# Aristo Motor Block Question



## jgallaway81 (Jan 5, 2009)

This is for the guys who have considerable experience at hacking the Aristo "PrimeMover" power blocks.

I just checked and an SD45/DASH-9/E-8-9 power brick WILL make it through an R1 curve, though there is considerable binding (surprising, right?).

I'm thinking of building-out a track cleaning car like that featured in this month's GR, though I want to build it out to something that could "disguise" itself as a track maintenance vehicle.

Since i love steam power, I'm thinking of using the bulk of a Porter engine as the boiler, a flat car as the frame and building up a cover for the battery to make it look like a rail-inspection vehicle. I was thinking an Aristo Commonwealth truck for the back half and either a cut-down mallet block or a 45/D9/E8 brick with mikado wheels. Considering the axle spacing of the diesel brick, I'm rather hesitant to use one of my bricks for that purpose.

I was thinking that the Mallet's drive bricks, which feature the ability to have the steam chest mounted around the motor, could be hacked down to either an x-6-x or even an x-4-x brick.

For those that have cut down the mallet brick... 
a) is the resulting drive brick powerful enough to run a heavy flat car and maybe a heavy towed car? (think about the weight of a streamlinercar)
b) do you have any of these available? I definately know i am not interested in a full x-8-x brick, but I don't yet know if I want two or three drive axles.

I'm working on designs now, which I'll post later, but wondered anyone had any thoughts>?


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

OK, we aren't going to get a bad response if we don't say Aristo is perfect, right? (you were kind of touchy on LSC) 

So, first are you going to make a "block" with a single motor? It will probably have to be. You will want a fair amount of weight, the gearboxes are pretty darn tough. You can pull a lot with enough weight and the motors have vents and fan blades. 

I'd stay with as many driving wheels as you can. You could even shorten the "flywheels" between the gearboxes to space the drivers more closely, and maybe adopt smaller drivers. If the wheel spacing and size of the mikado/mallet/consolidation wheels are good, then just cut off the block to eliminate the last gearbox and flywheel. 

Greg


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

I cut a pacific drive down to two wheels to make an Atlantic. It wasn't hard because of the modularity of the drive. Just lift a gearbox out and cut the front of the frame off, then glue and screw it back on. The four wheel block pulls as well as the six wheel block did, or rather, I havent noticed a difference. The mikado is a strong puller.

Aristo is supposed to be coming out with a prime mover version of the 0-4-0. I was told late summer/early fall. Took the with a grain of salt. But if it does come out, that block would be good to use.


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## SD90WLMT (Feb 16, 2010)

I'll go out on a limb here but not too far!!! 

Think along these lines..... 

Adding weight does increase traction, adhesion or whatever you want to label it to be... 

That is good = more weight, more traction... 

Now the saw on the limb,... 

Has anyone considered that, for a given loco weight the weight will be carried be 'X' amount of tires or wheels...... 
Each of these tires will carry a given weight - per wheel ......... 
..... that is also great,.. 

but,.. the MORE tires/wheels there are, the weight per wheel will drop or be reduced, decreasing the needed traction, overall...even if the overall weight is constant. 

If the drivers get TOO light, they will slip, no matter how many you have... 

So do some math and decide how much the inspection/cleaner vehicle might weigh when done, and use that to conclude how many drivers to use, bearing in mind that it needs to pull a load behind it! 

Left some things open here and unanswered,.. eh? 

Exactly, how much is needed to make this puppy move and do it's intended job? 

Some experimentation is needed to form a guide line to move forward from!! 

IS it gun'na crack now?!! 

Dirk - DMS Ry.


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## jgallaway81 (Jan 5, 2009)

Greg, no I'm not gonna get touch in this case. I'm looking for opinions here. If you can suggest a better drive brick, I'm ears. I just happen to know what I'm getting into with an aristo brick, and I like the fact that its modular, and that I can hang the steamchest off the motor portion.

I originally thought of an LGB brick like used by the GR author. I still have my circa 1986 Stainz, which runs great despite the the abuse I gave it as a 6yo kid. My major drawing to the aristo brick over the lgb on is that I like the looks of the American style drivers. I suppose I could invest in one of the 2017 (that is the Americanized Stainz isn't it?).

I guess I was thinking that someone who had already chopped down one of these bricks might have the left over parts cheap. With the economy slumped as it is, the railroad has slowed down, I'm not making nearly as much as I was last year, which of course means my expendable cash is smaller.

Since I don't run DCC, I need to settle on using one drive brick so I don't have to worry about speed differences.

Are there any other steam bricks out there that would take the abuse of a very heavy track cleaning car?

As for the concerns re the aristo drivers coming out of quarter, I was thinking of drill & pining them.


And, just as a reminder Greg, no one has been any more vocal about the drive bricks coming out of quarter as I have. When my mallet slipped, the valve rods snapped, jammed into the ties and stopped dead. the resulting stall nearly rolled my engine, tender, canteen and ~30car train off the layout and four feet to the floor, at the ECLSTS. Suffice to say, I was pissed. And after clearing off Big Green, I went over to the booth and let Aristo know exactly how mad I was. In no uncertain terms, I told them off, as well as anyone else who was there. (I admit, I was not concerned with tact at the time) I'll give them credit though, they sent a UPS pickup tag, brought my unit back to Jersey, replaced the engine completely with a brand new one, and when I asked about getting some custom parts off my unit, they sent back the cab and boiler shells and told me to keep them. In fact, you had commented on the thread at that time.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

I was just referencing that thread at LSC, no one was bashing Aristo, but ok, cool. 

For building locos, just like others have said, the modular design would work well, and as long as you have no misalignment of the motor and gearboxes, that hex drive between them works well, although I would suggest some heavy grease rather than leaving them dry. I don't have a unit apart, but the hex drive must be a press in part to the brass flywheel, so it should also be a reasonably simple operation to "shorten" these flywheels if needed to alter axle spacing. 

I would offer a piece of advice from a person that has a few "bashed" locos from Aristo parts (4-8-4 Northern, and 2-10-2 Mountain), the plastic used for the "blocks" is very hard to glue to, it's designed to be slippery I believe. So if you are "bashing" the block by splicing parts together, I suggest brass plate and screws, not plastic and glue. I had a few glue failures in my locos above. 

Regards, Greg


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## jgallaway81 (Jan 5, 2009)

Thanks for the heads up with the block assembly issue. I've never tinkered with the motor blocks before, mainly just customizing my fleet ot my road name.

As for the wheel spacing, I'm a little confused. Are you referring to the mike/mallet block? As far as I can tell, there isn't much room between the drivers on the mike block. The only place I can see room for shortening the block would be if I went with the 45/D9/E8 brick, which if memory is right, instead of flywheels between the axles, thats where the motors are.

As for bricks, I'm actually now thinking of the possibility of twin motorized bricks... use a Stainz on one end and the motor block from the matching motored tender at teh other end... but again thats alot of investment for a track cleaning car... but then again so was the engine produced by LGB, lol.

SO many possibilities, so many decisions to make. In this regard, I do envy the prototype modellers, at least they know what they have to get their stuff to look like.


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

A couple years ago I did a builder's log about cutting down an aristo pacific block:

http://www.mylargescale.com/Feature...to-it.aspx


As you can see, I ended up screwing it together


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

On shortening, it would be if you adapted smaller diameter wheels (than the Mikado) and then had room to "shrink" the axle spacing. 

You seemed to be taking about some smaller drivers/wheels... 

I don't recommend the PCC Aristo blocks, have seen enough already cracked a la USAT... 

Greg


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## jgallaway81 (Jan 5, 2009)

Unless you went to the new C-16 drivers, or diesel wheels, is there anything that would fit on the aristo axles? 

I guess my first decision has to be what I want to use for the superstructure.... back tot eh drawing board 

Thanks everyone for their suggestions... though I still don't know what I'm gonna do.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Right, exactly what I was thinking, the C16 for steam, if you wanted to go smaller. 

Let us know how you progress as you get more figured out. 

Greg


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

Posted By jgallaway81 on 12 Sep 2012 07:03 AM 


As for the concerns re the aristo drivers coming out of quarter, I was thinking of drill & pining them.




I've been thinking for a while about how to make the aristo drives more reliable. I've lapped the axles with valve compound, and that makes for a better fit, and I don't ask them to pull as much as they would be capable of it the wheels attached the right way. 

Drilling and pinning seems tough to do. There isn't a lot of room between the wheel and the gearbox. Maybe if you took the gearbox fully apart, attached the wheel to the axle half, and then drilled, but hard to hold it stable. Then it might be tough to get it quartered exactly right. If you do it, can you document it? 

I've sometimes thought cutting a lot in the axle and the wheel, and keying it, might work.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

note that the Aristo axles are hollow, so it might be difficult to drill and pin, but that would lock them in quarter for sure. 

After I lapped my axles to the wheels, I've had no slippage, but I also regage the wheels to correct the back to back. Of course that messes up the gage due to the overly thick flanges. 

Right now, the best thing to do is to turn off the back of the wheel to get a proper flange thickness, then lap the wheel to the axle, then add shims to the axle where it attaches to the worm gear. If you do all of that, and a couple of electrical tweaks, you can have something that runs as well as the engineers designed it to work. 

Greg


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

*Looks like its time for a little treatise on Aristo 3 & 4 axle motor blocks, straightening the *
*bowed **4 axle ones, and modifying both the 3 & 4 axle versions... Not going to go into the *
*wheel **to axle mounting on this one, go into that later if anybody is interested... First off lets *
*deal with the bowed 4 axle blocks, these R used on the consolidation, mike, and the mallet... *
*About 90% of these things R bowed upwards when they come out of the box !!! I've had to *
*"straighten" 35-40 of these things for myself, and some of my friends, I've only ever seen 3 *
*straight ones out of the box !!! Their all bowed the same way, up at the ends, never seen one *
*bowed downward... Worst case was 3/32 end-to-end, but the amount is not important, its a *
*right, or its wrong thing... I mount a piece of 1x1/4 inch steel bar stock, about 7 1/2 inches *
*long to the bottom of the block with 4 #8 flathead screws from the inside... This pulls these *
*blocks into alignment and keeps them there permanently, adds about 8 ounces of weight *
*well below the CG too.. The first pic below is of the heavy consoldation drive I made up for *
*my most recent build, it shows the mounting of the steel bar...*



















*Next we'll move on to lengthening the 4 axle block to accomodate a 2-10-2 I built a few years *
*back... This can be done several different ways, I chose 2-3 pairing of the blocks utilizing *
*the powered ends of the blocks to get the benefit of 2 motors, I don't think 1 motor is enough*
*for one of these big engines, not if Ur going to pull the kind of loads these thing were intended *
*for... Here the 1x1/4 steel bar not only straightens out the whole mess, it is actually the spine *
*of the motor block... GLUE just don't cut it for these kind of mods... The 1st pic, (a poor one)*
*shows the basic 5 axle block, note the 9 inch steel bar on the bottom... The next pic shows the *
*wheel mods done here to get the most lateral motion possible... The next pic shows the drive *
*train assembled with blind drivers on the center axle, an absolute must to run it on 8 ft dia *
*track, 10 ft is min for flanged center driver... 

















*










*Moving on to the 3 axle motor blocks, again there is more than 1 way to do this, I chose a 2+2 *
*marriage utilizing 4 motors, 1 for each axle for my Northern build, but 3 would probably suffice.*
*Here again the 1x1/4 inch bar stock is the spine of the block, but added this time is an additional *
*upper spine of 1/8x3/4 bar stock on the top, gives me additional length to mount the boiler as *
*well as a spot to hang the fourth motor and mount the steam cyls in the proper position... As *
*above, forget the glue, this is strictly nuts, bolts, and screws for these kind of projects... The *
*wheels fitted here R the USA BB units fitted to Aristo axles, the wheelbacks were machined *
*the same as the wheels pictured above...* *Here is a pic of the assembled drive **train for the Northern...*
*Paul R...









*


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Paul, beautiful work, and I completely agree you need mechanical fastening to secure the parts together, I have not seen a good glue and a way to make it strong enough with just glue joints. 

Did you turn the wheels or are those different, they look beautiful. 

Greg


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

I keep meaning to try that steel bar method on the two consoles I made. But wheel attachment-- love to hear your thoughts on that. When I've lapped the axles, I've had to grind down the back of the wheels, and it's not easy to do well without a lathe


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

Looking back over my post, I see I left out a pic that I had intended as part of the post, Oh well....
Greg, the only "turning" I did to any of those wheels were the wheelbacks to get a little more lateral 
movement... Adapter bushings were made and pressed into the BB wheels though... On the wheel to 
axle mounting on the Aristo wheels, the problem is that the tapers R different, 6 degree IA on the axle, 
an 7 in the wheel... I chuck up the wheels in my lathe and recut the wheel taper with a 6 degree taper 
reamer, I then space out the axles at the gear to get the lost guage back... I also drill out & retap the 
axle for 6-32, an use an allen-head cap screw at least a half inch long to secure the wheel... U will have 
to shorten the axle so that that the screw pulls down on the wheel, and not the axle... 
Paul R...


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## Garratt (Sep 15, 2012)

Has anyone considered that, for a given loco weight the weight will be carried be 'X' amount of tires or wheels...... Each of these tires will carry a given weight - per wheel ......... ..... that is also great,.. but,.. the MORE tires/wheels there are, the weight per wheel will drop or be reduced, decreasing the needed traction, overall...even if the overall weight is constant. If the drivers get TOO light, they will slip, no matter how many you have... 
Dirk - DMS Ry. 


There is only so much traction you will get from a steel wheel on a steel track as there is little surface area.
I think the more wheels the better, even if the weight per wheel is divided by the total number of wheels. 
A bulldozer has little weight per square inch of track on the ground but it does have lots of surface contact. 
I'm barely an expert on all this, I'm sure there is someone else that will clarify properly. 

Andrew


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

Posted By Garratt on 16 Sep 2012 05:21 AM 
Has anyone considered that, for a given loco weight the weight will be carried be 'X' amount of tires or wheels...... Each of these tires will carry a given weight - per wheel ......... ..... that is also great,.. but,.. the MORE tires/wheels there are, the weight per wheel will drop or be reduced, decreasing the needed traction, overall...even if the overall weight is constant. If the drivers get TOO light, they will slip, no matter how many you have... 
Dirk - DMS Ry. 


There is only so much traction you will get from a steel wheel on a steel track as there is little surface area.
I think the more wheels the better, even if the weight per wheel is divided by the total number of wheels. 
A bulldozer has little weight per square inch of track on the ground but it does have lots of surface contact.   
I'm barely an expert on all this, I'm sure there is someone else that will clarify properly.  
 
Andrew 
 




As I understand it, the problem for real 1-1 railroads was weight distribution in relation to the durability of the rail. Too much weight on too little surface area destroyed the rail. You could theoretically have the weight of a late steam mikado on two driving wheels, but it would tend to destroy the rail and railbed. There's a difficult balance to be struck between weight, weight distribution, and track damage. There's also these problem of "hammer" on the track, caused by the weight of the driving rods as they move down. The counterbalance on the wheel would reduce this pounding, but as locos got bigger the counterbalance got harder to achieve. The whole point of the PRRs duplex locos was to reduce rail pounding by reducing the sizeand weight of the driving rods. On a g scale train, it seems to me it ought to be possible to have a 4-2-4 that would pull like a big boy, though it'd look weird and be ridiculously heavy for its size.


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

Posted By W3NZL on 16 Sep 2012 03:17 AM 
Looking back over my post, I see I left out a pic that I had intended as part of the post, Oh well....
Greg, the only "turning" I did to any of those wheels were the wheelbacks to get a little more lateral 
movement... Adapter bushings were made and pressed into the BB wheels though... On the wheel to 
axle mounting on the Aristo wheels, the problem is that the tapers R different, 6 degree IA on the axle, 
an 7 in the wheel... I chuck up the wheels in my lathe and recut the wheel taper with a 6 degree taper 
reamer, I then space out the axles at the gear to get the lost guage back... I also drill out & retap the 
axle for 6-32, an use an allen-head cap screw at least a half inch long to secure the wheel... U will have 
to shorten the axle so that that the screw pulls down on the wheel, and not the axle... 
Paul R...


So you don't key or pin the wheels to the axle, just rely on the recut taper and an Allen key in place of the aristo screw? I need to get a lathe!


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

Mike, 
The only pinning I do in my wheel work is the adapter bushings in those BB wheels on the Northern, and their just 
precautionary... My bushings R a far tighter press fit than the USA factory press fits their axles to the wheels, It'd 
not surprise me to find that those things have quartering problems on the driven axle... If U get the whl/axle tapers 
matched, and a good quality cap screw to hold it together, it will NOT slip, U'll tear the axle from the plastic gear first...
I know, I tested 2 of them to find out, broke off, and twisted out the gear mounting screws in both cases, but the 
wheel to axle mounting remained intact with no slippage...
Paul R...


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## lownote (Jan 3, 2008)

Paul, thanks very much for sharing your methods. If I ever get a lathe...

One question though--how do you adjust the spacing of the aristo axle halves?


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

If I use medium valve lapping compound and some elbow grease I get the tapers to match. The wheel is pretty soft material. 

Not too hard to tear out the tiny screws that hold the axles on, since aristo decided to share the holes with both the right and left axles, so the screws are half as long as they could be... and they are tiny machine threads in plastic. 

Greg


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

*Au contraire Greg, the axles do NOT share a common set of mounting holes... The *
*mounting hole sets R offset 60 degrees from one-another, and the screws go almost *
*all the way thru, but stop short so as not to cause an electrical short...*
*Mike, I punch out shims of various thicknesses with a Greenlee chassis punch an *
*install as necessary, try to stay below .030 per side... Paul R...
*


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Umm...










I remember some reports of shorting also with the opposing screws touching each other. 

I'll have to look more carefully, but if you look closely, you will see that the screws are only as long as the center part, i.e. they are NOT the full thickness of the gear, but only half.

Whether they are opposed or not, I need to look again, but the basic problem is that they are HALF as long as they could be to have better "purchase" in the gear and I don't think much of the fine thread in the plastic, should have been a coarser thread.

I have a bunch of shims for adjusting the wheel spacing too, got them from the guy who makes Outback turnouts... really helps, although I will run out soon.. but being an old ham (N6RGZ) I have a box of greenlee punches still in brown antirust wrappers.

Greg


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## TonyWalsham (Jan 2, 2008)

I had a problem years ago when the SD-45's came out, of intermittent shorting making the lok lurch along. 
I finally found the cause of the problem which was as Greg has described. Two screws were a puffteenth too long and when tightened up a smidgen too much would short out with the screw opposite. The solution was to shorten the screws slightly but why AristoCraft used such a silly idea of having the screw holes shared by screws either side, beats me? Perhaps they changed later runs.


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

C'mon fellas, hold one of those gears up to the light an U can clearly see the light shining thru the holes from the other side, 
and they R in the blind shoulders shown in Greg's pic, in fact U can sort of see one of them in the pic !!! The R rotated 60 
degrees to the other side, so if assembled as was intended, HOW COULD the screws touch each other ????? I've disassembled 
and reassembled hundreds of those things, including the very earliest ones of those things with the plastic drive hexes an I've 
never seen any difference in that gear... If somebody had shorts between the screws, somebody put it together wrong to 
start with....
Paul R...


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Paul, don't get testy, we're all here to share and learn. 

Yes, I see the shadow, and I'll look more closely and at more gears as I said before. I thought I conceded that point, but I will again.

Nevertheless, the screws are SHORT, and only go halfway through the gear, pull out easily and have a very fine thread. 

Those are really the salient points, that this is not as strong as it could be. 

I do believe that early units did only have 3 holes and the screws opposed each other, but I don't have evidence right now, other than Tony's recollection and others have told me the same thing. 

I will investigate further, but opening an older loco to find this might not be worth it. 

As far as clues, why the heck are the screws still short? In fact, I believe if you inspect some, you will see that they have been cut shorter with what looks like clippers. 

Anyway, maybe someone has some blocks apart to look at them. 

Greg


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

Well I've got several of those gears laying around here, some real old ones too, an everyone of them looks Identical 
to the one U pictured... There isn't any reason U couldn't put one together using only the 3 holes, just drill the holes 
thru to the otherside, can't imagine why U'd want to though, U'd be just asking for trouble... While it certainly wouldn't 
hurt to have longer screws, I don't think its really necesary, I've never seen the mounting fail except when I twisted 
them off by hand testing the wheel/axle joint, and some of the early ones that the screws weren't tightened, or put 
in at all, which was a serious Q/C problem they had...
Paul R...


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

I agree, why would anyone want to put one together with the screws opposing. 

I've seen a number of blocks with "loose" axles. These were not my locos, nor did I disassemble them, so I cannot tell if the screws stripped out of the holes, or they were not tightened properly at the factory. 

Also, from the picture I showed, that was dropped and it bent the axle as shown. I have never had a loose one, but have heard from more than one person that had this situation... noticing a wheel wobbling, and assumed it was the wheel on the axle, but it was the axle on the gear. All the people I know that had this happen just got new motor blocks from Aristo... it's not really fun tearing one down. 

Thanks for the info and experience Paul... 

Greg


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## jgallaway81 (Jan 5, 2009)

Okay, well here is a stupid question... 

Could the driver be bored out to form a cylindrical hole? If so, what about pressing in a short length of brasstube, soldering it to ensure electrical conductivity and mechanical re-enforcement, and then placing that over the axle. If the tub length was precisely selected, it should be enough to get past the hole for the axle screw, and still allow a key hole to be drilled & pinned?


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Sure the driver could be bored out, but I think you would lose the "shoulder" for the screw and lockwasher to press against, plus how to locate the wheel gage? 

Better thing to make solid axles, and press the wheel on the axle and then pin. Again the possible problem of making the hole too large in the wheel. 

If someone was going to the trouble, you would want to solve the slipping problem and the problem of being unable to set the wheel gage. 

Right now, when I lap the wheel to the axle... I just put medium lapping compound on the axle tip and run the motor block and lap the wheel to the axle. Does not take a long time and costs nothing and I don't get any slipping. 

Greg


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

Jason, 
Its relatively easy to "fix" the problem with the existing set-up, much easier than attempting another cure... 
I have one axles worth of a pressed together set-up similar to what USA uses, an it works just fine, I have 
it in one of my creations and never had a problem with it, so I've just left it there... BUT, I can tell U that 
it was a lot more work than "fixing" what is already there...
Paul R...


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## Jethro J. (Apr 4, 2012)

Alfull lot of work to fix something that should be rite from the factory, this design is what 8 10 years old now? Very sad indeed.

Jethro


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

Paul, a small exception to "relatively easy".... adjusting the wheel spacing requires complete teardown of the motor block and the construction of shims which requires a bit of skill. 

It's way more effort than a loco with the wheels pressed on axles. When people ask me how to fix and I tell them, most do not bother or pay someone to do it. 

Greg


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## jgallaway81 (Jan 5, 2009)

First, its a shame that Aristo couldn't fix this after a decade. As a victim of the driver slip, I do know how terrible it can be to suffer from this... "good enough" syndrome from AC.

However, having said that, its also a shame that a CNC program couldn't be drawn up real quick to turn out replacement axles. Standard cylinders for the axles, and reboring of the wheel hubs seems like it would at least get the connection solid. With that, a simple pin like in the original pacific drive could provide quartering.

Oh well.


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## Greg Elmassian (Jan 3, 2008)

It's pretty clear that the tolerances for a press on wheel are MUCH tighter than 2 tapers (even if the tapers are 1 degree different from each other!!). 

Aristo has a lot of clever ideas, but many of them depend on tight quality control. Wheel spacing is just one. Look into how the power pickup mechanism works and you can see lots of places where it is marginal. 

I would prefer pressed on wheels, and a better wheel contour, but I think that would mean at least some type of steel insert into the pot metal the drivers are cast from. 

Greg


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## W3NZL (Jan 2, 2008)

*While Aristo's way of fastening the wheels to the axle leaves a lot to be desired, **it will work *
*if its done right to start with, and assembled by a reasonably intelligent labor force...*
*But when its not quite right to start with, then put together with cooley labor, U can't expect *
*too much... Fixing those drives really is relatively easy, especially when compared to the *
*alternatives... Paul R...
*


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