| If I was a
betting man, I'd put my money on oxidized tender
bolsters. ?Every Mantua 4-4-2 I've worked over had
this problem. ?For some reason the lot of pot
metal used for the tender floors picks up the
usual Mantua carbonized black junk very quickly.
?The first one I worked on about drove me nuts
till I figured it out. ?When clean, they'll run
like a dream, then gradually get worse and final
run in stops and starts, just like you're
experiencing. ?Could be something else of course,
but that's what I'd check first. ?Try polishing
them and the tender truck bolsters up. ?Mantua put
a copper washer on some of them to try to help
with this problem, but it doesn't do much good. ?A
tiny amount of contact cleaner will keep them
working properly for a longer period of time, but
eventually you'll be back to cleaning the same
area. ?
??The real long term fix as already has been
mentioned is to equip the tender trucks with
wipers and hard wire them to the tender frame.
?I think the easiest way to do this would be to
solder spring bronze wire to the tender trucks.
?Have done that this year on a whole bunch of
General trucks with very good results.. If you
need some spring wire, contact me off list...it
doesn't take much
??I'd also check to make sure all the wheels
of all your tender trucks are in contact with
the rail. ?This loco has some issues with that,
esp. depending on what Mantua truck was used.
?The one that should be there and seems to work
best is the "Reading" style truck, but various
trucks were substituted depending on what was on
hand during assembly, and who did what after the
engine was sold.
??All the 4-4-2 s I've worked on had a nice
can motor and gear box. ?Don't know if they were
all that way, but those ran very nicely once
contact problems were resolved, and should
convert to DCC easily. ?Hardest part of the DCC
conversion will be wiring up those nifty
operating marker lampas. ?Haven't done one yet,
but think you'll need to add a resistor to drop
track voltage down on them.
??Finally, thanks for the kind words, Vic!
?Here I thought I was sneaking quietly onto
Ebay...you just can't get nothing past some
people (lol).
??My latest project has been working over a
group of 6 Rivarossi 4-4-0' s for a gentleman,
as well as 3 J. W Bokers. ?He's decided that he
really likes not having to hassle with dogbones,
so they are all getting two piece brass tubing
drive shafts and can motors. ?Think at this
point I could write a small book on pick
problems on these engines, and how to solve
them...basicaly the problems, no matter what
they act like come down to poor driver pickup.
?I'm find both the wipers and the little spring
plungers just don't act like they are supposed
to, and am just modifying them as a matter of
course...the improvement in performance is
simply amazing.
Continuing on my present HO layout, but have
just bough a lot of really old O gauge Truscale
tack from the New Orleans area. ?This stuff came
out of a club down there and is old enough that
there is a high probability that Frank Ellision
among others ran stuff on it. ?Got in mind a
small O scale loop arounf the workshop to test
and play with as well as some On30 trackwork,
that will also double as ?an HO repair test
loop, so I don't have to keep running from the
bench to the layout to test stuff.
??Finally got a pair of beautiful Tenoshodo
GN articulated locomotives from a friend to
clean up and sell. ?They all have rotten foam,
but I won't know how bad till I get into them.
?If any of you are looking for one of these,
drop me a line...maybe we can work a deal that
leaves everybody happy.
??Apart from that we ain't been blown or
washed away yet down here in the Ozarks, but
it's been a close thing a time or two. ?Any of
you guys going to be at Atlanta next
month...maybe I'll run into you.
JBB
??
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