Loco truck cross referance list

[daniel_leavitt2000]

The SD40-2 Flexcoil thread had me thinking, do we have a cross-compatibility list for engine trucks and side frames?

[craigolio1]

Great idea!

[daniel_leavitt2000]

There are a lot of engines I am not failure with so it would need to be a group effort. The final list will be posted on a separate thread.

Part one: Atlas 4 wheel road truck.
Blomberg B, Blomburg M, AAR-B solid bearings, AAR-B roller bearings, FM, GE Floating Bolster

I believe all use the same gear case.

Cross compatibility: IM square bearing box Blomberg B

Are any Kato trucks compatible with Atlas chassis? Do LL trucks fit Atlas chassis?

[up1950s]

Sounds like something Ron may have tattooed on his wrist .

[C855B]

Are any Kato trucks compatible with Atlas chassis? Do LL trucks fit Atlas chassis?

IIRC, Justin ( @MRLX1020 ) did a Flexicoil sideframe swap for me, Atlas SD24 for Kato SD45. The 1:1 UP SD45s had the older style, he needed the later style that came on the Katos for a project. I don't know if the entire truck and gear tower is the same without taking stuff apart, but the sideframe swap was snap-on/snap-off in just a few seconds. The Kato HTC trucks are different than their Flexicoils and the sideframes do not interchange; I don't know if the truck assemblies will swap directly but I suspect they might.

I have an Atlas (maybe Kato-sourced?) GP30 that runs with Life-Like C424 AAR B trucks including the gear towers. They're a little loose in the chassis, but it runs OK. I did the swap as proof for somebody who wanted to model GM&O prototypes with the trade-in trucks.

[wcfn100]

I have an Atlas (maybe Kato-sourced?) GP30 that runs with Life-Like C424 AAR B trucks including the gear towers. They're a little loose in the chassis, but it runs OK. I did the swap as proof for somebody who wanted to model GM&O prototypes with the trade-in trucks.

Ummm....



 

Jason

[C855B]

Ha! This was a number of years ago, I think well before Atlas did it.

[SandyEggoJake]

Thinking a broader, @daniel_leavitt2000 (and don't mean to highjack ur idea, but I've been thinking along similar though expanded lines) what we could use in N scale is an index of known locomotive and tender trucks and wheels.  And with that, we could infer side frame and truck swap-ability.

Max @mmagliaro recently reminded me that for N Scale Steam, the 2006 NTrak Steam Locomotive Information Book has a "table on the inside front cover listing all commercial, non-brass steam locos with their driver sizes, weight, retail price, and gear ratio."  Now woofully out of data.  And yet without some ideal info for bashers (axle length & dia, flange, etc.)

As for where to house such a list?  Well, I've not spoken with Mark @spookshow, but as most here know, he have developed a great reference for N.American N Scale Locos, N Scale Trucks (http://www.spookshow.net/trucks/trucks.php) and the start of a brass gear list.  A db of loco & tender trucks and wheels (with pictures!) would seem to be right in his... err... wheelhouse?

[cjm413]

There are a lot of engines I am not failure with so it would need to be a group effort. The final list will be posted on a separate thread.

Part one: Atlas 4 wheel road truck.
Blomberg B, Blomburg M, AAR-B solid bearings, AAR-B roller bearings, FM, GE Floating Bolster

I believe all use the same gear case.

Cross compatibility: IM square bearing box Blomberg B

Are any Kato trucks compatible with Atlas chassis? Do LL trucks fit Atlas chassis?

The Life-Like split frame GP mechanism will accept Atlas Blomberg trucks

[daniel_leavitt2000]

As for where to house such a list?  Well, I've not spoken with Mark @spookshow, but as most here know, he have developed a great reference for N.American N Scale Locos, N Scale Trucks (http://www.spookshow.net/trucks/trucks.php) and the start of a brass gear list.  A db of loco & tender trucks and wheels (with pictures!) would seem to be right in his... err... wheelhouse?

Actually, that was also my project. It got a bit too complicated in the last few years when everyone started producing their own trucks and tooling was shared or sourced from other contractors.

I would like to do a post here, but i'm struggling to come up with names for the gear towers. the list should looks something like this:

Gear tower # > Side frame names > Models featuring gear tower + side frame style > Compatible with...

[atsf_arizona]

Hi, all,

Back in the Christmas 2016-New Year's break, we ran this 12 page thread: 

https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=40758.msg506703#msg506703

On page 11 of that thread, I posted this spreadsheet, which at least indexes what Atlas thinks is the common trucks that are used across the different locos
in their N scale portfolio:

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Downloadable Excel spreadsheet cross-indexing some major Atlas diesel components!   
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Here is the clickable link from Google Drive to download Excel spreadsheet, click on the link and download it for free - you are welcome to share it.

(2020 07 18 - updated the Google Drive link below as the old link didn't work any longer - this should allow you to download the Excel file)
(8:40PM EST 12/22/19 - uploaded additional new version that fixed the URLs to point to Atlas' new location of loco Parts diagrams)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1A6VJR3uFGOLfr50-GreWia_oe4UCCxaL/view?usp=sharing

Instructions below.   

This spreadsheet got built then because one of our the major discussions has been:

• What are the correct replacement part numbers to use in these locomotives?
• What parts are swap-able between locomotives? (focusing on motors, motor saddles, worm/shaft assemblies, bearing blocks, trucks)

To answer that question, I collected the part number information from the Atlas and Intermountain parts websites, and created an downloadable Excel spreadsheet which has drop-down Sort menus allow you to find and correlate part numbers across almost all the N scale Atlas/Kato, Atlas, and Intermountain SD45-T2 / SD40-T2 locomotive types. 

This allows you to answer for yourself :

*By locomotive type,  what part number for  motor, motor saddle, trucks, etc?

What became apparent when building this spreadsheet, is there are some notable "exceptions" to what you would expect to be a compatible part. 

Example:  according to the instruction sheets, the DCC-ready Atlas GP30/35, GP7 and GP9 use a different motor saddle than the commonly used p/n 480001.  I verified and found this to be true in a Atlas 48082 Santa Fe GP7 #2692 some time ago.  I swapped in a older fast-speed motor into that GP7 DCC-ready mech, to speed match the loco with my older fleet - and found that the standard motor saddle p/n 480001 plastic fingers are spaced *differently* than the GP7 DCC-ready mechanism motor saddle holes.  I had to "force fit bend the plastic fingers" to match the GP7 DCC-ready mechanism (at the time, I had no idea these particular newer DCC-ready mech's used a different motor saddle).

These exceptions are especially worth knowing to save time and effort, not to mention possibly being cause of a hard-to-shoot bug in a noisy locomotive mechanism.

Downloadable link is at bottom of this post. 

In spreadsheet, the bolding and colored cells are some of these 'unexpected exceptions' to the part number you would expect to be compatible.


============================================================================


Very useful are the "Sort" drop-down headings at the top of the Excel spreadsheet, by sorting "A->Z", you can quickly find out:

* What parts are swappable between what locomotives? 

 
===========================================================


Here is the clickable link from Google Drive to download Excel spreadsheet, click on the link and download it for free - you are welcome to share it.

(2020 07 18 - updated the Google Drive link below as the old link didn't work any longer - this should allow you to download the Excel file)

(8:40PM EST 12/22/19 - uploaded additional new version that fixed the URLs to point to Atlas' new location of loco Parts diagrams)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1A6VJR3uFGOLfr50-GreWia_oe4UCCxaL/view?usp=sharing


Instructions: 

You must "Open with Google Sheets", or download it to your Excel on your Windows PC or Mac and then "Enable Editing", in order to see the drop-down menus.

I trust that you'll like this resource. 

It's a best-effort, I believe it's as accurate as the info that I have.  With so many part numbers, I do find 'inconsistencies' such as the following:

Motor saddle p/n 426001 is specified for both Atlas RS-11 Classic, and on the parts sheet for GP9 DCC-ready.  But "not found" on Atlas Online Parts website.  (neither p/n 9426001 nor p/n 426001 were found).
No parts diagrams on Atlas Parts website for GP7/GP9 DCC-ready, or the VO-1000.

I documented this info off the PDFs on the Intermountain website at:   http://www.intermountain-railway.com/customerservice/dccwebpage/N-Scale-SD40T-2-SD45T-2-Insert.pdf  and the Atlas parts website at:  http://www.atlasrr.com/nparts.htm  I then then cross-checked the 'exceptions' at the Atlas Online Store at:   http://shop.atlasrr.com/c-1064-n-locomotive-spare-parts.aspx   Not all 'parts not found on Atlas website' or inconsistencies could be resolved, but thankfully, there's very few inconsistencies  (so congrats to Atlas for such a great Parts website). 

Regardless, this whole spreadsheet should help up-level our "parts" conversation significantly.

Yes, it's taken a long time to put all this together.  It's best-efforts basis and not guaranteed to be 100% correct (or updated if a manufacturer updates and I don't know about it).  It'll be continuing work in progress and I enjoy doing it if time allows.  The spreadsheet is update-able. 



You are welcome to share it.... all I ask is that you give me credit as the original author.