car over them and paying close attention to see if there is any "bounce".

The only bent axles I have seen are the result of a 40-inch dive to the concrete floor!

Hi Jim.

I just ordered a new set of trucks from Lionel for $12.00 each and put those on the

Sager place car. It's been running on my massive 042" curves for about .5 hours

now and no problems.

I did take the old truck apart and the wheels just fell off the axles. It looks like the

side frames hold the wheels one way and some metal tabs hold the inside of the

wheels. Nothing pressed on here. Maybe it's supposed to be like like. don't know.

the wheels did seems to rock vertically on the shaft quite a bit.

If I remember right, wasn't there problems with the conventional classic set

Madison a couple years a go ? No matter, a new wheel set seemed to cure the

problem on this car.  Hope this helps...

Bruce..