# Power pickups



## mickey (Jan 28, 2009)

I'm trying to locate something I can use to make my own power pickup like what bachmann uses on their tender trucks. I know I could buy their power trucks as parts but at $15 each, it adds up. Any suggestions?


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

What are you picking up power for? A piece of rolling stock? A loco? The wheel diameter and the current draw makes a difference.

Greg


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## mickey (Jan 28, 2009)

More of a generic question right now. I know about ball bearing and plunger but they get too expensive, so I'm looking to see about wipers. The first step would be turning the lights on some older bachmann passenger cars that use the old 9 volt battery.

What started me even thinking about this was doing the RC and sound in my units and seeing how bachmann does the tender pickups on their 440, 460 and 280. I'm thinking about not using the engine pickup and relying on the tender only so I can use the existing wire harness to send power from tender mounted RC board to motor. I also have a Hartland Lilly Bell to convert the RC and sound and not sure what their wire arrangements are.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

One way that works well and is inexpensive is the brass ferrules in the journals of the trucks, you get pickup from one wheel that way.

Look at how it is done on Aristo heavyweights.. (also on my site of course).

Aristo does this on their tenders.

Carbon brushes on the backs of the wheels work well, but add drag and need maintenance and must be kept clean.

You already know about ball bearing wheels.

The metal plunger on the back side of wheels is poor, too much friction, most people have given that up.

Greg


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## chuck n (Jan 2, 2008)

Flexible metal (copper alloy) that press against wheel has several drawbacks, in my opinion. The first is that they add significantly to the drag that the engine has to pull. Some of my cars with them are like pulling a brick. The second is that the metal of the wheel is harder than the metal in the wiper. With a lot of running the wheel grinds away the part of the wiper that contacts the wheel, leading to loss of contact when the ends fall off.

My recommendation would be to put ball bearing wheels, with electrical pickups, on one car and then run wires with plugs to all your other cars. Yes, they are expensive, but you only have to do one car and they add minimal drag.

Chuck


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## SD90WLMT (Feb 16, 2010)

What's wrong with simply using the 9volt batteries to light up the cars?

Dirk


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Because he asked for power pickups and not battery? ;-)

Be careful with ball bearing pickups, they are not rated for high current.

When I started I did not realize this, and wondered why all the loco manufacturers use sleeves on the ends of the axles on the tenders, or carbon brushes.

Likewise, not even Aristo uses the ball bearings in their locos, the ball bearings on the axles are "hybrid", metal races, ceramic balls. They use a single ball pressing against the axle shaft for power pickup and that has it's issues as well.

Greg


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## mickey (Jan 28, 2009)

SD90WLMT said:


> What's wrong with simply using the 9volt batteries to light up the cars?
> 
> Dirk


My issue with it is having to turn on/off the switch to the battery on each car each time. Then replacing the batteries. I tried it indoors at Christmas time and invariably forgot switches and ended up eating thru batteries. I want to make things quick and easy to get out and going.


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## mickey (Jan 28, 2009)

I'm not the mechanical person but from what I could see in the pics on the HW, it looks like it getting it from where the wheel goes into the truck. I already have the Bachmann trucks on the cars so looking to just use them, so not sure how the HW idea would help. On the tender they use what seems very simple and little drag. You can see it here: http://estore.bachmanntrains.com/index.php?main_page=popup_image&pID=532 . I'm looking to replicate this but not sure where to get the wiper parts. Best I can tell, I have to buy the entire truck, which of course gets back to the price issue. One question though is if this method would pickup enough power to make it work.


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## SD90WLMT (Feb 16, 2010)

Mickey....thanks for your explanation for moving away from batteries in your cars...

Dirk


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

The backs of the wheels are not smooth enough for carbon brushes. USAT streamliners have a mirror finish and aristo CNC wheels are smooth enough.


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## mickey (Jan 28, 2009)

The Bachmann tender arrangement is not like what you showed. It is like this:









So I went out and looked at the actual trucks on these battery cars and the axle is actually plastic with a plastic hub on each end then a metal rim pressed on. So the wipers like above will not work. I'd have to replace at least one axle and probably 2. Looking at some axles only I bought for replacing the wheels on some older green coal cars, they don't have the flange like above. May just have to bite the bullet and replace 1 truck per car to get this working the way I want. Does the above arrangement really provide enough power top run a motor? Lights should not be an issue, I assume.


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## Randy Stone (Jan 2, 2008)

For lighting, I like the way American Flyer picked up power on their tenders and lighted cabooses. They used a thin sheet of metal that rubbed against the axle. While it shined like copper/brass I'm not sure exactly what the material was. The wheel sets were reversed so one truck picked up power from one rail while the other truck picked up power from the other rail. There was very little drag on the axles.


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## mickey (Jan 28, 2009)

That's what I'm basically looking for. That is similar to the tender pickups in the pic above except the wipers are catching the very edge part of the wheel that the plastic axle goes into.


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## toddalin (Jan 4, 2008)

Accucraft makes/made a light flexible brass pick-up to be added to the wheels of the goose. I have this on my goose' rear axle. The goose only has pick-ups on one side on the rear and the other side on the front.

For the front axle, I used a piece of springy wire soldered to a tab that is sandwiched between the pieces of the truck as they screw together. A piece of electrical tape keeps the tab from shorting out where it attaches.


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