Tender driven loco

[Trains trains trains]

Hello, I am wanting to buy a tender driven locomotive and was just wondering how reliable are they. Are they quiet or loud runners. If anybody could recommend these locomotivesmthat would be greatly appreciated.

[Trains trains trains]

I am thinking about a Hornby R2119 King class near new.

[ColinB]

The biggest issue I have with tender driven locos is that they don't pick up power from all wheels, generally they get power from the loco for one side and the tender for the other side. On some of the later locos Hornby improved this, so some of the late China ones do. The other issue is traction tyres on the tender going hard, but you can replace these. If they are not oiled they make a winding noise, but that is easy to fix with some oil. Kings are quite a short wheelbase so I assume they are a bit easier for the tender to push around also the tender is the 3 wheeled variety and from my experience are better for traction than the A3/A4. Reliabilty wise they are perfectly ok, I have been sorting out my really old locos, I have just got back into the hobby and was surprised that most of mine still worked after being stored for the best part of twenty years. A tender driven loco is usually substantially cheaper than the later loco driven version, so if you are happy with one then you are saving quite a bit of money. Converting them to DCC is possible, I found doing the opposite of Hornby works really well, put the chip in the loco and connect the loco to tender with the same lead Hornby use on their later models.

[JJ73]

Hey Train Trains Trains - I've made a whole video about that on my YT cahnnel - Here is the link :- Click here

Thanks in advance

[Puffed Out]

Tender driven/motors, in my opinion, are easier to clean and service. Look after them, they look after you.  The older the tender drive is, the likelyhood is that the magnet may need re-magnatising. 

I have 2 Royal Scots, one tender driven(9 years old), the other Loco driven(new).  On any given power setting the tender driven goes that bit better/faster.

[BreatGritain]

If I may hijack the thread and ask..

 

Puffed out, what are the symptoms of a tender drive that requires re-magnetising? And any links / guides to remagnetisation?

 

Curiosity more than anything.

 

Thanks

[96RAF]

Plenty of info about remagnetising on the forum, mostly X03/4 motors but same principle.

[Chrissaf]

What are the symptoms of a loco motor that requires re-magnetising? And any links / guides to remagnetisation?

.

This video really explains it very well indeed with pratical demonstrations of before and after ... well worth a watch.

.

.

 

[ColinB]

Everyone seems to jumping onto this remagnetising thing with ringfield motors. I know it is an issue with Wrenn/Hornby Dublo where they have a solid magnet, similarly Triang/Hornby X03/04 motors, but I have not noticed an issue with any of my Ringfield motors. I did have an issue where I put the flexible magnet in the wrong place, but other than that I have not had any problems with magnetism. On most occasions  it is the armature or brushes. I think if I remember back to my basic electrical engineering the magnet is less likely to lose is magnetism because it is in a ring, but I may be wrong. Most of my ringfields are at least 20 years old, I have most issues with traction tyres. The reason ringfields go much faster is that ringfields are generally 3 pole motors, most loco driven motors are 5 pole, plus the gearing is much different. Try running your ringfield at crawl speed and see how it compares with a modern loco. I have tried it with a tender driven Duchess and the equivalent modern loco driven version.

Oh, if you want to know if it needs magnetising check the current drawn by the motor, if it is excessive like nearing towards 1 amp or greater then you have an issue with magnetisation. Worse case the motor will actually burn out.

[The Duke 71000]

Quote (Colin B) "Everyone seems to (be) jumping onto this remagnetising thing with ringfield motors" Unquote.

 

Indeed and in many cases for the wrong reasons. The ringfield motor as produced by Hornby is NOT a very powerful design, and is now over 40 years old, which is why it is confined to certain "Railroad Range" models. So re-magnetising these motors is unlikely to make much improvement if any, to haulage capacity.  

 

Traction tyres: Virtually all major overseas ranges apply traction tyres as a matter of course to nearly all their model locos. So you can double deck your layout to make better use of the available space in the average home, and overseas modellers appear to have no problems.

 

Only the British seem to have problems with traction tyres, and in most cases it is the customers lack of awareness or understanding that produces the problems. Any loco with traction tyres must NEVER be pushed along the track even for 1 inch or risk immediately stretching the tyre and damaging it, so it can no longer function correctly  ! 

 

I have had no problems whatsoever with my half a dozen Hornby class T9's or my five Schools class locos. Indeed these two model types wouldn't pull a realistic load on my exhibition layout without traction tyres. My Schools class locos quite happily pull 15 coaches up a long 1 in 100 gradient, straight out of the packet. Which makes them significantly stronger than even the much larger Bulleid Pacific models as supplied !      

 

High amperage draw is NOT necessarily a result of insufficient magnetism. For example I discovered that a new Hornby Bulleid Pacific with 12 new Hornby Pullmans in tow triped out my panel mounted controllers (set for 3.5 amps max) in less than 30 seconds. When tested the train was trying to draw over 4 amps. The reason, the Hornby Pullmans (with LED tablelamps) now have capacitors (electricity guzzlers), and other electronics included, mainly for the benefit of DCC users. I don't use DCC, so I was forced to rebuild my Pullmans by removing all the superfluous electronics and rewire the table lamps. This reduced the whole trains draw to around 1.3 -1.5 amps, and in the process prevented a potentailly dangerous fire !

 

Amperage draw by a locomotive is affected by many factors including how many vehicles the loco is pulling, incorrect or over lubrication or old lubrication that has become thick. Resitence in axles, gears and any other mechanical part than can cause drag, or of course a faulty or partially burnt out motor. A motor with flywheels will also increase the amperage draw slightly as the motor has to cope with the momentum created in the flywheel(s) turning. Electrical resistance by DCC chips; incorect wiring of the layout, where very slight shorts may be occuring; the quality and type of wires used on the layout etc, ect !

 

The wise modeller joins a good local model railway club  !

 

The Duke 71000         

[atom3624]

Back to the original Opening Post.

 

I have had tender driven locomotives in the past, but prefer locomotive driven for realism, but from previous experience and cherry picking some comments on here:

1. They are reliable - but can require some maintenance.
2. Maintenance is quite straightforward - cleaning, brush replacement, tyre replacement.
3. Noise - there is some you could call characteristic of such drive - some more than others.
4. Performance - can vary depending on overall use, but generally very impressive.

The decision is yours. If you like it, it runs well (if not directly, perhaps you can request a running video from the seller?), then over to you.

 

Al.

[Trains trains trains]

Hello, thank you all for your help, I think I will steer clear of tender driven locomotives. 

[Tony57]

Hi Trains.

I run old Locos with X04 and X03 motors, Ringfield tender drives and Modern. I prefer the older moters as they are home servicable / repairable they may not be as detailed as todays models but they are less fragile and have a more robust motion gear. I also prefere the simpler electronics involved with the older models My oldest loco was made in 1955 and is still working today, its a Triang Class F7 Transcontinental Deisel with a Mark 1 motor bogie. My oldest Ringfield is the original 2 10 0 Evening Star with its silver seal ringfield motor made late 70's. 

If you ask modellers whats the best some will rubbish X04/3 and ringfield and say modern is best others rubbish modern motors and say ringfields are best others X04/3 are better than modern each to thier own preferance.

Do not be put off by others preferances, buying anything secondhand has its issues, it could be a minter or a dud. Older model are made in larger numbers than today's so getting replcement parts is easier and standard motors were used, so a bad one can be replaced with a good one, where as today spares are limited and new replacement motors can be hard to come by.

[ColinB]

In response to someone's earlier response to check if the motor has lost magnetism. When I said that you check the amount of amps the loco is drawing, that was without any load (no carriages), but I thought that was obvious. As for traction tyres, rubber goes hard naturally over the years try driving a classis car/bike with 30 year old tyres plus for the last few years rubber is not what it used to be.