Kato Mikado Revised Driver Set?

[Big Train]

I have a couple Kato 2-8-2s on the workbench right now: one for painting and the other for a tender swap. And I figure it's a good opportunity to swap out the original drivers and install the updated driver set, based on all the gen I've seen here about poor conductivity resulting in reliability mayhem when the engine is DCC'ed. As well as DC I guess...not had that issue though. Plus, one of the newer members in our group purchased a DCC Mikado that is showing signs of electrical and/or DCC problems. So eventually, I'll be replacing these drivers also.

Now, according to Kato's part catalog, this part is no longer available:  932031/932030   USRA 2-8-2 Heavy Mikado Driver Set (Rev), 1 ea N-Scale / Fits: USRA 2-8-2 Heavy Mikado (Rev)   DISC.

BTW, what exactly is the root cause of the conductivity problem that caused Kato to manufacture a revised driver set? Seems like I need a Plan B.

Other than a business case, why would Kato discontinue parts, not only to keep their products running, but use in secondary applications like kit-bashing and modification of other steam engines? Seems like a free source of continued revenue, if you ask me.

What does this sort of policy mean for the long term use  of my two GS-4's? I buy these engines to run....might as well make them "hangar queens" now. Does Kato expect me to buy an FEF-3 to ensure I have a steam engine where spares are available in the foreseeable future?

I guess I should have paid more attention when the replacement drivers came out. It's bad enough you have to buy locomotives and rolling stock when they are first released (based on my experience, yours may vary), but parts?

The real 2-8-2 is a workhorse locomotive and can be found on many North American railways, especially the USRA pattern. So I can't see the market for N scale Mikados being saturated to the point of being discontinued. It's like Ford Motor Company ceasing production of F150s.

[mmagliaro]

The issue is that in the early run Mikados, Kato relied on a phosphor bronze finger strip to contact both the center
wheel hub and the driver rim.  It does not reliably keep contact at either location. 

There is an article slated to come out in the next NTrak steam locomotive book that covers repairs to the tender and driver
pickup issues in the Kato Mikado (written by yours truly).

First you should flip it on its back and test all the wheels with test leads.  You may well find that some of the tender
wheels aren't working either, because of dirt in the axle point cups, misaligned or bent contact strips insider the tender,
or misaligned drawbar wires.  So make sure you fix that first and get all 8 wheels in the tender working.

As to the drivers, there is no easy fix that I am aware of.  But I have had good success using high quality liquid conductive
epoxies.   I use Nickel Print by MG Chemicals.   They also make a Silver Print that would do an even better job and get
you a much lower resistance path, but it's pricey.

The idea is to scrap and clean the contact points behind the wheels (the strip, and the places near the hub and rim where it touches),
and then apply a coat of the conductive material there.   I have repaired 10 or so drivers like this, and it definitely works.
The trick is getting clean surfaces, a good mix and good coat of the conductive epoxy on there, and test it with an ohmmeter
when it gets hard.  I am usually able to get it down to a pretty good conductive path that is less than 2 ohms or so,
with Nickel Print.   If you go with Silver Print, you will probably do better.

There are some conductive ink pens out there that have silver in them, and those should work well too.  Just make sure
you get a good wide conductive path of cement in there.  It has to be able to carry current, and even a short,
and not melt away or burn up.

Notice... I stressed good quality.   Don't use the cheap carbon-based conductive glues.  They will not work.  They will
have too much resistance and will fry away at the first hint of a problem or short that happens to unluckily run through
that wheel.

[peteski]

Now, according to Kato's part catalog, this part is no longer available:  932031/932030   USRA 2-8-2 Heavy Mikado Driver Set (Rev), 1 ea N-Scale / Fits: USRA 2-8-2 Heavy Mikado (Rev)   DISC.
...
Other than a business case, why would Kato discontinue parts, not only to keep their products running, but use in secondary applications like kit-bashing and modification of other steam engines? Seems like a free source of continued revenue, if you ask me.

What does this sort of policy mean for the long term use  of my two GS-4's? I buy these engines to run....might as well make them "hangar queens" now. Does Kato expect me to buy an FEF-3 to ensure I have a steam engine where spares are available in the foreseeable future?

I guess I should have paid more attention when the replacement drivers came out. It's bad enough you have to buy locomotives and rolling stock when they are first released (based on my experience, yours may vary), but parts?

The real 2-8-2 is a workhorse locomotive and can be found on many North American railways, especially the USRA pattern. So I can't see the market for N scale Mikados being saturated to the point of being discontinued. It's like Ford Motor Company ceasing production of F150s.

Are you serious or just joking?  Where have you been in the last 20 years?

Unlike in the 70s or early 80s (where there were only relatively few models available and those and parts for them seemed to always be available in the hobby shops), N scale locos from most manufacturers are now all "limited runs". Many manufacturers go as far as to take reservations and if they do not have enough pre-orders, they will not produce the model.  Fortunately Kato does not do that. But still, Kato models come and go fairly quickly.  Well, most of them at least sell out quickly (except for the RDCs).

I would venture a guess that Kato did saturate the Mikado market (at least with the road-names they produced) since they have not re-run the model for a very long time.  Yes, it is a model of a popular loco, but Kato doesn't seem to think they can make enough money to run them again.

As far as spare parts go, manufacturers are pretty much doing us a favor (at least nowadays) by making spare parts available in the first place. For example, just try to get a spare part, even for a current Walthers model.  Almost impossible task.  Kato, Atlas and few others are actually very accommodating by having a good supply of spare parts and making the available to the modelers.  They had many Mikado parts in stock for years, until they had a fire-sale and they sold most of them off for bargain prices.  Since they have not re-run the model for a while, there are no more parts available.  But Kato USA actually convinced Kato Japan to just run a batch of the traction-tire driver retrofit kits since it was a highly requested item. That was very unusual and welcomed by the modelers since  the TT drivers were selling for ungodly high prices on eBay.  But that was an exception rather than a rule - I wouldn't expect any more spare parts for Mikados unless those models are produced again (which from what I gathered from Kato USA will not be anytime soon).

Spare parts being a good source of extra revenue?  That is not how manufacturers see it.  To them it is extra expense of keeping inventory of hundreds of little pieces which in the long run don't make much money and are a big headache to be dealt with. Just ask the manufacturers directly an that will be the response you get.

[mmagliaro]

To add to what Peteki notes here,
I spoke with Kato representatives at several train shows.   The story I got directly from them was:

1. Remember when they sold off all those Mikado mechanisms, complete with motors, drivers, valve gear and
everything, for only 20 bucks a piece?  That was because they had something like 10,000 of them (his number,
not mine)  that they decided they simply could not sell as complete engines and they wanted to just get rid of them.

and

2. The only reason they were able to get Kato Japan to rerun the traction tire drivers for the Mikado was because
that driver happens to fit some other Japanese prototype steam loco that Kato was already doing a rerun of
anyway, so Kato USA was able to convince them to "make some more of the TT drivers, while you are at it."

Though it may be hard for us to believe, they did indeed saturate the market with 2-8-2's.   I remember
when it was easy to pick up a Kato Mikado for $50 or $60, either on eBay or at a train show.
When a model as famous and good-running as that is selling that cheap, there obviously isn't a huge demand
for it.  Heck, when they first came out at a list price of $160, I bought my first one for only $80 brand new
from a dealer at a train show.  He had a table full of them.   That was the most I ever paid for one.
After that, it was $50 - $60.  I do shop around, and admittedly, I'm a cheapskate, but still...
 
It's a great engine, but it has always been available heavily discounted, which means there was a glut of them.

[SkipGear]

Too add to all of the above....how long as the Mikado been around for?

The first run was in 1996. That is almost 20 years ago. I don't even think full size car manufactures keep parts inventory that long. They have done us a favor to keep the parts available as long as they did.

[k27463]

I feel like I got into N scale too late.

I'd be in for 3 or 4 Mikados in CB&Q...just not at the $150-200 they seem to go for nowadays. 

[ncbqguy]

I won't go into the actual production numbers but suffice it to say that the total number of engines produced on the first run was astronomical by today's standards.....

The problem was that many dealers placed multiple orders with different distributors for the Mikados when they were announced, fearing that they would be shorted by a distributor. Kato actually delayed release of the engine to produce what they had orders for.   
Many of you weren't around even as recently "back in the day" of the 90's when new N Scale stuff sold out before the order deadlines.  BLI famously had an advertisement with a guy standing by the side of the road with a sign that read "Will work for Kato SD-40s".....   It took a long time for the first run to finally move off the distributor and dealer shelves.   The second production with new roadnames was mostly done just to get the detail parts packages and tender trucks......I think we could have had a brand new engine but there were so many Mikados that people needed extra details for and it was the only way we could satisfy the demand.

As well-regarded as they are, the first production suffered from a number of design problems... the weak point in the drawbar that would bend or snap in transit, the packaging that allowed this and even the drivers to be jostled so much they could be smashed out of round, the previously mentioned driver rim to axle stub disc that did not make reliable contact, and the frame halves which did not align the driver bearings well so that not all the drivers were in contact with the rails.

Some of the engines performed flawlessly and could haul 40 cars out of the box.   Others that had pickup problems, really misaligned frame halves, bent wireless drawbars, etc. could barely haul themselves or five cars.

I was surprised when somebody mentioned on one of the boards that Kato USA told them they were out of Mikado drawbars.....even after all warranty repairs were done and a large quantity of them were packaged there was still the better part of half of a 55 gallon bag of them left in the warehouse well into 2000.  The drawbar design problem had cropped up a decade earlier when Kato had to send a repairman to Bensenville to fix Con-Cor GN S-2 4-8-4s which arrived with mostly broken drawbars in spite of full foam lined bookcase packaging.

The new drivers and traction tire were designed to fix the pickup and traction problems.   The new packaging cradle was a workaround for the weak spot in the wireless drawbar and protected the wheels in shipment.

Kato used to have a restriction that only parts could be run in conjunction with the exact same part being made for a production run of locomotives.   The problem may be that even if the USRA Mikado is run again it will be "improved" with the current style of chassis which might not share many, if any, parts with the previous productions.....the price of progress.

Charlie Vlk

PS-  A fellow member of the live steam club that I belong to here in Tennessee, Howard Warren, is also an N Scaler and he discovered "back in the day" that the Bachmann 2-8-0 drivers will fit into the Kato Mikado chassis.   They can't be mixed as the diameter is slightly different and you may have to fiddle with the siderod and crankpins, but it is a possible option to explore.

[Big Train]

Thanks everyone for the opinions

mmagliaro:

Been a big fan of your work and am constantly amazed at the innovation and creativity used to overcome some of the the technical problems encountered along the way. Wow. I’m glad you’re on our side! I’m looking forward to seeing your article.

Can I achieve the same results with Neolube or is that not even close?

I will try and locate those products. May not find exactly those but something equivalent. Canadian federal regulations are weird and will reject importation of commercial products for something as simple as not including French on the packaging.


peteski:

1.) I’m not joking.

2.) I have a life that extends beyond the need to monitor The Railwire 24 hrs a day. N scale is a hobby for me.


Charlie Vlk:

Thanks for the tip about Bachmann 2-8-0 drivers. I will investigate that also.


Moving on:

As far as the business of not maintaining an adequate supply of spares, that indicates to me the manufacturers aren’t willing to meet a reasonable, expected need. I wonder how many manufacturers use the phrase “to exceed customer expectations” in their mission statement. But if we let them off the hook and just accept that as a part of doing business in N scale today, they’ll just keep carrying on as usual, and that is not acceptable to me. And I don’t think it’s acceptable to some others. For that reason, I won't buy locomotives from Walthers. Remember, guys, it’s our disposable income that goes to support the industry. It’s a want, not a need. And if I feel my hard earned cash is being spent on a product with a limited life-cycle that may or may not lead to frustration at some point in the future, I might decide to re-direct my money on something else that will provide me with the feeling the manufacturer is respecting my money.  If locomotives were priced at the point I can say “Well, it’s not worth the powder to blow it to hell”, I wouldn’t mind. Cannibalize it for usable parts and buy another one. If you can find one. 

After hearing all the production issues Kato had making these, they might have considered keeping spares just to keep the "first adopters" and subsequent users happy after all the production headaches. Even if, at some point in the future Kato releases the 2-8-2 again, I really doubt there will be that many changes requiring the need for new tooling. Maybe with Model Power releasing their new re-engineered steamers, Kato may not run theirs.

It's funny, here in Canada, I never saw the $50 or $60 Mikados...I would have bought a skid load. Maybe Kato's MSRP was a tad optimistic, do you think? Even at train shows here they were above the US$140 mark. Second-hand ones are still fetching US$100 even now. But, then, as Canadians, we're use to being gouged on all sorts of consumer products when compared to US prices for similar items.

Yet, the drawbar problem again appears on the two GS-4s I have. Has Kato solved that on the FEF-3?

While I would like a FEF-3 because I like steam, based on my experiences with the 2-8-2 and GS-4, it better be heavily discounted.


Thanks again

[mmagliaro]

Forget Neolube.  It is somewhat conductive, but cannot carry any current.  If you were to short over the
bronze finger/rim joint on a Mikado driver and current actually had to flow through there, it would probably
just vaporize.
If you are really unlucky, it would burn or melt.  Do not use Neolube for its electrically conductive properties.

MG Chemicals sells their products through distributors in Canada.  I checked.
I don't know where you are in Canada, but this page will get you started.

These are dealers who carry it in Ontario:

http://www.mgchemicals.com/distributors/canada/on/

You can use the mgchemicals page to search anywhere in the world for distributors.
------------------------

I do not particularly like Kato's parts policy, but in fairness, in order to provide good service to their
customers, they are not required to stock parts for us to buy.  If you had a Mikado with a damaged drawbar
or faulty drivers, you could call them and send it in for repair.  If they repaired the engine and returned it
to you, would that not be good service?    Also remember, the engine came out 20 years ago.
They did stock and rerun parts, including replacement driver sets for it, for a long time.    I think at this point,
they should not be knocked for failing to stock parts for a long-out-of-production model.

Walthers is another questionable one.  They have no available parts for sale on their website.
Yet, I have found that if you call them up and tell them what you need, they do try to accomodate you,
even in cases where they really were under no obligation to (i.e. I don't own the engine, and I just want
a part for kitbash project!)   They may be slower than I'd like, but it actually is possible to get parts from them,
believe it or not.

[peteski]

Big Train,
my comment had nothing to do with you having to monitor The Railwire 24 hours a day. I was stating facts about Mikados which are generally known (not specifically to any forum participants).  It was about the N scale model market in general and about N scale model and parts availability.

Your comment about Kato abandoning their customers by no longer supplying parts seemed a bit odd (considering that these locos haven't been produced in more than a decade).  Again, a general observation, not relating to any online forum participation.  I have no problem if you have not kept in touch with the N scale market but a part of your post seemed more like a rant than a question.  If I misunderstood you, I'm sorry.

[Big Train]

peteski:

no worries, mate


mmagliaro:

Sayal Electronics in Southern Ontario is my default go-to place for electronic hardware. Thanks for checking that out for me.

[glakedylan]

fwiw

in last two weeks I have bought two Kato Mikado drivers with traction tire @ eBay
they are out there

sincerely--
Gary

[victor miranda]

can I get you to send the the jewel boxes when you are done with them?

[victor miranda]

Big_Train

frankly my record for predictions has been spotty on specifics
and not too far off in general terms.
I once said the MP pacific would be available on the bay for 40 dollars.
I was wrong about that but for a while you could get one for about 55.
and there are/were lots of BINs that seemed to not sell.

I am going to make a prediction....
the Kato FEF will not fall to deep discounts.
Used ones will sometimes be cheap
this last part being a case of how much replacement motors cost and availablity.

reason for prediction follows

In personal terms Kato has managed to put things I want on 'fire sale'
when I have little cash.
I did not buy all I wanted when the mikes were tossed out the door.

I also knew that Kato was VERY unlikely to make more parts for it.

The reason I mention the Kato Mike parts blowout
is to point out that Kato must have learned
exactly how many steam engines it is possible to
sell over the course of a few years.

pick any number you want.  Katousa will not make more than that again

so if you want a Kato FEF, wait until Kato makes another run
and buy it...

and a spare motor.
or two
and traction tires...

end-o-reasons.

what I'd like Kato to do is keep the parts policy they have
and change the policy for making steam engines.

I strongly believe they could print money
by making a light pacific a light mike and the heavies.
and pick darn near any medium sized consolidation

and rotate through them one per year.
make about what they can sell for christmas.

I got the FEF because it is handsome.
what I want is a fleet of steam for the ordinary... work?... on my loop.

victor

[loyalton]

Big Train, not to trigger you, but you haven't experienced the reported problems with the GS-4 yet?

The Kato Mike was a leap forward for N steam at the time, though by no means perfect, as we've found. Keep in mind that Kato did address the problems over time. By the time it did reach its peak with the KOBO run, IMO everyone had their fill of USRA 2-8-2s. Today it's old news, old technology. And one would still think another blowout could be possible in the future.

So I agree with victor miranda. It's time for a light Mike, among other types. It'd have to be DCC, likely with sound. Coreless motor, gearhead added. I'd also want the DCC-activated coupler from the KOBO version. Throw in 3D printed variant versions from KOBO. But by comparison, even a $100+ Kato Mike would be cheap.