Lionel prewar warping of castings.

Plenty of that stuff survived.  Zinc pest is a batch or melt contamination so all parts made from that batch will be affected.  It's more problematic when a loco or car was only made in small quantities to begin with.  That could mean only one or a few batches and obviously if even one batch was affected, most of that loco would eventually be junk.  Now they made thousands of those tank cars and so most are good.

Lots of info on this process, what causes and the effects out on the net.  I've posted this stuff before, it's not mine just good info.  Check out that Railking tender shell below!

In my experience zinc castings contaminated with lead grow over time. How well they survive depends on if the shape will tolerate the growth. A good example is the boiler casting on the 700 or 763. The first year, 1937,  was a particularly difficult castings. The round portion of the boiler survived fairly well but where it transitions to the cab is where so many of these castings fail. In Don Hagar’s DVD on inspecting the 700 he actually gives a dimension to check and advises not to purchase locos which have grown over some limit as these will fail at some point. Getting back to buckling, in some cases I have seen, like the 700 tender, the sides of the tender get waves and the frame bends. I believe this is because the shell is growing in length and the frame is not. They are attached with 8 screws, 4 down each side. I think if most of those screws had been removed so the shell was free to grow independent of the frame, the shell would not buckle and the frame would not have been bent down at the ends. Same is true for the loco frame. If the boiler was free to grow, the frame would not bend down at the ends. On the 700 this frame bending is illustrated by the pilots dragging on the center rail. 

In the photos of the tank cars above, I wonder if the frames were free to grow and not restrained by the tank, they might not have buckled. I believe the buckling is caused by the tank  trying to restrain a casting that wants to grow. 

The thinner castings have a lot more trouble with this than the heavier ones. Look at the 700e compared to the 8976 switchers. There were lots of 700 failures due to contaminated zinc, but is is unheard of on the switchers which have a very heavy boiler shell. Another example is the 717 caboose, and it’s semi scale relatives. The running boards, which are very thin and rigidly restrained by the carbody, are frequently badly buckled. 

It may be too late for most prewar trains, but in my 700k tender I did remove all the mounting screws, except for two in the middle.  Don Hagar did say it was possible to straighten 700e bent frames exercising great care.  Maybe the tank car frames could be straightened and then the tanks reattached with less restraint.    

David Johnston posted:

 

In the photos of the tank cars above, I wonder if the frames were free to grow and not restrained by the tank, they might not have buckled. I believe the buckling is caused by the tank  trying to restrain a casting that wants to grow. 

 

David, for this car I think you've got it !!  The central point of warping near all four corners is the bracket that holds the frame to the tank.  The tank is solid steel and of course could not expand as the casting did, so the casting had to bend around those points to expand.  It wasn't much expansion, but enough to be spotted in a photo.  If I had not taken the straight side view photos, I would not have noticed.  Thanks for your input.

Now to see the extent to which the frames warped or remained straight on other 2755 and 2955 cars.  Fortunately the next NETCA board meeting, after York, will be at the house of one of the largest Lionel collections that has several variations of almost everything.   I'll inspect his tank cars and report my findings back on this topic.

The OO Hudsons are prone to the frame warping downwards, but I have read this is an issue of the screw down the stack that holds the boiler to the cylinders being overtightened over the years.  The front of the OO Hudson clamps together not only the boiler to frame, but retains the 2 stairs from the running boards to the pilot.  The screw goes into the cast headlight bulb mount on the frame.  That does NOT bottom out against the top of the boiler shell, so the screw can be tightened to where its pulling upwards on the frame, leading to gradual pushing of the pilot deck downwards as the screw pressure pulls upwards above the cylinders.  I have read that someone offered a frame straightening service for these, but do not know if that gentleman is still alive or if someone has a technique to offer how to do this(my 004 could use it).     AD

My 2955 tank car has frame warpage.

What makes it interesting, is some just have warping, some crack and disintergrate completely.  While others are just fine depending on what "pour" of metal they were cast from.   They were just learning the hows and whys of diecasting zinc metal back then.   But when we see it in more modern trains, that is just poor quality control and or cheapening on the part of the Chinese factory and the company that they are made for not keeping a tighter control of the process.   If anybody has tricks or techniques to gradually straighten bent frames like on Hudsons and so forth.  Please do share so the younger generation can still fix these issues.  We need to not let these skills go to the grave of those that have done the repair work in the past.     AD

I straightened a frame on a 261e once. It was bent from being dropped though. It turned out well. I might try something with my 2955 someday but I'm more leery since that is from zinc pest most likely. It also much more expensive to replace if I make it worse.

This is/was Dad's 1835E tender that came with his 366W set(blue passenger cars...his first train given, given to him at the youthful age of 26!!).  The pest hit hard and early...he said within the first year (1935).  Lionel stepped up and provided a new tender, which to this day remains in perfect shape....no evidence of pest anywhere.  Dad said he couldn't recall whether Lionel really knew that the replacement tender would be alright....or whether he/they just got lucky!

The bottom photo I think really tells of the pest's power.  The brass nameplate split solely on the strength of the distortion in the side.  Awesome stretch, eh what?

BTW, the missing journals on these trucks were used to help restore other rail equipment.  

I've kept this twisted sister solely to remind myself and others how radical the learning curve was for Lionel in dealing with this metallurgical mayhem.  Generally, as Lionel proceeded with its in-house manufacturing, they controlled the pest quite well.  But, as we all now know, when they relinquished this portion of manufacturing to other providers, they lost the control so important.  What's even more provoking is that generation of replacement parts was from no guarantee of improvement to non-existent.  

Disheartening, isn't it?

KD

Exactly, once production moved from in house here in the USA, control was largely lost.  A few companies did better at QC within the model train world in regards to the factories in the PRC.  But with the language and distance barrier, it has to be a complete logistical nightmare.  Much like the mint/sealed in the box but ruined by a leaking horn battery quandry for the postwar collector.  Collectors of mint in the box models made overseas face zinc pest issues with tender shells, GG1 shells, trucks and couplers in a couple brands that I will not name.  I haven't seen any boilers or loco frames warped, but lots of warped, cracked and flat out crumbling to nothing tender and GG1 shells, trucks and couplers.   I wish I knew who the gentleman was out in Arizona that did OO Hudson frame repair and find out what his jigs and techniques are/were.  The trains will be around for generations to come, we need to pass down how to deal with some of these more difficult to repair issues.    AD

@artfull dodger posted:

The OO Hudsons are prone to the frame warping downwards, but I have read this is an issue of the screw down the stack that holds the boiler to the cylinders being overtightened over the years.  The front of the OO Hudson clamps together not only the boiler to frame, but retains the 2 stairs from the running boards to the pilot.  The screw goes into the cast headlight bulb mount on the frame.  That does NOT bottom out against the top of the boiler shell, so the screw can be tightened to where its pulling upwards on the frame, leading to gradual pushing of the pilot deck downwards as the screw pressure pulls upwards above the cylinders.  I have read that someone offered a frame straightening service for these, but do not know if that gentleman is still alive or if someone has a technique to offer how to do this(my 004 could use it).     AD

If you are talkingabout the gentleman from Arizone, he's still around and he's still fixing OO Locos.  Had him fix mine back in December.

I got your email George and I sent him an email.  I wish the fixing of warped frames in both O and OO would have been part of the skills I learned while repairing them for the Lionel shop that I worked for all those years.   The only Hudson I got my hands on was the 1-700e that I owned personally.   A prewar 700e would need a lottery win for me to ever afford to own one.  But the OO Hudsons, I now have two, a 004 and a 003.      AD

He does good work.  My 001 Hudson runs much better and does not short anymore.

And since I can tear mine down to a bare chassis, it saves me a bunch of $$.  The 003 that I got had a much better frame, nearly zero warping.  So I transplanted the E unit and motor into the 003.  She runs well.  Its tender lacks a coal pile and needs a new drawbar.  So I will have to do some parts swapping off the 004w tender so I have the full scale tender with whistle.  The 003 came with a vintage KD motor, but it doesnt fit in the body.  The motor's brush assembly hits the floor of the cab and I am not sure what can be done to make it fit.   AD

It's a real shame but these modern scale models coming out of China also have this 'growing/swelling' problem. You'd think they would have the problem down by now, but not in China. What a shame.  I have a 700E, a gunmetal 763E and a a black 763E from circa 1940. The Gunmetal 763E and 700E are specifically from 1937 as Don Hagar's DVD identifies but I have been very fortunate, nothing has grown or swelled. My growing issues are with these modern engines which are beautiful, but they dropped the ball on quality control of zinc alloy purity.

@dkdkrd posted:

This is/was Dad's 1835E tender that came with his 366W set(blue passenger cars...his first train given, given to him at the youthful age of 26!!).  The pest hit hard and early...he said within the first year (1935).  Lionel stepped up and provided a new tender, which to this day remains in perfect shape....no evidence of pest anywhere.  Dad said he couldn't recall whether Lionel really knew that the replacement tender would be alright....or whether he/they just got lucky!

The bottom photo I think really tells of the pest's power.  The brass nameplate split solely on the strength of the distortion in the side.  Awesome stretch, eh what?

BTW, the missing journals on these trucks were used to help restore other rail equipment.  

I've kept this twisted sister solely to remind myself and others how radical the learning curve was for Lionel in dealing with this metallurgical mayhem.  Generally, as Lionel proceeded with its in-house manufacturing, they controlled the pest quite well.  But, as we all now know, when they relinquished this portion of manufacturing to other providers, they lost the control so important.  What's even more provoking is that generation of replacement parts was from no guarantee of improvement to non-existent.  

Disheartening, isn't it?

KD

That particular tender was an Ives design, and Lionel put it with the 385 engine to create the lower end '1835' after buying Ives. I suspect that these tenders were still fine in 1929, and that Lionel did not do anything to fix what Ives had started.  Lionel stuff, postwar, tends to be pretty good over the years, so they must have learned about quality control of the die casting alloys, many others (McCoy??) did not.

Jim

Back in 1986, I was at the TCA York Eastern Div. meet and was looking for replacement parts for my 700E which my father had purchased but it needed some missing parts replaced.  I inherited the rebuild project. Additionally, it had a severely 'swelled' steam chest for which I could do nothing but replace it. At that time, we knew of this issue and we found this vendor who had both original Hudson parts (I wanted everything original for obvious reasons). He had all the parts we needed, including the steam chest. However, he also had solid brass castings of the same part and he said at that time he thought he would make it available because of these swelling problems. The brass replacement part was the same price as the original die cast steam chest. We purchased all the other original parts we needed (lubricator valve, original 700E motor and drawbar pin. After thinking about it that evening we went back the next day and bought the brass part knowing we will never have a problem with that part. I have never had any regrets for doing this, my 700E, which is 99% original (brass steam chest) runs beautifully to this day. I always understood that Lionel themselves had rectified this issue way back in the late 1930's and afterwards. Now, here we are, 80 years later and these Chinese models which are so beautiful in every aspect, are haunted by this impure zinc alloy. Why? don't they understand this issue? It makes you want to by just brass models since you know they at least won't swell.  (I do have some Sunset 3rd Rail models and they are great) Lionel (and MTH for that matter) be careful.

Its called the Chinese dont care about anything but the profit margin.  The cheapest raw materials is what they are using unless the company ordering those items micro manages the operation from a QC standpoint.  With language and distance barriers, that is difficult at best.  As the Chinese say, " Its nothing personal..just business."   And we are left with the poor quality castings and the companies that sold that product to us take a big hit in buyer trust of their product.  Along with a financial hit if they are replacing items on their dime and time.  Maybe someday I will hit the lottery and can afford a prewar 700e.  Till then, its just a pipe dream and my mini version in OO gauge will have to fill that void.  The reissue, while nice, doesn't scratch that itch the same, plus I want the 10:1 gear ratio where the Hudson will roll without track power, the 18:1 doesnt freewheel that well! 

I hear ya! Perhaps the safest model train locomotives would be those built of brass. I love the detail of brass even though these modern die-cast models do give them a run for their money which, even 25 years ago, most likely could not have happened. The problem is, as you said the quality of the die-cast metals used. With brass, we don't have that impurity issue which protects us but sometimes it feels like if you are too close to a brass locomotive and you sneeze real hard, you just blew a step off the boiler.  I guess if Lionel and MTH brought the manufacture of these locomotives back to the US, an otherwise $1,399.99 locomotive may cost $3,000.00, but maybe not. 

I dont buy the whole "we can't afford to build it in the USA" argument. By the time one figures in logistical costs combined with the rising in mfg costs in the PRC.  From what I have been told by those in the know, that we are at the point of it being a wash production cost wise.   But the problem lies in the lack of those facilities in the USA set up to produce the models again.  Lionel started the process keeping the ex Weaver tools state side and producing those models in the USA.  I think, over time, we will see some model train production return here.  But it will take longer to return than when it left.   Nothing wrong with diecasting, its more robust and heavy over brass construction.  Especially important for pulling power and durability for sets ment for children.   Its fully possible for the Chinese to maintain the proper mix on the zinc material and create stable castings.  But its the business model to cheapen quality to a certain point to maximize profits that creates the problems we as consumers face.   The old Lionel figured this out, and got a pretty quick handle on their in house and 3rd part casting facilites.   But in todays models, the build quality once achieved by Lionel and others has been thrown out the window to some extant to maximize profits for the bean counters.  Mr Kuhn brought Lionel back the level of quality that JLC had achieved in the golden years, sadly the owners that followed took it right back down after they moved production outside the USA.  Granted we have seen some really great models.  But with glaring issues that persist with quality control.     I would personally pay more for a model made in the USA to a high level of quality, than something made overseas to a lesser level of quality.   Just my 2 cents.   AD

I agree completely, that's why I ended my last reply the way I did. We've all been told for so long that to have a product made in first Japan, then Taiwan, Korea and finally China that would cost $100.00 would cost, if made in the USA around 3 times as much. I knew the owner of T-Reproductions who reproduces Buddy 'L' outdoor pressed steel trains and used to reproduce prewar Lionel standard gauge/O gauge accessories. At that time (early 1980's) he used to stamp out these lionel prewar parts at a local machine shop which had the tool and die capabilities. He decided to go over seas because he said that the cost for a run would go down from $120,000  to  $20,000.  Well, that was back then. Things are different now and I, like you would pay a bit more for a model made here rather than overseas, especially if we knew that quality control was part of what we were paying for.

I might chime in here a little as I have some past "passive bystander" experience in chinese manufacturing.

A LOT of the production quality issues raised in the above posts arise because of a combination of both the contractor AND the commisioner trying to maximise profits ... a factory in China is no different to a factory anywhere else in the world , except for the fact its workers are not outspoken when short cuts are made , they get the same performance based wage regardless of the quality of what they are engaged in making .

If any Commissioning company wants a specific grade of material used AND PAYS FOR IT then that is what they will get .. the problem is "Mr Lionbachwillmtmp" expects to make a killer profit on its items , and so they make a "$$" decision regarding the options presented to them ... MrChina says " ok we make from top top alloy , but it cost you XXX$ per unit , but we can cast in really crappy alloy for X$ ... so Mr Lionbachwillmtmp says .. "so what you got in XX$ ?"  and they shake hands ... Mr Lionbachwillmtmp is betting that enough units wont show problems in the warranty period , and isnt really concerned if they fall apart and swell 15 years later , cos by then he is enjoying life in his cabana in the Bahamas,... its the next MD's problem ... you shoud also remember that the % profit to the manufacturer is miniscule compared to the retailer , so yes if there is not an iron clad specifications agreement , you might not get what you paid for , but that responsibility lies even MORE with the commisioner of the production than the actual manufacturer ... For sure China does some shonky stuff , but they are learning it from the best ...

If you pay top level manufacturing prices that is what you will get ... trouble is most big western companies dont want to pay for it , hiding behind the .. "Its made in China watchoo gonna do ? " rhetoric , and until consumers say "enough" its just gonna keep on happening ... MrChina will get his 5-10$ per item profit, and Mr Lionbachwillmtmp will make their 100$'s+  per item profit for putting it on a shelf  ....

( Dons his Flame Resistant Undies and prepares to duck!  )