Remotoring AHM Plymouth and Baldwin

[John Hubbard]

Does anyone have any advice on remotoring the old HOn30 AHM Plymouth and Baldwin locos from the 60s?

 

[nachoman]

i remember reading something about this not too long ago, so i tried google to see if I could refresh my memory, and found this:

http://www.bnfhoby.com/Text Documents/Minitrains Tutorial.htm

i am not sure if this is what I had read, but I saw some of those baldwins on ebay and could use one myself. I was curious how they ran straight out of the box.

kevin

 

[John Hubbard]

Kevin,
When the Baldwins were new, they were OK, but not great - they were only about $6 after all. Now, most of them have suffered cracked gears - the worm gears on the axles split as the plastic ages - and either have a hitch in their getalong or simply stall at the bad spot. NWSL makes a replacement gear set, which requires replacing the worms and the axle gears as a set, that brings them back to "like new" operating status at about $20 per set.
The old open frame motors are more of a problem and I think a modern can motor would be a big improvement, although the basic gearing design will still be marginal at best, even with the NWSL gearset.
John

 

[nachoman]

for a cheap and good can motor, find an old CD rom drive. they can usually be had for free or very cheap - I have salvaged a few, and pulled out a small 12v can motor that would wok well in an N scale or narrow gauge engine. I think I paid 50 cents for the old cd drive, and got an identical motor to one I bought from NWSL for about 10 bucks.

kevin