Matt,
Most of the Athearn freight cars in the 40'-50' range are older 50's era cars and would have a 50 ton bettendorf(non-roller bearing) truck under them. Newer cars like the 'Railbox/FMC/etc...) cars would have a
70 ton roller bearing truck as a general rule. Kadee has bettendorf trucks available - 380-500 & 380-511. The Kadee trucks feature all metal side frames with real springs and their own metal 'non-magnetic' wheels. Now, with that said, why not use the Athearn truck and use P2K 33" wheel sets in it? This should give you a good combination of detail and good rolling. The working springs really do nothing for 'tracking' and the 'engineering' plastic Kadee uses for the axles seems to 'grind' down and the rolling qualities seem to 'de-grade' with time. The P2K wheel sets have some kind of 'engineering' plastic in them also, but seems to be 'harder', and does not appear to wear down and 'gunk' up in the Athearn side frames. A good purchase would be to by the 'exact' tool from Reboxx to ream out the journals on any of your trucks, the rolling qualities will improve. You can also get what appears to be this tool from 'Micro-Mark' tools....Jim Bernier
Matt & Kathleen Brennan wrote:
Matt,
That Athearn tank car is about a 14,000 gal tank car - the paint job appears to be for Union Pacific iesel fuel service. This car has the standard Athearn bettendorf truck under it. It could be either 50 or 70 ton capacity(the diference is in the size of the axles/bearings). If you are modeling the 50's, the Athearn friction bearing 'benttendorf' is correct. Modeling later era's would use a roller bearing style truck.
Jim Bernier
Matt & Kathleen Brennan wrote:
I agree completely. I looked through the Walthers catalog late last night and decided that a package of either the Kadee 33" metal wheels or the P2K 33" metal wheels was the best option in the end. I'll use the existing Athearn trucks. I will definitely acquire the Reboxx tool [or Micro-Mark's version] as well.
Many Thanks for the replies - everyone!
Sincerely, Matt
Agreed. I might have a pair of P2K metal wheels in the parts box. If so, I'll slip them in to see how they work. But, keeping the Athearn trucks, as you suggest, is the best solution. I can easily remove a Kadee wheel set from a car and compare them as well.
Thanks Paul!
What you really want is the Reboxx tool as well as an assorment of the different length axle wheelsets. That way, you have something to match any particular sideframe you might run into. I bought a handful of all the different lengths; that way, I had what I need when I need it (reorder when getting low).
Peter King of Flying Scotsman Hobbies was thinking about putting together this sort of kit at one time to sell; don't know if he ever did or not....
Kennedy
Reboxx does have a set of axles in 10 sample lengths, WS-SAMPLES, that they sell themselves for just this purpose. It's $10.00. The only thing it's missing is the tool.
-fm Webmaster of the Pere Marquette Historical Society, at
I bought the sample set, plus extras of all the different lengths so I didn't have to wait to order the correct ones and possibly lose interest in completing a project (which I do a lot of the time). The advice I was giving Peter was to include extras of all the lengths to avoid this.
Kennedy
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