[tw001_tw]

I'm having troubles. I hate to bother you nice people... so no hurry, but if you
know..
why does my HO tend to jump the line? straight or on a curve...
I have two things that do it, a tender of a 0-6-0 steamy and the engine of a
4-8-4. at the current time my temp track is just in an oval. so.... any ideas?
thanks folks!

 

[T-Man]

A jumper ehhh. In HO a misaligned track. The rails don't meet, one is above the joiner and a bump occurs.
Steam engines have side rods if they jam the engine usually stops. Check for smooth operation. Bad gear?
How about weight if one is missing in the front it could lift on you. Last is the problem with the front truck or rear. Bent or wobbly axles come to mind since the wheels are isolated from each other by a piece of plastic.
Pick one?

 

[shaygetz]

Unless it's the more sophisticated roadbed tracks like EZ track or Kato, regular sectional track is not symmetrical at all. Laid out in a circle with all joints meeting will leave you with upwards of a 2" gap at the last joint. This makes it difficult to avoid the kinks and bumps that derail equipment.

 

[MacDaddy55]

4-8-4=tough turns on curves!

Hey TW,
You might look into 22' or higher curved radius for your layout. I have a couple of 4-8-4z and really had a difficult time keeping them from derailing on 18' radius.....big staight rigid engines look great(especially pulling passenger cars) but take a tight corner like DOO DOO! Hope this helps good luck!:thumbsup::thumbsup:

 

[T-Man]

Slow down and pay attention to the brakeman.

 

[stationmaster]

Tight radius turns plus many rigid wheels ...... uh-oh's galore.

Bob

 

[shaygetz]

I did a video on another topic featuring a Bachmann Class "J" and a Rivarossi Big Boy, Cab forward and Y6b Mallet handling 20" curves...

 

[tw001_tw]

Hey, thanks everyone for all the suggestions.
I got ez-track right now and I have double / triple checked my joints. so
I'm suspecting the cars/engines/tenders themselves.
I will double check the radius of my track (for my 4-8-4) and check into
weight, balancing, axels, etc. for my other problems.

Thanks a lot for pointing me in the right direction. :thumbsup:

 

[tkruger]

I had a similar issue but it affected all of my trains. In one corner everything would derail if it went more the 25% throttle. It was not the train or the track that I found to be the cause. I found that it was my table. Although I measured all of the parts correctly when I built it I did not account for the fact that my basement floor is not exactly level. This was causing the table to tilt to one corner. The unlevel slant was to the outside of the rail, thus at speed the train would derail to the outside. This is highly unlikely but it puzzled me for a while.