It was hypothesized over the weekend that some of my cars may be too light. I intend to weigh them on a digital scale to be sure. I found the NMRA RP for weight. Now the question is: if I need to add weight, where should I place it? Obviously, lower is better. I'm guessing it should be centered, but here's a twist: Metrolink trains run in reverse half the time, so the cabcar at the end of my train will be leading. Will more weight over the front truck help keep it on track, or will it make things worse? Does anyone think the NMRA recommendation is too light or too heavy? Scientific explanation, firsthand experience, or unsubstantiated opinions sought.
In adding weight to cars, I would keep it as low and distributed as you can. I don't know what scale you are in, but with my N scale cars that seem a little light, I often use these little pieces of 1/4 oz lead with adhesive on one side. At minimum, I use the NMRA RP and then figure out the weight of my car (I have a scale meant for cooking and it is pretty accurate) and then take the difference between RP and actual and split it in half, with half the added weight over each truck. I think an even more ideal practice would be to make a uniform plate, but sometimes that doesn't work out visually. (I know, I know - lead bad. I am not letting babies disassemble these cars and put their mouths all over the weights). I would hesitate before loading the weight at one end. If you think about the prototype, I would guess it has a fairly evenly distributed weight load. It seems like it could only result in that other end wanting to jump around a bit. Adam
As a rule, I don't worry about the weight of my cars unless they are causing problems. If a car won't track properly then adding weight will normally help....but if the car tracks fine out of the box I don't worry if it meets the NMRA standard, and when I add weight, I add weight till it tracks properly, again not worrying if it's over or under weight. If the weight is truly centered, it doesn't matter if it's in the middle or placed over the trucks at the ends of the cars. I agree that placing the weight at one end of the car is probably a bad idea........weighting that end car a little extra heavy might not hurt, but I'd distribute the weight evenly. Remember ....if you add weight to all your cars, your engines may not be able to haul the same size trains you've pulled in the past.....which is the reason I only add weight when it's truly needed.
I always weight kits up to NMRA using lead (I keep a roll of roof flashing sheet for the purpose) as I guess they've done the research to establish the ideal weight. But prototype cars weights vary hugely anyway between loaded/empty, so I wouldn't sweat it unless, as already said, you have a problem with cars jumping off. Two points about the cabcar situation, but it applies to all trains. I wouldn't put all the weight at one end of a car. As well as leaving the other end light it will possibly overload the axles at that end causing excessive wear. That's just a theory, but again maybe the NMRA recommendations include an allowance for that. Also, having a heavy car at the opposite end to the loco (with lighter cars between) increases the risk of 'stringlining' when pulling or 'crumpling'?? (whatever you call the opposite effect) when pushing. Better to have heavy stuff by the engine and reduce weight as you move down the train. But just having them all the 'right' weight would be more practical really.
Car Weight All my cars are weighted according to car length. The NMRA standard is a great rule to follow. I use used lead tire weights i get from the local tire shop. I use the stick on ones in 1/4 ounce segments. The remaining tape is removed by soaking in lacquer thinner for about ten minutes. When determining how much weight to add I weigh the car and if it is a 50 foot car that weighs only 4 ounces I add one ounce of weight half an ounce over each truck or as low as is possible in the car. Adair shops makes some weights that can be added to open top cars and not show. My personal weight standard is 1 ounce per 10 scale feet of car length. I have a 3 1/2 ounce minimum for cars under 35 scale feet and a maximum of 7 ounces for cars over 70 scale feet. A 50 foot car would weigh 5 ounces. Light weight cars can be a source of operational problems especially in long trains.
I didn't catch whether or not you are in N Scale, HO or any other scale. In which case I really don't know where to start other then to say the NMRA standards are in my opinion right on. Outside of the box...there are some unusual ways to go about weighting a car. Allow me to share some ideas... I've seen and tried. I've seen pennies cut in half, washers, bolts, nuts, fisherman's weights and even some sand used to weight cars. My advice is to weight the car's to a minimum and weight them alike. For N Scale I use the standard of one ounce total weight for a 40 foot freight car. Anymore and the train becomes to heavy to pull up my 2% grades. I also insist on smooth running trucks Ie., Micro-Trains. From my bag of experience comes this example: I had a baggage car that followed in behind a Life Like PA which came with a dummy knuckle coupler on the front end. Since, I wanted to run two PA's back to back, AA style I knew I would have to switch out the ugly Rapido box like coupler on the baggage car. I then replaced the Rapido Coupler with a Micro-Trains knuckle coupler. Only to learn that the coupler on the PA would pull the baggage car off the track. Some research, including a visit to the LHS, a brief discussion with Jim the owner, resulting in a small Micro Trains boxed coupler and instructions on how to install it on the PA's nose and I was off and running. Still the couplers tended to pull the baggage car off the track. Not wanting extended room between the locomotive and baggage car or room to have a N Scale family picnic, while sitting on the couplers. In other words keeping the distance prototypical correct as in short. I put in a call to Jim. His response...Weight! Add some weight! Which is contrary to his usual take on the subject. And it certainly goes against my thinking especially with N scale, since I operate trains on 2% plus grades. Well, I added one ounce of weight and ended up with a total of two ounces... before I was finished. The baggage car now stays on the track and it doesn't matter if it's in a reverse move or pulling through a minimum 15 inch radius curve. This worked this time but I still ended up with a car that is in my opinion overweighted and shortens the train... by one car length. After thoughts or things to consider: Edited add on. One of the reasons I've seen guys add weight, has more to do with the track work. One layout I visited, the track was atrocious. Out of gauge 9 to 11 inch radius curves and poorly angled rail joints. Not to mention the ski jumps. I also found as much as five to six ounces of weight in many of his N scale cars. Fix the track and the need to use excessive weight disappears. You mentioned operating on a club layout. Most of the time club layouts are very well done. However, there are those exceptions. If your cars run well at home.. on your layout, you may need to look at the club's track work. I've seen some modular clubs where most of the sections are very well done and one persons contribution is the exception... causing users all kinds of grief. I might add here the owner is usually the one saying you might need to add some more weight to your cars. I don't think so. Out of context perhaps but! One fellow lost a beautiful HO steamer to a concrete floor because someone left the bridge up. Got's to be careful. Kind of sad to say the least. I do hope's that helps.
If it ain't broke... Gotta agree with MRLDave -1:1 cars vary greatly in weight. I can't see adding weight unless I've got a problem that only weight will correct. Maybe I'm lucky, and maybe superelevated curves help, but I've had to add weight to cars only twice (about 2%). It's been my experience that derailing usually is caused by something else (track, couplers, truck doesn't like its kingpin). Scott
I have encountered a few HO freight cars where I had to be creative to add weight to the cars. The Walthers covered coil gondolas are notoriously underweight. I found that that for about 22 cents I could add enough weight to bring them up to the NMRA recommended weight. I took two sets of 11 pennies and wrapped them in silver duct tape. It turns out that the pennies are the right size to simulate a coil load. I set one "coil" in the cradle over each truck. These cars now run like a champ. Also the Walther Classic kit 3483 cu ft coal hopper is about 3 ounces under the NMRA recommened weight as built. I filled the car with HO scale coal and glued it in place. I used a 50/50 mix of matte medium and water. This is the same mix that I use for ballast glue. I did take about four days for the glue to set completely. I have done this to several cars now. They all now have enough weight to run well without derailing. Bob Perkins
With all my cars I replace the steel weight with lead. I've Kadee magnets and they don't like steel in the cars. I use the NMRA suggestion. I have the experience it's better to have more weight than less. Wolfgang
Yep. (See my website - HO Rolling Stock ) Yep. (See my website ... again ) I always try to weight open cars (like hoppers and those darned coil cars) in the 'empty' condition, so I can run them like that without problems. Not always possible to have the full weight, but usually get fairly near.
Several years ago, a friend of mine used BBs to add weight to his N-scale cars...often well-over the NMRA RPs. One day I chided him for over-weighting his cars and reducing the number of cars he could pull up a 2% grade...but when I went home that night, I checked my own cars and found several that were much heavier than needed because I had, rather indiscriminately, added weights (One or two 1/4 oz weights with adhesive pads on the back) to light cars that were derailing when pushed through the turnouts in the throat of a yard. Apparently I had solved the wrong problem...when I fine-tuned the trackwork/turnouts in the yard, I didn't need the extra weight in so many cars. On my present layout, I still use the 1/4 oz lead weights with adhesive pads on the back, but now they're just in my short beer can cars and 2-bay covered hoppers. I also had trouble with some empty 89' container cars until I put a weight inside the containers and stopped running the cars without a container. Scott's (Siskiyou's) comment about trucks and incorrectly sized kingpins is exactly right. A number of years ago, I had switched out original coupler trucks for MT trucks with couplers but failed to also replace the kingpins with the MT pins provided. I had dozens of derailments until I realized how much slack/wiggle there was in the replacement trucks with the original kingpins. Reliability went up immensely when I used the proper MT pins in the MT trucks. A word to the wise: Several times I've purchased used N-scale cars that had replacement trucks but original kingpins. These cars often had extra weight put in them, too, possibly in an attempt to make them more reliable. I'd bet many of these were sold off because the extra weight didn't solve the derailments caused by the wrong kingpin.
