Reclaiming Damaged or Generally Unacceptable Coach Wheels

[John Fitton]

Has anyone found a way of reclaiming coach wheels which were badly manufactured or damaged? I have a fairly large stash of older wheels which are wobbly or are otherwise not suitable for incorporation into the fleet, and it seems a shame to consign them to the trash heap without some investigation into a large scale repair programme. Right now just looking at the standard 14mm disc wheel set.

John Fitton.

[David Knight]

If you are speaking of Gibson wheels the fault can often be traced to a left over pip on the casting for the hub. Once fettled back into a closer approximation of round the tyre can be pressed on and the wheel will run true, or more true, or truish

Cheers,

David

[John Fitton]

Hi David,

The main issue is with wheels not running true on the axles. I am ok with fettling up the plastic centres and re-securing the tyres, but an equally frequent problem is securing the plastic centre onto the steel axles.

John

[billbedford]

Hi David,

The main issue is with wheels not running true on the axles. I am ok with fettling up the plastic centres and re-securing the tyres, but an equally frequent problem is securing the plastic centre onto the steel axles.

That's exactly why springing was invented.....

[Terry Bendall]

When Alan Gibson ran the business he would normally replace wobbly wheels without any query. If they have been bought since Colin took over the business you might find that he will do the same. Worth asking the question.

Terry Bendall

[Philip Hall]

To my mind, springing, or any other kind of suspension for model vehicles, was not invented to alleviate problems caused by eccentric wheelsets, it is there to improve the ride and appearance of the vehicle on the track, and of course to allow for track which is not perfect, as it will inevitably be.

If wheels are eccentric, the engine and stock will bounce up and down and this just looks awful. You will see this on layouts of all scales and gauges.

Philip

[John Fitton]

I have generally standardized on the three-point suspension method for bogie vehicles, using the MJT and Brassmasters CCUs with complete success. I select the best wheel sets for the bogie with no roll capability and the marginally acceptable wheels for the bogie with the ability to roll. Generally vehicle stability is very good. However, I have over fifty axles that are unusable, so I am looking for a salvage scheme.

Any ideas welcome...

John

[Philip Hall]

I have not (yet) tried to true up an eccentric 14mm carriage wheel centre, but the problem is, as you say, securing the wheel on the axle either during turning or afterwards. My method of wheel turning involves an interference fit of the wheel on the turning mandrel, and if it's loose obviously that won't work. Which is why I've not done it.

However, I have knurled the end of axles before now when a wheel has become loose and that method has had some success. Might be worth having a go at a wheel and remounting it that way to see if it will hold.

Philip

[John Palmer]

I would be most reluctant to attempt curing an eccentric wheel by turning it on a mandrel. If the tyre is eccentric then I would treat it as scrap. If the disc insert has been manufactured with an off-centre bore then re-boring and bushing it to cure that eccentricity or replacing it with one having a concentric bore is the way I would go.

For eccentric disc wheels, I think I would be inclined to turn new inserts. Ideally these would be turned from a non-conductive material to provide the necessary insulation, e.g. Delrin. Otherwise such insulation would need to take the form of a bush between disc and axle.

However you approach the problem, curing it involves a lot of work that should not have been necessary. It may be worth the effort involved in setting up a production run of replacement components if you have a large number of defective wheels. Speaking for myself, I wouldn't otherwise want to incur that effort.

If it is essential to conserve the original insert (e.g. for spoked wheels?) then I would think in terms of mounting the wheel in a ring chuck for the purpose of re-boring the central boss on the correct axis. In this case there would be few alternatives to bushing the new, oversize bore unless you could find a satisfactory way of filling the original, off-centre bore. I suspect that bonding the chosen filler with the original moulding might be problematic.

[Philip Hall]

I think I may have been misunderstood, I would not try to turn a tyre, for the result would be to pull the tyre off with the turning force. All I have done, on the odd occasion when I have found it necessary with driving wheels, is to remove the tyre, then true up the moulded centre before remounting the tyre. This normally sorts out things. Mounting the wheel centre in a ring chuck and re-centring it is beyond my skills just now.

My mandrel is not strictly one in the normally accepted sense. It is merely a length of axle steel a few inches long, mounted in the three jaw chuck with the other end running in a bearing in the tailstock chuck. The wheel centre is mounted at the tailstock end. This removes any eccentricity there might be in the three jaw. Not my idea, I hasten to add, I pinched it from Brian Harrap. The moulded centre is the usual interference fit on the 'turning axle', so no clamping is required. I also turn the lathe by hand, as very little usually needs to be taken off a centre. Speed is not a good idea so you can see how much of the 'high spot' on the centre is being removed.

Now this works with driving wheels which are made from slightly flexible plastic, like AG, as the wheel happily grips the axle enough for the purpose. AG rolling stock wheels seem to be made from a harder plastic and are not easy to secure like this. Which was John's comment on fitting wheels to axles a little earlier in this thread.

However, I have actually trued up an errant Sharman bogie wheel by turning the tyre, in this case it worked because the Sharman wheel is locked on in both planes. I did take it very easy, though!


Philip

[John Palmer]

Sorry, Philip, I had indeed misunderstood about tyre turning, and I salute your courage in doing this on a Sharman wheel! It was the disaster I had when attempting this myself that accounted for my reluctance to adopt such a course.

I like the idea of running the mandrel in a tailstock bearing. You speak of this being mounted in the tailstock chuck, and this is fine if you can be sure that such a chuck will not introduce eccentricity of its own. Would it be worth making such a bearing to fit the tailstock's taper, so as to promote accurate mounting of it on the lathe's axis? Alternatively, you could set up the mandrel to turn between centres, which should eliminate eccentricity introduced by use of a 3-jaw chuck.

I would be interested to know the magnitude of the eccentricity John is seeking to rectify. I would have thought that little material needs to be taken off the diameter of a wheel's moulding before it becomes so slack a fit in the tyre as to introduce a different source of eccentricity.

[Philip Hall]

John,

The turning axle, as I call it, is mounted in the three jaw chuck. The other end of it, two or three inches away, runs in a bearing (a hole in a brass turning) rigidly mounted in the tailstock chuck, which in turn is clamped in place. The wheel moulding goes on the tailstock end of the turning axle. So the turning axle revolves in the bearing which cannot move. The eccentricity of my chuck is approx 1 thou (you might well say why am I bothering, just mount the axle in the 3-jaw in the first place, but there you go!) so there is very little to take out - the length of the axle does this quite happily. At the far end it all revolves quite true. Your idea is interesting but probably a step too far for my skills as this works very nicely. And my lathe is a very old Unimat SL (rejuvenated by Vincent Worthington with a Sherline chuck), so no morse tapers, only a 12mm thread! The tailstock chuck has also been renewed with a Rohm one.

As for taking off too much material, yes this does happen and you can end up with a slightly loose tyre. Often you only need to take off a smidgen, just the bulk of the 'high' point, maybe 2/3 to 3/4 or so of the diameter, which you can easily see as the lathe is being turned by hand. But if it does end up loose, then I superglue some Rizla paper inside the tyre at four equal spacings before mounting the tyre back on with Devcon 5-minute epoxy. The epoxy will ooze out a bit and take up the space between the papers. I also check that the front edge of the wheel moulding is exactly at right angles to the axle hole as well, so when the tyre is glued back on it is true in both planes.

In case you are thinking a photograph would help, so it would, but all my pictures of this are on our PC which right now will not connect to the Internet, so the descriptions will have to do.

Now you can all see that this is a) the Dickens of a fiddle, b) quite time consuming, and c) no use at all if you don't have a lathe. Thankfully it's not necessary very often these days, and when it is I restrict myself to driving wheels. I also quite like sorting out a problem like this and getting to a guaranteed result where the engine runs so much more nicely. But for the odd carriage or wagon wheel, for the reasons of securing the wheel centre whilst you're doing it, I wouldn't bother. I can see that where you have fifty of them, maybe some other method of mounting them (like clamping them on a mandrel mounted in the 3-jaw and doing the lot in one operation) might appeal. Not terribly helpful from the point of the original post!

By the way, when I trued up those Sharman bogie wheels three came out OK, but on the fourth I wondered why the tyre surface had turned black after a cut or two. Of course I had gone right through to the plastic, and eventually mounted a spare Gibson tyre on the Sharman centre. That was one of my first attempts, so you can see that from that first disaster I have started to learn!

Philip

[John Fitton]

Thank you all for your participation in this thread! I think I will have to do a financial accounting here and see what the loss would be by chucking the misfits. The intent of the OP was to see if there was a reasonable method of fixing fairly large numbers of wheels, but short of remoulding new centres I think I am out of luck.

Cheers.

John

[Crepello]

I think I will have to do a financial accounting here and see what the loss would be by chucking the misfits.

Don't forget there could well be takers for the tyres alone!

[sebring115]

Could you not see if Alan Gibson can provide just the mouldings after all the tyres and axles should be ok?

Mark

[Will L]

I'm wondering why you have so many? Sure you get the occasional bad one but they are exception.

[John Fitton]

I'm wondering why you have so many? Sure you get the occasional bad one but they are exception.

Will,

All these wheels go back at least twenty years, to the original Gibson/Maygib days. I found it quite common for wheels to slip on their axles. At least part of the cause was rough handling on my part during installation and removal from fixed plastic bogies. In discussions with a BRMNA member I will attempt a Loctite restoration...More later!!

John

[Paul Willis]

Has anyone found a way of reclaiming coach wheels which were badly manufactured or damaged? I have a fairly large stash of older wheels which are wobbly or are otherwise not suitable for incorporation into the fleet, and it seems a shame to consign them to the trash heap without some investigation into a large scale repair programme. Right now just looking at the standard 14mm disc wheel set.

John Fitton.

Hi John,

I've been meaning to post in response to this for the last few days, and now have some time. Over the last couple of months I've been on a wagon renovation programme, looking at bringing wagons which I built many years ago or have been subject to damage over time up to the standard of my current builds. Part of this has been to critically assess the running gear and wheels for each wagon.

Spinning each axle in turn, and comparing it to the axleguard and/or the brakeshoe has revealed whether or not the tyre is eccentric in any way. If it is, the W-irons are popped apart, and it goes in here:

Wheels reclaimed.JPG

At the moment, I'm not doing anything with the wheels, aiming to build up a fair number as my review and upgrade work continues. It sounds like you already have a fair number though

What I have noticed is it is rarely *both* wheels on a single axle which are faulty. So my aim is to cannibalise the axles and salvage the good (concentric) wheels and throw away the faulty ones. I should be able to do this by just putting the pinpoint on a hard surface and applying even pressure all across the inside of the tyre, press it down until it comes off the coning. I can then re-mount the good wheels on an axle from which I've removed the duff one.

As part of my renovation programme, I'm also double checking the BtB measurement. I'm much more careful now than when I first built some of these wagons, when I just made assumptions about the wheels and slung them in. First I do the check for any pips or misalignments, as others have suggested. Something like this is common, and needs removing with a scalpel or smooth file.

Burred wheel 2.jpg

Similarly, it the back of the wheel protrudes further than the back of the tyre, I will use a file to smooth it back. This wouldn't normally affect running, as any contact with check rails will be on the back of the tyre, not the wheel, but it does make measuring the effective BtB more difficult.

When the checks have been made, and the wheels adjusted if necessary, I lock the wheel in place in the axle with some thick superglue, applied with a cocktail stick. The axles are then marked to indicated they have been set to my standard:

Wheels spotted.JPG

I even have a little note on my workbench to remind me

Wheels check.JPG

In this way, I aim to salvage half of the faulty wheels I have, and I'll aim to "not buy" any dodgy ones in future by checking them before purchase.

HTH
Flymo

[Terry Bendall]

What I have noticed is it is rarely *both* wheels on a single axle which are faulty. So my aim is to cannibalise the axles and salvage the good (concentric) wheels

A sound idea which I have done on many occasions.

I should be able to do this by just putting the pinpoint on a hard surface and applying even pressure all across the inside of the tyre, press it down until it comes off the coning

My method is similar. I put the axle end vertically on a piece of scrap wood and use a small pair of flat nosed pliers to gently grip the axle then press down on the back of the wheel. This removes it without distorting the wheel itself.

Terry Bendall

[Tim V]

Would you say this is a "fair number"?

IMG_8391.JPG

26 years of exhibiting, and a "no prisoner" approach to reliability has lead to this number of rejects, coach and wagon wheels.

Is this acceptable?

I have banged on about this over the years - why can't we pay more for a better quality product.

Better quality = less rejects = cheaper as you don't throw away half your wheels.

No I can't give them back to Gibson, some are Studiolith for example.

These days, if I want a reliable wheel, I buy the solid Nickel Silver ones, and forgo the extra detail of the plastic centre. I want rolling stock that will reliably run from A to B, not something that looks good from 2" away, but falls off.

[Terry Bendall]

I have banged on about this over the years - why can't we pay more for a better quality product.

I expect there will be a manufacturer somewhere who would make more expensive wheels which may be more reliable. Whether anyone is prepared to pay more is another matter.

These days, if I want a reliable wheel, I buy the solid Nickel Silver ones, and forgo the extra detail of the plastic centre

Well its your train set etc but I think that if the vehicle needs spoked wheels that is what most people will want to fit. Solid wheels v. three hole discs might be another matter as might the provision of an etched brake disc.

Terry Bendall

[grovenor-2685]

I expect there will be a manufacturer somewhere who would make more expensive wheels which may be more reliable. Whether anyone is prepared to pay more is another matter.

Isn't that what Ultrascale have a reputation for.
Regards

[Jol Wilkinson]

I expect there will be a manufacturer somewhere who would make more expensive wheels which may be more reliable. Whether anyone is prepared to pay more is another matter.

Isn't that what Ultrascale have a reputation for.
Regards

Yes, but regrettably they don't do the wheels some of us want.

[Philip Hall]

I have used AG carriage wheels with success many times, and later ones from Alan and recent ones from Colin Seymour have been very good. I do like the solid nickel silver wheels, but when buying a few years ago I checked and found quite a few that wobbled, so they went back in the bin; at those prices (which I have no problem with) I felt entitled to be fussy. A recent large batch of Ultrascale carriage wheels were bang on the money, every one.

Philip

[Paul Willis]

I expect there will be a manufacturer somewhere who would make more expensive wheels which may be more reliable. Whether anyone is prepared to pay more is another matter.

Isn't that what Ultrascale have a reputation for.
Regards

Exactoscale?

http://www.finescale.org.uk/index.php?route=product/category&path=541_542_545_546_547

Cheers
Flymo