Concor/Kato/Lifelike/Hudson 6-wheel tender truck upgrade

[u18b]

Picking up on Skipgear's photo.......

Is there any reason you cannot solder ONE more wire for pickup for the middle axle?

Shown here in pink.

[victor miranda]

Victor,
I like the fold idea.  In fact, making just one of these at home, one could just file little notches in the strips of phosphor bronze, solder the wire into them, and then file little fold notches, fold the metal over, clip with spring tweezers, apply a little more heat, and then the wire and the two folded pieces of metal would all be neatly soldered together with the wire in a notch so it won't be able to flex and ever break the solder joint.

But I do agree with Peteski, that if I decide to actually produce an etched part, I want to make something that
pops out of a fret and drops into the truck without any home bending or soldering.

hi Max,

ll\wally may have added more pick-up strips
the ones I have came with 2 per tender the number should have been 4.
so just replacement strips is quite valuable.

I have been doing other things so I have not made more...

If there existed a fret with 4 or 8, I suspect I'd buy them.

soldering wires is optional then.

if you can get the etching fine enough
etch the wire to the side tabs and fold it 90 degrees.
it will contact all three wheels then.

victor

[mmagliaro]

Picking up on Skipgear's photo.......

Is there any reason you cannot solder ONE more wire for pickup for the middle axle?

Shown here in pink.

Ron, I could, and I have even tried that (on my ConCor S2 / SP&S 4-8-4).  But that wire is a little short to really be flexible enough.
Even with .008" wire, I always felt that it was just a little too stiff and tended to lift up the contact on the other two.

[peteski]

If photoetching, how about this design?

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The blue areas are full thickness 0.016" brass while the whiskers are fully etched on one side to half thickness (0.008")?  That design makes the whiskers much more flexible and the pickup is on all 3 wheels.  Plus no assembly required - just drop-in replacment.

[mmagliaro]

Those little squiggly lines look mighty small.  Maybe... if they were heavier than that, it could be made to work.
Remember, this is being done by a 3rd party etching house, so I can't go overboard with how complicated it is to get it to work.  They will charge me if they have to run it more than once to make it come out right.

[peteski]

Those little squiggly lines look mighty small.  Maybe... if they were heavier than that, it could be made to work.
Remember, this is being done by a 3rd party etching house, so I can't go overboard with how complicated it is to get it to work.  They will charge me if they have to run it more than once to make it come out right.

Drawing was not to any specific scale. This was just an initial idea.  You could the whiskers with fewer or shorter squiggles and whatever thickness will work.  The point is that the squiggles make the whiskers more flexible.

There is nothing complicated with this design. No difficult close tolerances or holes.

[TVRR]

This is a timely topic indeed. I've got a 6 wheel rear tender truck with no pickup what so ever. Front one is good. I have had the truck apart checking for oxidation/crud, all surfaces appear clean and the axels look OK.
What else am I missing?

[mmagliaro]

DO you mean "what part is missing?  or what part do I need to buy?"
I'm afraid no such thing exists.

The first run LL Berks only had pickup strips on one truck.   The truck and tender are otherwise identical,
even to the extent that the "dead" truck has holes in the tender floor above it for the fingers to go up into,
and the contact strips in the floor are anchored in the center and run the whole length of the floor, so
all you need is the pickup plates in the truck.  Why they didn't do this on both trucks right from the beginning, I will never understand...  Savings?  For two little pieces of metal?

Anyway, you need just make something, like the photos I showed.  There isn't any commercial part you can put in there.  (and I haven't done anything about etching them yet)

[victor miranda]

hi Max,

I thought that TVRR may have an Oooold kato/cc hudson tender with no pickups in the tender....
and he was thinking it may be upgraded....

I could be wrong about that however.

victor

[TVRR]

Max, you would recognize this particular truck I think. It has the contact strips in the truck as shown all through this thread. It appears in everyway identical to the forward truck, but no power gets to the little nubbins on the top of the  truck that contact the phosphor bronze strips in the tender floor.  Such a simple mech but no luck. Somewhere between the wheels and the nubbins the power goes away.

[mmagliaro]

Max, you would recognize this particular truck I think. It has the contact strips in the truck as shown all through this thread. It appears in everyway identical to the forward truck, but no power gets to the little nubbins on the top of the  truck that contact the phosphor bronze strips in the tender floor.  Such a simple mech but no luck. Somewhere between the wheels and the nubbins the power goes away.

Ah.  I get ya now. 

Well, let's start with some obvious basics.  How do you know the failure is between the wheels and the "nubbins"?
Do you have an ohmmeter per chance?  (that would be really good if you do)
So, if you confirmed that the failure is between the nubbins and the wheels, then that eliminates any issue
with the nubbins touching the strips up in the tender floor.

 You can take out the truck, put it on some track, touch the probes to a wheel tread and to the grooved channel on the back of the wheel to make sure that's zero.  I can't imagine how it could not be, but check it anyway.    Like you said, those
trucks are pretty simple.  There ain't much that can go wrong to make one go completely dead.

Did you actually pull the pickup plates out of the truck
and clean them?  The sides and bottom edge especially.   I prefer to use paint thinner for this instead of alcohol.  They may look clean, but sometimes the surfaces riding in those wheel grooves have oxidation or other film on the bottom edges and they don't conduct.

[TVRR]

Well, application of Rule #2 fixed the issue. Totally removed every part from the trucks and tender contact strips, cleaned all metal contacts with a mild abrasive to a shiny clean condition, reassembled and it works.
Rule #2- If it doesn't work correctly, you obviously haven't done it right. Reclean everything, again.  Max if you ever etch some contact strips I'll line up to buy a few sets. 

[mmagliaro]

Very glad to hear you got it working!
Those truck plates have driven me nuts on and off over the years.   The ones in my Kato S2 are just like those,
and they drove me crazy before I pulled them out and polished them really clean, and the wheel grooves too.

[Sdynamo]

Max / Victor,

What do you use to polish the pickups & wheel grooves?  I've been soaking in alcohol and cleaning with paper towels but I'm still not getting consistent pickup on the 6 axle trucks.  Help me Obi Wans!

Max I'll happily buy new pickups if you produce something. 

[victor miranda]

hi Sdynamo,

I rarely polish, I usually just paper towel wipe clean.
when I have to ... shine... I use a Micro-Mark 3200 polishing pad

ummmm....
otherwise the generic answer to that question you are revolving is that something else is the problem...

clean metal parts that contact each other will do electrical work.
so something else is the problem.
like the thumbs are not against the plates in the tender
or the wheels pickups are not loose enough to drop on the wheels

this thread has the LL tender trucks and CC/Kato trucks, what kind is giving you fits?

victor