I just found out the hard way that MTH's HO Triplex has dummy axels on the tender. I was lead to believe it had 12 live drive axels. MTH's owners manual calls them drive axels, when in fact they are just for looks. The old saying "what you don't know won't hurt you" doesn't apply hear. If I had known that, I would have not spent that much money on one! I just thought prospective buyers might want to know this!
Oh My.
My SD40 has an electric motor in it!! They said it was a diesel-electric!!
Dr EMD, But I thought when it was worded as "drive axels" it drove something, not just ride along! I bought it for more pulling power on a long coal train. I already got a Trix Big Boy with 8 drive axels. With its weight and length, it has more pulling power than this Triplex.
Chuff;
Maybe you ought to pay more attention to what you are shelling out your money for. There is an expression called "Question Authority", and it carries through to all aspects of life that will affect you; otherwise, the expression "Caveat Emptor" does hold a ring of truth, now doesn't it?
The Old Reprobate
I'm sure this was done on purpose to make the model just as big a flop as the prototype.
Sheldon
In real life the Big Boy had more pulling power than any of the Triplexes. I'm not sure of the length of the Triplex, but I believe it's much shorter something along the lines of a USRA 2-6-6-2. It's a "small" engine. BTW, if you decided to build a layout that is consistent, having a UP Big Boy and an Erie Triplex together is going to present some few problems.
Gene
Gene;
If you were doing a layout even vaguely based on prototype, why would you have both the triplex and big boy on the same track?
...Or, hows this? "And now, the further adventures of Bog Boy, and his friend Trilopetes"?
Ye Olde reprobate
Rich,
That was what I was trying to point out to Chuff. He says he has one of each. But then, I'm like Sheldon - I buy what I think my railroad needs: No N&W J, no Big Boy, no Cab Forward, no Milwaukee Road A, etc.
Gene
Gene;
As you know, I share your point of view. My point was that both the Big Boy and the Triplex each were indigenous to only one road; the triplex two. In that sense, it is illogical to run both simultaneously-foreign to/or- on a prototype based road. To me it would be like running a Milw. Little Joe on a Bill Aldrich's New Haven layout and say it is OK, because it is a motor.
I never bought anything in HO unless I had some information about it. Both Model Railroader and Railroad Model Craftsman review new releases. I know that there are folks who question the voracity of the reviews but one would certainly tell you if all 12 "axels" were powered.
The advantage of buying in a hobby shop is that you could ask for a demo.
Wasn't the original Erie triplex used in helper service only? I know that the Southern had a triplex (they put the mechanism of a consolidation under the tender.) This engine was used as a helper and pusher.
Woody,
I don't think the Southern had a Triplex. The Virginian did and they soon turned it into two Mikes (it was a 2-8-8-8-?. I think the Erie had other plans for their two, but was forced to relegate it to helper service almost as soon as it hit the property.
Gene
I think prototype is not even in MTH’s vocabulary. I don’t even think they have a prototype screw in their O gauge line! But then again I have never seen a magnetic coupler on any real train! I think they even have air hoses to couple up too! So is there any model train on the market that is a true prototype?
The MTH O gauge line is tinplate and tinplate is not built to scale. Lionel took many liberties with there models including offering 2-6-4 engines as well as shortened GG-1s and passenger cars.
As for the Southern Triplex - a search of my references shows that there was no such thing but I would have testified in court that one did exist. I do know they experimented with consolidation mechanisms under tenders.
Gene is correct on the Southern Railway. They had 2-8-2+2-8-0 locomotives that were mikados with an older 2-8-0 frame and machinery under the tender. They failed for the same reason as the triplex, not enough steam from the boilers to run both sets of machinery when needed. The Southgern never owned a triplex and only owned a few articulateds.
For what the Southern wanted, a Franklin booster would have been more practical.
For what the Southern wanted, a Franklin booster would have been more practical.
Then why wasn't it done?
Why wasn't a franklin booster added? I don't know but I bet it was cheaper to put the 2-8-0 mechanism under a tender and do the work in house rather than buy new stuff; especially when diesels were making their smelly appearance. Just a guess.
If I recall correctly the Southern had two 2-8-8-2 locomotives.
Rich,
I'm assuming that the Southern Railway engineering staff had a bunch of obsolete parts that were paid for and thought they could make it work. There's a reason that they bought standard locomotives in the first place, not many of the southern lines had much of a motive power engineering staff that were like the Pennsy, N&W, C&O or the western roads.
They probably didn't have anyone who could figure boiler steam production. It wasn't until Woodard of Lima and his staff really did the math that the so-called super-power steamers appeared in the mid 1920s. Alco and Baldwin followed in this case.
The Southern experiment was done in the mid 1910s as a less expensive way to get a mallet. Someone just forgot that the boiler was adequate only for the original locomotive.
Jim
Jim;
Make sense to me. I know that the Pennsy standardized as much of the parts on a locomotive for just that reason. If you can minimize the amount of variation, then for one thing, your inventory costs will be lower; and if a locomotive was wrecked, tubes ran out and wasn't worth re-tubing, etc, then the parts became inventory again, and were used elsewhere-or sold to other roads.
Obviously the same could be done for at least first and second generation diesels.
Woody;
All things considered, I doubt if it were cheaper to take a 2-8-0, and put a tender body atop the frame, when you consider man-hours, the parts, re-design, etc, and juxtapose that with ordering and installing-in house-a Franklin booster truck. SO to me, it is still a mystery.
We are talking 1910 when man hours were very cheap and abundant. Of course there may have been other reasons. Perhaps it was somebody's bright idea in their engineering department! It makes modeling interesting. The late Bill Schopp, who used to do brass bashing articles for RMC did one of those Southern engines.
As for labor at the start of the twentieth century; The City of New York decided to undertake a renovation of a school building built at the turn of the last century. The contractors were greatly surprised when they realized they had to deal with brick walls 18 inches thick. No steel studs and drywall in that building! Bricks were cheap and labor was plentiful.
Woody;
The only labour that was plentiful back then was either "just off the boat" labour, or bozos no one wanted anyway, because they were a bunch of undependable half-baked screw-ups. Skilled and certifiable trades were just like today: Some good, some really excellent and knowledgeable and with a pride ethic; and some just drifting along. I will guarantee you dollars to donuts that the good skilled tradesmen were never wanting for work; this certainly includes steamfitters, plumbers, (there is a difference) millwrights, welders, boilermakers, etc; and if you think that the "suits" of that era held any more sway than their fanci-fied counterparts of today, guess again-the tradesman was often the final word-and for damned good reason! Need I explain?
As far as the aspect of labour rates for skilled people went, it was as growlworthy then as is now. In short, skilled craftsman labour was not cheap! This only adds to my question about why [they] would go through the trial and tribulation of doing the 2-8-0 thing when a Franklin truck was not only efficiently more feasible, but a hell of a lot easier on the ways and means committee.
Incidentally, I remember one of Bill Schopp's article about that hinged boiler-I believe it was a Union Pacific prototype-do you remembee that one? it was sure odd-looking!
Rich,
The prototype hinged boiler was first used on some unusual mallets made by Baldwin for the Santa Fe. There were a couple of versions but the best known were som 2-10-10-2 helpers built specifically for the Cajon Pass run. There were some 4-4-6-2 passenger versions as well. It is all well-documented in many Santa Fe steam books.
TRhe hinges were flat plates that were bolted together to make the joint. Maybe 8-10 were used depending on locomotive. All were retired by the mid-1920s and converted into something else.
The late Bill Schopp noted that these were perfect prototypes for small radius curves, mostly tongue in cheek as he knew the real ones required as much radius as a normal USRA 2-8-8-2.
The 2-10-10-2s were made into the 1600 class 2-10-2s. I think the 4-4-6-2s were made into 4-6-2s.
The Virginian Triplex was a 2-8-8-8-4, and they turned it into a 2-8-8-0 and a 2-8-2. All these big loco freaks ought to look at a Virginian 800. 2-10-10-2 that was very successful. Well... except for number 800 herself.
Japasha;
Thanx for the info. I had the road wrong (Mia culpa...) and the 2-10-10-2 sounds like the model Bill Schopp did. He had sent in pictures of the prototype, and it was as odd-ball as the model. Both did look pretty strange!
Schopp was an extremely talented person and his words as well as his work were an inspiration to me. Every time I start working on the details of an engine, I think of him and the stuff he did. From him, I learned that research is always paramount; whether you are modelling prototype, or just superdetailing a steamer and want to use a logical approach to what you are doing.
Pertaining to the original subject, about the dummy drive wheels, the following is the answer I just received from MTH:
Hi. I am so glad to hear everything is working well with the engine
and your DCC system now. We certainly did not intentionally mislead
customers regarding the drive wheels on the tender of the HO Triplex.
These wheels are referred to as drive wheels to differentiate from
the pilot track and trailing truck; it seems in retrospect it would
have been more clear if we had indicated which drive wheels were
powered and which un-powered. Again, we did not intend to hide the
fact that these wheels were not powered or to mislead customers
regarding the number of powered wheels; I personally answered a
number of emails from customers on this issue letting them know that
these wheels were not powered. I can see your point, and the fact
that we did receive a number of emails asking this, does lend itself
to the notion that we need to clarify this for future engines; I will
pass your email and comments on to our marketing department for
reference. The HO line is a new venture for MTH and we do want to
make sure that we learn from any mistakes we make along the way.
Thank you,
Kirstin
Sounds to me like we are dealing with a company that is new at something and is making mistakes; but will listen and as they say, hopefully learn from those mistakes. Companies that are looking to achieve success with a product will almost always look to their customer for guidance. It is, therefore, soet of a responsibility of the customer to provide that guidance; because without it, [they] will nevere know exactly what is on your mind.
As I inferred before, maybe people should take a good look down the horse's throat before you buy it. Avoid doing that only if it is a gift...
I haven't seen a triplex in action yet, but there will come a day.
The Old Reprobate
r.cprmier
I agree with you 100%. Like I said I have one of the MTH Triplex and that is how i figured out it only had 8 live drive axels. I hooked it drawbar to draw bar with my Marklin Big Boy and the Big Boy took off with it like it wasn't there. It was simply due to the Big Boy's weight. I was expecting 12 live drive axels on the Triplex and got my specs broke! If you are wondering what I am doing running a Big Boy and Triplex on the same railroad, I don't. I have 3 seperate set ups and all with their prototypical sceneries. But anyway, the Triplex is a smooth runner and has more bells and whistles than I will ever use, but it just didn't meet my expectation on pulling power. It will pull 20 coal hoppers without spinning its wheels, will spin some, but go with 21, but can't get 22 started for lose of traction.
I put the traction tire drivers on my Triplex and it pulls a 54 car train on my layout easily.
mdtell
Do you have any problem with continuity on your Triplex with those traction tires? Every unit I have ever tried them on I had a problem with continuity with the rails. But again, the Triplex has 7 other axels to pick up the power. I might try that. I might have to go with a different lubricant for my rails. I have found out that a light film of 3-in-1 oil keeps continuity up and some binding in curves down with my long articulate units. I have 33" radiuses but still have some binding in curves at creeping speeds, when I have dry rails. I found out, by trial and error method, that clean dry rails causes derailment problems. I use all metal wheels on all my cars and a Centerline wide body track cleaner. The longer I ran the track cleaner, the louder the wheel noise got until derailment started in curves. I put some drops of 3-in-1 oil on the roller cloth, the noise and derailments immediately started decreasing and by the 3rd lap, was completely quite with no derailments. I also was informed by a tech that 3-in-1 oil would cut down on wheel pitting. But that 3-in-1 oil would do a number on those traction tires! So I would have to go with something like that Labelle 107 oil, which has no petroleum base, but that darn stuff is so expensive! I wonder how a something like a cooking oil would work? Anybody got any suggestions?
I have been running traction tires for 30 years with no continuity problems. But I don't oil my track. And I thought Wahls was bad.
I have no continuity problems and I only run the Triplex with train at 10 scale miles an hour, the same as the prototype. I do run my other trains at much faster speeds; all without problem. I have 33 inch minimum radius on my layout but I do not oil the track. I do not have noise, binding or derailment problems from dry track and my train has a mixture of metal and plastic wheels. There is some crud build-up at turnout points but I watch for that and remove it with a track cleaning block. I think if you dry your track and put the traction tire drivers on your Triplex you will find it to be a very smooth and good puller.
Discontinue 3 in 1 NOW! I don't see how in the world clean, dry rails would cause derailment problems.
Gene
About the onlything that makes sense to put on track is goo-gone or Wahl's oil. Anything else is ixnay!
Quote from: r.cprmier on May 19, 2008, 09:33:45 AM
About the onlything that makes sense to put on track is goo-gone or Wahl's oil. Anything else is ixnay!
Rich and others,
Actually for the purpose being used by chuff_n_puff the 3-IN-ONE oil is better than Goo Gone. In fact Goo Gone is very poor choice as it is not a lubricant. But then neither is the 3-IN-ONE oil a good choice based on the way chuff_n_puff was applying it.
Yes, Rich, I know you are not suggesting Goo Gone be used as a lubricant.
Since 3-IN-ONE oil will attack some plastics, but not all types of plastics, I generally tell folks not to use 3-IN-ONE oil in model railroading.
Some history â€" many years ago 3-IN-ONE oil was used by the O-Gaugers. You will find instructions to use 3-IN-ONE oil in some of the old Lionel manuals. But back then, there was no plastic in the locomotives or track.
Reminder: Here is what I have written about Goo Gone,
“If wheels very dirty use Goo Gone (not recommended for use on rubber traction tires) all-purpose cleaner in place of the alcohol [isopropyl alcohol] and gauze pad in place of the towel. After wheels are clean then spin wheels on dry towel to remove the cleaner residue.
If you are using DCC make an extra effort to remove the cleaner residue. Finish with very, very small amount of conductive contact lube on each metal driving wheel tread and electric pick-up rub points.â€
That was some good info. I found out a long time ago that goo gone left too much residue. I use a product by Aerocar that is a track cleaner and conditioner for DCC trains and it does a great job and claims to help on better continuity with DCC. I have had several people recommend Wahl clipper oil for lubricant, but had an old tech tell me today that he has used Johnson and Johnson baby oil for lubricant on rails in curves for a long time and it worked great and was plastic friendly. As long as I don't have to start burping my trains, I guess it will work!
chuff_n_puff,
With minimum 33" curve radius and nickel silver rail I am unsure about your need to lubricate the curves.
I have detected no need for any oil on nickel silver track railheads. Sure very, very thin film of certain types of oil on aluminum, brass, or steel railheads retards corrosion of them but oil not needed on nickel silver railheads. Unless, depending on the alloy or metal used to make the wheels, the oil on track could help keep a thin coating on electrical pickup wheel treads to retard corrosion and electrical arc pitting on them.
If you are having electrical conductivity issues oiling the track I suspect is only masking the actual source(s) of the issue.
Check your MTH locomotive using info in http://www.tonystrains.com/tonystips/2008/011008.htm
chuff,
Over my 30 years in the hobby I have know many modelers who use the Wahl clipper oil with great results.
I personally prefer dry rails and have never had pitting or pickup problems with nickel silver track.
Like Virginian, I have and like my locos with traction tires - another reason to stay with dry track.
I do use goo gone to clean dirty wheels but like Hunt sugests, I clean it off throughly before running trains.
Having done lots of testing regarding pulling power, I have never seen track lubrication to be good or necessary.
Sheldon