# Matal wheels for Hartland minis?



## 876 (Dec 27, 2007)

I made my first large scale purchase the other day, a Hartland Locomotive Works bobber caboose. Excellent quality, however the plastic wheels are a bit of a let down.

Who do you feel makes the best metal wheelsets for these little guys?


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## steam5 (Jun 22, 2008)

The standard Bachmann metal wheels is a direct replacement 

Alan


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## Garratt (Sep 15, 2012)

The Bachmann axles are a tad shorter but work fine. 
I have also tried the small 25mm Bachmann wheels on the HLW mini cars which make them sit noticeably lower and less 'toy like'. The axlebox horn plates hang down a bit but still clear things. They could be filed easily so not as low.
At 1:24 scale the small 25mm wheels work out to be 24" which are big enough for a small field railway. Accucraft's short flatcars at 1:20.3 use 25mm wheels and the deck still sits a little lower than HLW flats with 25mm wheels. 31mm wheels seem way to big to me, they would be over 29". The couplers then sit a a little lower but work OK too. Depends on what you like the look of and what other rolling stock your caboose will be with. Either way the cars are far more stable with metal wheels and go clickety clack! 

Andrew


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## Dan Pierce (Jan 2, 2008)

I use the USA trains wheels and buy 10 pair at a time as this quatity gives a discount (15 per cent). 
And at shows, they are 10 pair for $85 with a choice of black or shiny, or a mix of both. 
These are solid wheels and are very heavy, great for lowering the center of gravity on rolling stock.


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## djacobsen (Jul 20, 2011)

Who makes the BEST metal replacement wheel sets for HLW rolling stock? 

HLW does! 
Call Parts & Service: 402-571-2933 

Happy Rails! 
Dave


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## steam5 (Jun 22, 2008)

Posted By Garratt on 29 Jan 2014 04:06 AM 
The Bachmann axles are a tad shorter but work fine. 
Andrew

really... from what I have seen they are basically the same length plus or minus just under 1 mm

Alan


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## Garratt (Sep 15, 2012)

Alan 

It's not by much. The ones I have are only slightly shorter. Less than 1mm. 

Andrew


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## San Juan (Jan 3, 2008)

I'm using the "small" Bachmann metal wheels. Bachmann product number 92422. I also converted to LGB link and pin couplers.










Link to large image


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## vsmith (Jan 2, 2008)

If like me you are running these on tight turns, (21" &31" dia track myself) the BEST replacement wheels are LGB ball bearing wheels, as they cut the wheel flange friction, which can be a serious source of drag especially with multiple car trains, down to zero. So your only pulling the weight of the cars, not the drag load of the flanges.... but they are also to most expensive. They can be over $20 an axle which gets you the weird situation where your running $40 wheelsets on a $10 car LOL 

But switching to metal wheels, anyone's metal wheels, is the best single upgrade you can do to these little buggers, as it gives them more weight thats down low so they track and couple far far better than with just the plastic wheels ever would.


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## Garratt (Sep 15, 2012)

Matt, nice rust! 
The link n' pins are also a great improvement to these budget cars. 

Andrew


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## Stan Cedarleaf (Jan 2, 2008)

Ferro... As Matt posted, I support the other combination that can be used is the smaller Bachmann 24 mm diameter wheels... They look very nice on the Hartland kits.... 

However, using them will lower the height of the coupler so some other adjustments would need to be made....


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## 876 (Dec 27, 2007)

Thanks for the recommendations everyone.

I'm going to sample a pair of Roll-EZ wheelsets along with LGB and do a side-by-side comparison. 

Also, this seems to be a very friendly and helpful forum, quite a different experience than I had with a certain O gauge website.


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## Dick Friedman (Aug 19, 2008)

Nearly ALL my metal wheels are San-Val, er EZ roll wheels. Some are bearing wheels other are the old fashioned kind. I built a maintenace of way train using batter power. It has two Hartland short cars (one for battery, one for speed control). I agree that they look funny with great big wheels beneath them, so I moved to the small Bachmann metal wheels. Looks good, and required no other work to install them. Did have to put some white grease on the axles to control the squealing, but that also reduced drag! 

The nice thing about the Bachmann small wheels is they come four axles in a pack -- enough for both my cars!


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## Stan Cedarleaf (Jan 2, 2008)

Here's a Hartland caboose with 31mm Bachmann wheels...


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