bill badger Posted January 30, 2014 Share Posted January 30, 2014 Just running in a new loco (a Bachmann L&Y Class 5 2-4-2T in LMS black); lovely model and pretty smooth on DC from the off, with only the usual amount of the 'Bachmann Wiggle'. After a good couple of hours on the rollers there is a light dusting of what look to be brass particles across the roller spacers. I've never seen this before and I must have run in 5 or 6 new locos before this since getting back into the hobby, including the NRM L&Y liveried version of the same model. Is this normal; have I just missed this on the others? Do I need to lubricate the wheel bearings (I assume this is where the brass has come from), or is there 'summat amiss'? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Il Grifone Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 It does rather look as if someone at the factory forgot to lubricate the bearings. A few drops of light oil should sort things out. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill badger Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 Thanks. I'll apply some appropriate oil - I was unsure whether oiling wheel bearings was the 'done thing'; the instructions for my new locos only seem to refer to motor bearings and the gears without mention of wheel bearings, motion etc. First principles tell me that they should be lubricated (with, it goes without saying, a very delicate hand), but I'm sure I've read elsewhere that people don't advise it in case the oil gets where it shouldn't or attracts dust & dirt and gunges everything up. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
BRealistic Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 That's what I thought, Bill. Makes you think, though,if you'd have run-in the loco on a roundy of track you probably wouldn't have noticed any of those 'particles' and continued to use the loco as a good runner! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill badger Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 That's a very good point. So perhaps its correct to think that this was just the result of normal wearing away a slightly overtight new bearing and isn't a cause for concern? What's the general consensus on oiling wheel bearings? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill badger Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 I had my tripod out to to do something else, but just for fun, here is the wee beastie in question. To oil or not to oil...? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
darren01 Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 Hi All my new loco's get oiled before i place them on my rolling road, rod linkage,axle bearings, even the pony wheels as well. Darren Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Il Grifone Posted January 31, 2014 Share Posted January 31, 2014 All bearings require lubrication, apart from some in 'slippery' plastics such as PTFE. Plastic requires a suitable oil of course as mineral oils cause it to harden and break up. Metal to metal needs oil to reduce wear and friction - the difference in 'rollability' is easily seen. Lubrication instructions from the old masters - a Hornby Dublo R1 and later Hornby http://plan.vintagemodeltrains.biz/dubins20066.jpg http://plan.vintagemodeltrains.biz/Hornbyservice3.jpg http://plan.vintagemodeltrains.biz/Hornbyservice4.jpg The use of 3 in 1 is generally not advised because it is too thick, though I have to confess to having used it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill badger Posted January 31, 2014 Author Share Posted January 31, 2014 Thanks both. The vintage instruction are very useful, although I must my professional interest was sparked by the recomendation use use carbon tetrachloride 'obtained from any chemist' for the cleaning the motor; the toxicologist in me started having fits when it saw that . Happily I suspect the closest they would let you buy these days is isopropyl alcohol... As a chap who runs an old MG and an old Landrover the idea of oiling and greasing bearings is second nature. Its just that I've read various notes offering dire warnings about getting oil in the wrong places and gumming up the works on models, so was a bit put off oiling anything more than the Bachmann instruction indicate. Off to buy some modellers' light oil then... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sam Moss Posted February 1, 2014 Share Posted February 1, 2014 At the club, all bearings (motor, rods, wheels etc ) are oiled. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Il Grifone Posted February 1, 2014 Share Posted February 1, 2014 Carbon tetrachloride was commonly used as a cleaning agent back then (I'm sure I must have used it myself). It's toxic nature was 'discovered' later. (You could buy lead paint and asbestos then too... - I've seen a copy of a document dated 1910 referring to the toxicity of the latter. This didn't stop it being used of course.) My brother's chemistry set had 3 experiments blanked out - possibly because they involved a mixture of saltpetre, charcoal and sulphur? As an aside, hydrofluoric acid is sold freely in Italy as a rust remover! Too much oil has the tendency to get where it's not required - motor brushgear and commutators for example and in the case of mineral oils onto plastic parts. (Another reason for not using 3 in 1.) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
shortliner Posted February 1, 2014 Share Posted February 1, 2014 Carbon tetrachloride was commonly used as a cleaning agent back then (I'm sure I must have used it myself). It's toxic nature was 'discovered' later. As an aside, hydrofluoric acid is sold freely in Italy as a rust remover! .....and according to NCIS last night - hydrofluoric acid is freely available in 5 gallon plastic cans from autoparts stores in USA for cleaning wheels! Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Il Grifone Posted February 1, 2014 Share Posted February 1, 2014 .....and according to NCIS last night - hydrofluoric acid is freely available in 5 gallon plastic cans from autoparts stores in USA for cleaning wheels! I can remember my Chemistry master warning us about the particularly nasty way it burns through the skin and then keeps going...... Not for the squeamish http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrofluoric_acid Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill badger Posted February 1, 2014 Author Share Posted February 1, 2014 Thanks for the tips everyone; some light model oil is on the way. I spend my working life designing the remediation of land contaminated by our industrial past and we come across things like asbestos, lead and various solvents (CT and trichloroethene - both common degreasants at one time) as a matter of course. Its no wonder that life expectancy in the UK has climbed steadily over the past few half century with the phasing out of lots of really rather nasty substances. My father-in-law was design engineer at a major asbestos products producer in Rochdale and tells of people having snowball fights with spare of limpet asbestos lagging after they'd finished a job and acquiring all sorts of asbestos items to use in DIY jobs at home. Happily he was in the design office and not on the shop floor and never appropriated any to use at home; he thought at the time that it wasn't nice stuff. We use hydrofluoric acid in our labs to digest some soil samples before analysis; it' nasty, nasty stuff. Staggered you can buy it 'over the counter' in some countries. Anyway enough of my rambling. Thanks for the advice. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Il Grifone Posted February 2, 2014 Share Posted February 2, 2014 I find that somehow I have some (a small quantity - obviously from when we lived in Italy, but I didn't buy it for sure). The problem is how to get rid of it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium kevinlms Posted February 2, 2014 RMweb Premium Share Posted February 2, 2014 Bill Badger wrote: "My father-in-law was design engineer at a major asbestos products producer in Rochdale and tells of people having snowball fights with spare of limpet asbestos lagging after they'd finished a job and acquiring all sorts of asbestos items to use in DIY jobs at home. Happily he was in the design office and not on the shop floor and never appropriated any to use at home; he thought at the time that it wasn't nice stuff." A late club member used to be a boiler inspector for Victorian Railways. He knew more than anyone else about boilers & in fact for industrial boilers the state government inspectors used to come to him for advice, long after he retired. They were his apprentices on the railways, decades ago. . When steam was phased out (OK, scrapped in indecent haste!), he stayed there until the end, others went to the EMU erection shop, where as was normal for the 1950s, asbestos was used for body insulation & on traction motors, etc. He outlasted the lot of them by a couple of decades, the rest having succumbed to asbestosis, long ago. Edited as the copied section by Bill disappeared as part of the editing. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium BR60103 Posted February 3, 2014 RMweb Premium Share Posted February 3, 2014 Since we're off topic now. does anyone remember a product that was supposed to stabilize or something asbestos so that it could be removed in one piece or left in place? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
bill badger Posted February 3, 2014 Author Share Posted February 3, 2014 There are various products and technciques used in the industry to encapsulate or stabilise asbestos; it all depends on the type and setting of the asbestos you want to address. The simplest situation, applying to low-grade, cement bonded sheeting with only a very low white asbestos content (the typical garage or factory roof) is to wet the sheets with water before removal. If you're doing this domestically and the sheets need breaking to fit in the council's red bags, just wet them again before you do this. When we do this operation as part of demolition, the process is the same, we just use fire hoses and also wet the removed sheets before putting them into lined skips. The lads tidying up all wear suits and face masks; some may think using a mask would be sensible for home 'users' dealing with asbestos roof sheets, although to be honest there's little point unless its a properly face-fitted mask with the correct P3 filter. If in doubt get professional advice; be aware though that this is unlikely to come from the local builder who will just 'bash it to pieces'. For other types of asbestos, I've seen various approaches - use of liquid adhesives (with wetting agents to allow proper penetration), cement based coatings (probably not a good idea to be honest), sticky plastic wrapping etc. All these would be used for the blue and brown asbestos based products - typically pipe lagging, limpet or insulation board. If you think you have some of this to deal with, it is definitely not a DIY job - please don't go there... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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