Atlas 4-4-0

No, they are using the Bachmann version.

Just received my Atlas 4-4-0, and I must say, it is exquisite in every respect... save for one. Why did they have to do the drivers with such low relief? Those spokes are virtually non-existent, worse in fact than B-mann's drivers. I just don't understand...

 

But is there room for a decoder?
I'm assuming, that since the motor is in the tender, there's some space in the cab?
Or decoder on top of motor and pile lots of wood around it?

 

I know this is the atlas model but several have put decoders in the bachmann 4-4-0. Some have put it in the tender and others on top with piles of wood. I'll pasted the link below. I don't imagine there could be too much of a difference between them. There are also a few videos of DCC 4-4-0s out there. Just search youtube for N scale DCC 4-4-0. BTW I love your work MC :teeth:

Here is the link:

http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/board/index.php?topic=22552.0

 

Or a hollow oil bunk, or add side extensions for an increased caol load and hide it under there. According to USPS tracking mine should be out for delivery right now as I type and I have a brand new in box, never been run, with original factory air, Bmann version sitting by the puter to set them side by side to do a comparision. Atlas already wins the first comparision in that it has tender and loco wheels pick-up. And as usual my slightly abby normal brain is racing forward thinking that maybe these little guys could be kit bashed into older versions of the ten wheelers like I and several others have done with the Bmann versions.

 

The cab is completely open (unlike the B-mann, which is filled with metal). It would be quite a squeeze to get one in there, however, and then you'd have all of those wires to contend with; I think a tall wood bunker on the tender would be the better option, which would certainly simplify wiring. This would then allow you to glaze the cab windows and add an engineer and fireman to boot.

 

Mine showed up today. It has the same problem that brokemoto mentioned. The pilot wheels are lifting the front driver just enough to stall the locomotive on track joints. I've only tested it on a bit of straight unitrack. I'll see if i can iron out the pilot wheel issue. I will probably play with getting dcc on it as well, but I have my doubts. We will see.

 

Well there was a knock at the door whilst I was slaving over a hot stove for the Missus. I rushed to the door in time to see the USPS Eagle departing in a flurry of feathers after depositing a box. Opened the box and there were my two new Atlas 4-4-0s. First thing I did was open and check the parts schematic. All metal boiler including the dome bases. So much for relocating the steam dome a little further forward, so plan B. Next thing I did was break out the scale and weight the little beauties. Almost 1.75 oz dripping wet. Next was to weight the Bmann 4-4-0 and almost an even 1.5 oz. Weight for traction point goes to Atlas for the all metal boiler. Noticed in the parts schematic that the top deck of the tender is a separate part so with that possibly removed and a new deck there may be hope for the DCC folks. Compared nose to nose the Atlas has the more delicate and less clunky details. Bell is smaller and very detailed for such a small part. Handrails are much thinner along with the pops and whistle on the steam dome. Headlight is less clunky and more to scale. And the valve gear is very fine detailed and delicate compared to the Bmann. And that is probably the part that the ten thumbed folks will damage first. First look appears to be all wheel pick-up except pilot wheels. Sitting on the track section the pilot appeared to have a very slight droop. Pushing it up gently resulted in slightly kinking the fine wire pilot deck braces. May have to reset them in new holes on the deck. As commented earlier the wheel spoke detail is very shallow but possibly a little Bragdon weathering powder carefully applied may highlight that area and bring it out more. In all I am reminded of the Shay in the delicate nature of the details. And here is a quick photo of the Bmann and the Atlas pilot to pilot.



I'll try prying out that tender top this evening, hopefully it is not glued in. This weekend at some point I'll break out the test track and try them on my old 7 and 5/8ths switches I have and see if they make it through those. Then I'll load some gons down with lead and run some tests on tractive effort and grades. But so far first impression is good.

Trying another shot hopefully zoomed in a bit more and lightened some.

 

Got the top deck off the tender after I finally figured out how it was attached. Basically flip the tender upside down and remove the first and last wheels by carefully prying the side frames out a bit. This exposes a philips head screw in each corner that anchors the top in. Top basically falls right out then. There is no room at all under that top deck. Two large weights set either side of the motor and the tender will disassemble into quite a few pieces unlike the Bmann tender. It may be possible to mill out space in the metal weights on either side but I don't think so and then there is the issue of loosing weight in the tender needed for pick-up. However it is quite possible to build up an extended fuel bunk on the tender top deck using the tender deck as the bottom frame for it so it can be solidly re-attached with the four screws. There is quite a bit of space between the tender top and the cab roof overhang so a small decoder should clear. The side toolboxes on the tender deck are separate pieces that can be removed giving more width. In the process of finding out just how delicate some of these pieces are I was putting the tender deck back in and rested the loco on the work mat. Managed to break off the steam dome detail which are separate pieces on the dome. Fortunately I have the same in my steam parts box and the dome top is plastic which fit into the metal dome base. So for me it is just a matter of popping the dome top off and replacing the parts. I'm still impressed with the details though and I have to get back in the mentality of handling a fine Swiss watch innards instead of some of the more clunky parts of the Bmann.

Oh and replacing the tender wheels back in there little metal cups can be a bear.

 

Ok, so I have mine apart.

First, a quick rundown on disassembly. Remove the wheelsets from the trucks. Remove the four screws on the bottom of the tender. The top of the tender can now be removed. To remove the motor, the weights must first be removed. I pushed the two brass pins that portrude from the bottom of the weights through the tender floor to accomplish this. The motor has two mounts that secure it to the floor. The mounts use two friction pins in the tender floor that can be separated with an x acto or similar tool.

The motor has bare braded wire that simply wedges between the weights for power. The pickup tabs from the tender trucks wedge into a slot in the weights. The two brass pins I mentioned earlier collect power pickup from the locomotive itself, via the drawbar.

I have come up with a couple ideas for dcc, but none are easy. I think that mounting the chip to the top of the tender is definitely the way to go. This will require coming up with a way to cover/ disguise it. I would like to make mine a wood burner anyhow, but I don't have much of a clue how to build the wood load.

I think that the method I might try will be to use thin brass sheeting over the drawbar pickup pins, around the weights, and ultimately solder a wire to those through the coal load area that I would remove from the tender top. The wires for the motor could access the motor contacts through the same absent coal load. I would remove the function/ lighting wires from the decoder and cover with a wood load of some kind.

I want no part of wiring the locomotive headlight to the decoder. I would leave it to use track power. After all, a headlight of that era would use whale oil or similar and would not be turned on or off on command. Come to think of it, in daylight it probably wouldn't be on at all. I don't really know- I wasn't around then!

Anyhow, these are my thoughts after first look. I will make a decision about how to proceed tomorrow. For now, I am tired and in need of a cold one, after another busy week at work. I don't really need this locomotive to be dcc. I bought it as a novelty, really and would be fine to run it on conventional dc- I just kinda want to take on the challenge. I hope some of this mad rambling is helpful to someone.

 

About a year or so ago I took two steamers and converted them to wood burning logging locos. The side extensions were set back so the cab roof would clear and the wood load is made of small branches trimmed off an Azelea bush cut to length of about 3 foot and split with a single edge razor blade. A number of pictures I have of the older stuff in the 1800s shows when they "were wooded up" the pile of wood often was higher than the cab roof. Not a great picture but here's an idea.


And maybe a little better photo of my two wood burners.

 

John, those wood loads look great. Nice work on those locomotives in general. My L&N steam locomotives book has several pictures of 4-4-0 wood burners in it that show a mess of wood stacked all over the tender deck, so I think stashing the decoder in there would be do-able. Thanks for the tip, that's just what I needed.

 

Well after spending the morning helping the Wife to spend money I sat down this afternoon with the test track set up and the 4-4-0. After cleaning the track I powered up and began to put it through its preliminary paces. Initially took about 3 volts to get it moving and I at first thought the headlight was burnt out. As I increased the voltage and speed I finally saw a dim glow and turned out all the room lights to check further. Now I know this is supposed to be an oil light but in my opinion it is even too dim for that. After a bit of back and forth running everything smoothed out and mine would crawl nicely down the track at about 2 volts. Suspect that this will get better with time and running. The low slung pilot had no issues with the switch machines and the only thing it did not like was the Atlas rerailers. The pilot wanted to drag some on them. Non-powered frogs were no issue for it and it sailed smoothly through all of my old switches with the non-powered frogs. The big acid test was the old set of 7 and 5/8ths radius switches I have installed on one of the double track sections. Most everything will derail a pilot or trailing truck at least on them and it sailed through them both forward and in reverse with nary a hiccup. My test track has four tracks and the one set has these sharp turnouts while the other has the more standard 9 and 3/4th radius turnouts. I use the set with the sharp turnouts to test my logging critters and small locos to see what they can handle. So I believe this loco will handle curvature under 9 and 3/4ths. The rigid wheelbase tender had nary an issue with the tight radius.

After a suitable period of running I checked the tender for motor heat and was just slightly warm to the touch. I should have broke out my thermal tester but in hindsight I didn't. Next was time to see what type of grade it could handle by itself. That turned out to be a 14.5% grade without cars and before I said enough. See photo below for the 14.5% grade.



Next was time to put it back down to waterlevel and add cars and weight. Had 12 cars tacked on behind with some gons filled with lead .50 cal bullets and some other heavy weight from the old weight box. Took them all nicely down the track forward and reverse. Total weight behind the loco counting cars and extra weight was 14oz. At a 3% grade the load behind had to be reduced to 4oz. consisting of my two heaviest cars and two gons filled with lead weights. All the cars used were a mixture of 40ft. boxcars, gondolas, and two 60 foot troop cars, along with three work cabooses and all running on MT trucks and wheels for the water level test.

My final test at grade was with a set of 34 foot Overtons, a total of 6 cars at a 3% grade. From a cold start on grade it gained speed to the top before having to be shut down. Took the grade up to 4% and had to reduce to four #4 foot Overtons without any wheel slip. The Overtons all were weighted with the kit supplied weights for them and running on the Roundhouse/MDC trucks.

In short I'm pleased with the loco's performance. The only issues I have are the dim light and the pilot truck which flops around in the extreme. But as loose as that truck is it showed no tendency to derail at all. There is probably enough room in that empty cab to put a small amount of Tungsten Putty at the forward part just over the rear driver that may increase performance in the tractive end. Based on the weight I had tied to the rear coupler this loco should be able to handle about 20 cars on a level grade and 6-7 cars on a max 3% grade. I did check motor temp again after all the torture testing and it was still barely warm.

Being limited by my test track length I cannot say what the top speed is but it appears impressive. From a standing start it gained speed in a hurry, danged near popping a wheelie starting out, and when I ran out of track a few milisecs later It was still gaining speed. My initial impression is that Atlas has done a good job overall on this little delicate critter. Now we await Professor Mark's review and opinion.

 

So someone with a Pacific Northwest layout could theoretically run these up some serious switchbacks, eh? 14.5% with TT's usually spells better-than-2% with a couple cars. I'm stoked to seehow this comes out!

Oh, and my first thought about where to add DCC? I say some 3D Printing will give us the oil bunkers/wood loads we want for a few nickels apiece!

 

As you can see from the rest of my post it did handle 6 34ft Overtons on a 3%. Looking at the front pilot, which I have found to be a separate piece, I'm looking into whether I can replace the pilot with a MT conversion like I did with the Bmann versions. I also looked at the possibilty of a Z scale coupler but I don't believe there is enough clearance for one with out raising the pilot. May check my parts boxes and look into the possibilty of a dummy coupler.

Just a thought that if one was to run on a switchback the front coupler would not be needed since one would face opposite directions on each end.

 

Just got mine, couldn't resist.

Wow. Haven't even run it yet. Remember that this was link & pin era, so the idea of a front coupler was a long link hanging down. When I've seen photos of old 4-4-0's converted%

 

The link and pin was prohibited in 1893 and by 1902 or there about the use was prohibited in interchange service. So depending on your era the front coupler may be the standard rather than link and pin. And some of these made it in class one railroad service until 1948-50. The last link and pin use in the US was reported to have been a logging operation in 1950 which would have been exempt from the regulation. With the Civil War era cars release coming up which are reported to have link and pin some of the folks that model in that era will have to figure out how to get a link and pin on the tender. The pilot should be easy for that.

On another note I broke out my 2nd one after supper just to check the headlight and did that with a 9 volt. That one also has the dim light that would be consistant with an oil light. So I would say a nice touch by Atlas on capturing that effect. Since I plan to slightly modernize mine I may have to think about how to brighten that light some.

 

Boy, did the system ever truncate/screw up that post and won't let me fix it. Lost most of it.

Anyway,

...converted to switching service it usually involved replacing the original long cowcatcher with a switching style pilot. There's several photos of logging 4-4-0's equipped with link and pin AND switching pilots in "Central Arizona railroad" by Shuppert. They looks completely ugly as sin.

The Sheffield & Tionesta, a common-carrier near me, had an 1870's era ex- C&NW 4-4-0 that they picked up secondhand in 1900 for their passenger service (which included monitor-roof passenger cars from the original D&H gravity railroad, a real museum train even then). It was nicknamed the "high wheeler", and pretty much the Atlas model all around. The front pilot was replaced with a shorter, steel-slat pilot, conventional (not notched) knuckle equipped with a big notch down the front to clear the air hose. It's a lot shorter than an original 4-4-0 cowcatcher. So if you're struggling trying to figure out how to do it, that's the sample I've got and if you want to see it bad enough, PM me and I'll ship you a scan.

It was replaced with a new Baldwin 4-4-0 in 1915, a beautiful modern 4-4-0 in every way.

 

I get a kick out of Shupperts book because it's the only book I've seen with several vintage 4-4-0's pulling log cars, basically the N Scale Kits 25' buggies.

Photos: Arizona Mineral Belt #___, 1888
Arizona Mineral belt #1 with switching pilot, 1888
Central Arizona 4, built 1880 for A&P, 1903 photo still with the long pilot and drawbar, pulling log train (cover).
Central Arizona 1, 1889, with a way-extended cast link and pin head extending out over the original pilot, pulling logs
Central Arizona 5, 1912, can't see pilot but it's pulling a BARNHART LOADER and a log train. See Shapeways for the Barnhart, N scale kits for the cars.
Unidentified 4-4-0 on the Flagstaff Lumber Manufacturing line, it has a knuckle pilot very similar to S&T' 4-4-0 - shortened.

OK, so now I've got you going...Logging Railroads of the West, old 4-4-0's in logging, looking pretty much like the Atlas:
Page 85, three of them. Mason County Central, Russian River Land & Lumber, Carson Tahoe lumber & Fluming.

 

I received two of the undecs yesterday. Still a long ways to go as far as testing/evaluating, but one thing I noticed right away is that one of them is a bit herky-jerky and prone to stalling at slow speeds. Conversely, the other one runs smooth as silk at all speeds. I haven't spent a great deal of time analyzing what might be wrong with that first one yet, but maybe the pilot truck issue Brokemoto mentioned?

-Mark