Ideal weights for 7mm wagons?

[Ruston]

I remember reading somewhere on this site about the ideal weight for 4mm wagons in terms of running qualities. Something that was set by some association or other (presumably after much research)...

 

Is there anything of the sort for 7mm and , if so, what is the ideal weight for typical British short wheelbase goods wagons?

[Fastdax]

Is there anything of the sort for 7mm and , if so, what is the ideal weight for typical British short wheelbase goods wagons?

 

Hi Dave,

 

One handy rule of thumb is 1 gram of weight for each millimeter of length.

 

My wagons are weighted to about 150g to 180g for short (9' or 10' wheelbase) wagons. Unless you want to pull dozens, or pull them uphill, I don't think a bit of excess weight over this limit is important.

 

I have no idea if this length includes buffers, but I include them in the length for the above reason.

 

Duncan

[peter220950]

Hi Dave,

 

One handy rule of thumb is 1 gram of weight for each millimeter of length.

 

My wagons are weighted to about 150g to 180g for short (9' or 10' wheelbase) wagons. Unless you want to pull dozens, or pull them uphill, I don't think a bit of excess weight over this limit is important.

 

I have no idea if this length includes buffers, but I include them in the length for the above reason.

 

Duncan

 

Beat me to it, the Guild Manual also confirms this to be a good rule of thumb for minimum weight, 1g per mm. I work to length over buffers, as the guide is for minimum weight anyway. They also recomment 125g as the minimum for any wagon.

 

Peter

[Spamcanman]

The NMRA says 1 ounce of weight per inch of wagon length. I haven't worked out if that's the same as the guild's metric guide!

[cromptonnut]

The NMRA says 1 ounce of weight per inch of wagon length. I haven't worked out if that's the same as the guild's metric guide!

 

1 ounce is 28.3495 grams, 1 inch is 25.4mm.  Close enough

[Simond]

Naw, baint sure about these new fangled measuring milli-things. In owd money, it war an ounce per inch, or part thereof

 

(Which, by chance...)

 

Trying to be briefly serious, I think it is pretty irrelevant unless you have some ultra-heavy (ABS whitemetal, for example) and some ultra-light (any of the plastic kits) in a long train. If you are running longish trains, trying to keep the wagons at about the same weight is probably helpful.

 

A typical pre war 4-wheeler would have been between 4 & 7 tons empty, and say 12 to 20 tons laden. This scales out from just under 50g "light", to something like 250g "laden". Somewhere in the middle ought to work ok.

 

Best

Simon

[Ruston]

Thanks for the replies. I'll get the kitchen scales out tomorrow.

[jim.snowdon]

In the manner of the Rolls Royce response to the power of its cars, the answer is "sufficient". I do not as a rule add any extra weight to my wagons, even Parkside ones, and they all run happily on the club layout and test track. I am inclined to the view that most 0-gauge modellers over-weight their stock in the mistaken belief that it results in better running. It's a sort of "if it isn't a decent weight it isn't proper" reaction.

 

From experience, in terms of running qualities the only thing that weight can do is make rolling stock less sensitive to track irregularities. Any tendency for wagons in a train to tip inwards is normally a consequence of a stiff running wagon further back in the train, not the presence of a heavy wagon, unless significant gradients are involved, when a portion of the weight translates into an increased pull on the couplings. The one exception where I will concede that weight does come in useful is on outdoor railways, where wind is an occupational hazard and light high-sided vehicles can end up being blown over.

 

Nor is the effect peculiar to 0-gauge stock - I used to model in EM and have run long trains round substantial curves without problems, again without any additional weight in my wagons.

 

Jim