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In lugnet.trains, Manfred Moolhuysen writes:
> In lugnet.trains, Ahui Herrera writes:
> > Maybe this is just on my layout since it's on the rug and not a 'real' flat
> > surface. Last night, I connected the #10001 Metorlinear with the superchief
> > engine in the front just to see it in motion and I notice that my poor train
> > could not move it. The engine(s) kept slipping. I got a engine on the
> > front and back of the metrolinear an the middle passanger car. After this I
> > picked up the super chief and did notice that it's heavier than my other
> > cars. So what is my question? Well with the super chief being so heavy is
> > one motor as the instructions show enough to actually pull several cars?
> > I'm think that perhaps not. Perhaps an A and B unit with the B unit using 2
> > motors and the A using 1 might be enough to pull both heavy engines and say
> > 4 cars. Has anyone tried this or knows the limit of how many cars 1 super
> > chief with 1 motor can handle?
>
> In my experience two motors should be enough to pull a very long and heavy
> train. Also, I've noticed that when you use 3 motors on a train, every now
> and then you loose nearly all tracktion power, because on these occasions it
> somehow drains the trafo/regulator too much (you can see the green indicator
> LED fading). So I generally stick to 2 motors maximum. Have you tried
> swapping boogies, moving one of the motors from the Metroliner to the Santa
> Fe engine?
I would agree there. You get BENEFIT from having the motor on a heavy
vehicle because it reduces slippage.
A few random observations. Manfried is right, 3 motors will often give worse
performance than 2. And 4 can be correspondingly even worse, because of the
current supply limits of the speed regulator.
At the MichLUG/LTC meeting yesterday, several members brought their shiny
new F units (you know, the locomotive incorrectly known by the name of a
train) and we made up a small loop and ran them. It may be the largest
collection of 10020s photographed in one place so far (but not for long,
surely) at 6, with 4 of them powered.
Even though the loop was flat (it was on our new prototype tables, thank you
Steve R!!!) we did not get very good performance with 4 motors. As expected.
But it was neat to see!
GMLTC tended to run even very long trains with just ONE motor on their
layouts due to current limit/losses. At the far end of a very large loop of
track fed by just one regulator, you would see significant slowing if there
were two motors.
One motor is perfectly capable of pulling quite long trains IF it is in an
engine that is pretty heavy. The metroliner cab units are not. The motor is
under a quite light part of the cab unit and performance suffers. (weight =
better grip of the rails = less slippage)
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Current Limitations (WAS Re: Super Chief Weight Issues)
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| <snip> Thanks for all the input from everyone. I was not aware of the current limitation. What if I connect 2 train leads from 2 different train controllers power by 2 toy transformers to a single track loop. Would this help the current limitation? (...) (22 years ago, 4-Mar-02, to lugnet.trains)
| | | Re: Super Chief Weight Issues
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| (...) Indeed. My N class with 2 motorised bogies & the engine motor inside runs no better (grade-wise) than with 1 motorised bogie, and actually causes a single controller to cut out (I assume a heat switch) after an hour or 2 constant running. Also (...) (22 years ago, 4-Mar-02, to lugnet.trains)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Super Chief Weight Issues
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| (...) In my experience two motors should be enough to pull a very long and heavy train. Also, I've noticed that when you use 3 motors on a train, every now and then you loose nearly all tracktion power, because on these occasions it somehow drains (...) (22 years ago, 3-Mar-02, to lugnet.trains)
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