Dinas Bryn
Registered
My rack railway has been distroyed 2 this winter so I am haveing to move it, I intend pushing 3 4w coaches up the incline with the steam loco, what is the safest incline as I don't want to burn the gear box out Les
Steam tack loco LGB
- Thread starter Dinas Bryn
- Start date
stevedenver
Registered
dinas
LGB allows for 25% grade-i think this is a very good guide
while i think you might do more with 1-2 cars-it would depend on the length of travel
being as things (like parts-especially rack gears for the locos) have gotten scarece and pricey-i no longer try stupid kid tricks and am conservative with my toys
the locos have a circuit protection built in for overload
i have been running a 20% grade using up to 4 two axel cars without a problem-but its not a terribly long incline-about 28 feet m then flat , then another 12-15-i run both the electric and the ballenburg-the latter being more sensitive and persnickity about electrical pick up-its a real pain with a rack -you cant push it if it dies on the rack portion to get it going again
the rack locos are geared low-i dont think youll have any issues with 3 -4 cars-(presuming the little short starter set size)
the one thing i might also mention about steeper grades is that the loops can deflect and ride over each other-and this can cause issues-like a derailment-so consider a guard rail or some precaution-noticed this doing a stupid kid trick and running a 7 car train up and over -the downward force of all those cars against the loco can deflect the loops
i have also noticed that with more cars and great incline-descent can be very jerky -as the rack is taking the entire weight and you can see each tooth engagement-so i think this is best avoided -not too much weight, and 25% or less -
i have been using normal hooks because i am too lazy to install my rack hooks-but eventually i will-if you dont have -and you wish to dedicate cars to rack service-you can get MR WIRE CLIPPERS or TINSNIPS, and trim the bottom portion of the hook to avoid interference-did this with a single car and it works quite well-but wont uncouple over the LGB manual uncoupler thingys)
one other thing is that from time to time, with some cars-the bogies will travel off center with normal hooks (ie yaw in airplane parlance) , or if due to the rack heaving upward , it can raise the cars and even the loco ) and cause issues, and, they can sometimes catch on the rack rails at the start-up point ( i have a a few rack- then no rack- then rack-so ive noticed this-slow speeds arent an issue-higher speeds can be quite exciting tho
finally use about 2 rack holders per 300mm, sometime 3 on R1-helps prevent shifting heaving and other issues
at first i thought this was not necessary , but with temp changes and heavy load and slippage of the racks etc-it is in fact necessary
LGB allows for 25% grade-i think this is a very good guide
while i think you might do more with 1-2 cars-it would depend on the length of travel
being as things (like parts-especially rack gears for the locos) have gotten scarece and pricey-i no longer try stupid kid tricks and am conservative with my toys
the locos have a circuit protection built in for overload
i have been running a 20% grade using up to 4 two axel cars without a problem-but its not a terribly long incline-about 28 feet m then flat , then another 12-15-i run both the electric and the ballenburg-the latter being more sensitive and persnickity about electrical pick up-its a real pain with a rack -you cant push it if it dies on the rack portion to get it going again
the rack locos are geared low-i dont think youll have any issues with 3 -4 cars-(presuming the little short starter set size)
the one thing i might also mention about steeper grades is that the loops can deflect and ride over each other-and this can cause issues-like a derailment-so consider a guard rail or some precaution-noticed this doing a stupid kid trick and running a 7 car train up and over -the downward force of all those cars against the loco can deflect the loops
i have also noticed that with more cars and great incline-descent can be very jerky -as the rack is taking the entire weight and you can see each tooth engagement-so i think this is best avoided -not too much weight, and 25% or less -
i have been using normal hooks because i am too lazy to install my rack hooks-but eventually i will-if you dont have -and you wish to dedicate cars to rack service-you can get MR WIRE CLIPPERS or TINSNIPS, and trim the bottom portion of the hook to avoid interference-did this with a single car and it works quite well-but wont uncouple over the LGB manual uncoupler thingys)
one other thing is that from time to time, with some cars-the bogies will travel off center with normal hooks (ie yaw in airplane parlance) , or if due to the rack heaving upward , it can raise the cars and even the loco ) and cause issues, and, they can sometimes catch on the rack rails at the start-up point ( i have a a few rack- then no rack- then rack-so ive noticed this-slow speeds arent an issue-higher speeds can be quite exciting tho
finally use about 2 rack holders per 300mm, sometime 3 on R1-helps prevent shifting heaving and other issues
at first i thought this was not necessary , but with temp changes and heavy load and slippage of the racks etc-it is in fact necessary