Spectrum Connie: BUSTED!

[wm3798]

I'll post this here rather than in the Trading Post...  I need to reach the steam tinkerers among us...

After about a decade, maybe more, of reliable service on several layouts, my Spectrum connie has thrown a rod...



Looks like the keeper at Driver #3 was shorn off...  I need to replace the drive rod between driver one and driver 3 on the engineer's side.  You'd think with all the steam carcasses I have piling up I'd have something, but the old shiny parts from Rivarossi and Bachmann not only don't fit, they'd stick out like a sore thumb if they did.

Here she is in happier times...


Anyone have a 2-8-0 drive they've parted out?
Thanks
Lee

[ChristianJDavis1]

PM sent.

[eja]

Good luck Lee !


Keep 'er running.

[Chris333]

If you just pull it off will you even see it's gone?

[SkipGear]

#1 and #4 drivers are driven by the side rods. It has to be there. It honestly looks like it is worn through. I think it might just be time for a new mechanism or at least new side rods and crank pins, the pins are probably worn equally as bad. Bachmann doesn't have side rods listed as an available part for the loco. Looks like it is going to take a donor to get this one back on its feet.

[narrowminded]

Finding one should be the first effort but if that fails, and if the relationship with the Connie is extra special, I might be able to make one.   I would need all of the related parts for dimensions.

[wm3798]

It looks like help is on the way.

I better get on that engine's crew about keeping her oiled around!
Lee

[randgust]

I'm not sure if your rods were weathered or Neolubed, that's one advantage to regularly soaking them in Neolube as it is a lubricant and not a blackening agent.

I suspect your crankpins are also worn to the point of replacement.   

Wrong scale, but our 'storefront window' company HO layout has been powered with IHC 2-8-0's for years, very similar to the Bachmann 2-8-0 in design, just bigger.   It used to be constant running, now its an outside button so the public can run a train for about two minutes and then it shuts off.   But it still gets a TON of running and a TON of wear unlike anything else I've ever seen in model railroading.

I came in one morning and found one of the 2-8-0's on the floor, picked it up, and like yours, rods were dangling.   It had completely worn off the crankpin on the #1 RH driver, continue to run until the rod lodged, and pole-valulted itself off the layout and onto the floor, taking part of the train with it.   

Since then, rods and crankpins are fairly well drowned in LaBelle 108 on those, and haven't had a repeat.  They've picked up grime and dirt and look about as bad as a real one, but no more rod and pin failures.

Takes a lot of running to do this, almost as much as when I found a Mantua GP20 on the floor with flanges worn so thin that they collapsed and it simply drove off the layout on a curve.  Flanges were visibly folded over.   That's when you know you run stuff hard.

[mike_lawyer]

Is it the main drive rod?  Bachmann sells the cylinder assembly with the other siderods.

One other option is to find a 2-8-0 that is not working and use it for a donor part.

[mmagliaro]

There's a reason Kato makes their siderods and crankpins out of stainless steel.  My point is, if you are going to hunt for a replacement crankpin, look for something in stainless.  If Mikado crankpins won't fit, I noticed in hardware stores that you can buy packages of little stainless steel wire nails in gauges all the way down to 19, which is about 1mm diameter.  They are not too expensive, and they also commonly sell them in 18 and 17 gauge if your crank hole is a little bigger.  The head might be a tad bigger than you'd like, but you can chuck the nail in a Dremel and buzz down the head with a diamond file in seconds.  Of course, you can cut the nail to the correct length with a Dremel cut-off disk (or just some cutting pliers if you really have to).

[645diesel]

noisy boxcars do not suffer these fatigue related issues, but they don't look nearly as exciting as they pass by... hope you get it fixed soon, coal needs to get to up the grade to Thomas ASAP!  don't let management send in the F units!

[wm3798]

When I get the replacement parts, I'll tear it down and inspect the crank pin and the other components. If the drive I'm getting the part out is functional I may take Mark up on sending him the piece I would like fabricated and perhaps I can end up with two locomotive drives