Have you ever heard a rubber Band....

rsv1cox Wed Feb 05, 2020 6:51 am

No? Well that's because your not supposed to.

Rubber bands are quiet whether wrapped around a package or powering a model airplane or model locomotive. Unlike a noisy, dirty, smelly, glow engine a rubber band pulls a glider gracefully through the air with little noise or drama same for a model train only on a fixed track. However that form of power has always been looked down upon in those endeavors and have few followers. That said, I have always enjoyed rubber band flying models be them stick or the more sophisticated scale Quillows.

But I had never seen or heard of rubber band drive in locomotives until I joined the model train forum. But, even there they get short notice. I had to find out all about them. So I did some internet searches and found a few on ebay. Drives mostly are rubber bands or coil spring bands. Both do the job and are very quiet and smooth when compared to gear driven trains.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Rubber10

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Varney10

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Smooth10

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7210012

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7200013

BTW. Band driven locomotives have a designation.....Hi-F (High friction)

getback Wed Feb 05, 2020 8:32 am

I have seen these before and wonder how effective they were , now i know lol Why are there 3 difft. grooves for the belt different gearing or back up ? i see you have to take it down to the bones to put them in . Train

GallopingGhostler Wed Feb 05, 2020 9:06 am

My 1st grade AC motor Gilbert American Flyer locomotive was gear driven, but my 6th grade Atlas DC motor HO freight diesel locomotive was wound spring driven. My 8th grade Tyco mining town locomotive was rubber band driven. I remembered the cheaper rubber band driven locomotives in the AHC catalog.

They seemed affordable but by the time I had a part time after school job on a poultry farm, my money went toward other things. One of them was a couple one shot Cox RTF C/L planes that didn't survive the first flight due to the 15 mph western Tradewinds that always blew in Hawaii.

rsv1cox Wed Feb 05, 2020 9:51 am

I just took it apart to media blast and paint it Eric. The band can be changed to a different pulley without disassembly.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Varney11

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7210013

[url=https://servimg.com/view/19152833/5479]

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7230016

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Still have to find handrails, windows, headlight and decals for it.

And George. My first job was at a poultry farm in the early fifties. 50 cents an hour, five bucks for a 10 hour day. Kept me in .22's and later on bought my first car with savings. 1937 Ford coupe $80.00.

getback Wed Feb 05, 2020 10:13 am

Well that's cool you dont have to , looks better stripped lol!

rsv1cox Wed Feb 05, 2020 12:04 pm

getback wrote:Well that's cool you dont have to , looks better stripped

Actually I painted the body smoke gray, the cooling fans classic gray and the trucks metallic silver. Not sure about the cooling fans, I might paint them smoke gray too.

Put it back together wrong, had the insulated/non-insulated wheels on the same side, had to take it all apart again. Now I have a bind in the dual worm gear drive shaft. Got to solve that. Little tiny parts...………….where's those Enyas………... Groan.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7240023

GallopingGhostler Wed Feb 05, 2020 3:45 pm

rsv1cox wrote:And George. My first job was at a poultry farm in the early fifties. 50 cents an hour, five bucks for a 10 hour day. Kept me in .22's and later on bought my first car with savings. 1937 Ford coupe $80.00.

Bob, I see we share a similar early work life. Also, my father gave me a J.C. Higgins single shot .22 rifle. I worked on 2 poultry farms in Hawaii 20 years after you in early 1970's. Then, I was making $1.25/hr. at one, Maile Poutry and senior year at another, Takahashi & Sons for $1.40/hr. In 1971 I bought a 1968 Hino Contessa (Japanese Renault) rear engine 1300cc 4 door car for $600, a loan that I paid back my parents promptly. Photo below is the left side of road version, but one I had was the US import version.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Contes10

Specs: CarFolio.com 1968 Hino Contessa 1300 Sedan

BTW, nice restoration work on the locomotive. Thumbs Up

David S Wed Feb 05, 2020 7:18 pm

Lone Star Treble O trains from England used rubber bands to drive the wheels on their N-scale style trains.They were the first N-scale,but when Arnold came out with gear driven N-scale Lone star faded away.I have my original Lone Star train set and most of what they produced. They run pretty good,you just need too make sure that all the rubber bands are twisted in the same direction so the wheel sets all turn the same.

David S

NEW222 Wed Feb 05, 2020 8:03 pm

Well, isnt that neat. When I first saw the post and started reading, I was envisioning a wind up rubber band drive such as free flight airplanes. Then I saw the pictures...... Very Happy

**RknRusty** Wed Feb 05, 2020 8:31 pm

NEW222 wrote:Well, isnt that neat. When I first saw the post and started reading, I was envisioning a wind up rubber band drive such as free flight airplanes. Then I saw the pictures......

Me too, I did a moment of head scratching before the light blinked on and I realized what I was looking at.

rsv1cox Thu Feb 06, 2020 9:12 am

"A picture is worth a thousand words." Well, maybe a couple thousand of mine.

It would be hard to describe the motion of that mechanism without a picture. There just isn't much to it. But the shine on this particular drive mechanism is that all wheels are powered, not just on a single set of wheels like most locomotives. It's fun to watch it work without the body on. Very quiet, but is quiet a virtue on a locomotive.

Got another one in yesterday, an old "put together" Athearn diesel that you had to put the rails and hand grabs on. Not fun and the rails tend to rust.

The trucks are not attached on this one, just pins that align them while the rubber bands hold them up. Haven't been able to run it yet but I did get the bands in today to complete it. Still have to remove everything from the frame and media blast it and paint satin black.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7240024

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7240025

Body cleaned up well with just soap and warm water.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7240026

Love the "pagoda" roof on that Contessa George.

David S Thu Feb 06, 2020 5:33 pm

rsv1cox wrote:"A picture is worth a thousand words." Well, maybe a couple thousand of mine.

It would be hard to describe the motion of that mechanism without a picture. There just isn't much to it. But the shine on this particular drive mechanism is that all wheels are powered, not just on a single set of wheels like most locomotives. It's fun to watch it work without the body on. Very quiet, but is quiet a virtue on a locomotive.

Got another one in yesterday, an old "put together" Athearn diesel that you had to put the rails and hand grabs on. Not fun and the rails tend to rust.

The trucks are not attached on this one, just pins that align them while the rubber bands hold them up. Haven't been able to run it yet but I did get the bands in today to complete it. Still have to remove everything from the frame and media blast it and paint satin black.

Body cleaned up well with just soap and warm water.

Love the "pagoda" roof on that Contessa George.

This is the same construction of rubber band drive that Lone Star did on their n-scale engines.Lone Star also called their engines Treble O or OOO Lone star.

David S

rsv1cox Thu Feb 06, 2020 6:15 pm

Hi David, Got a picture?

I did a search on N scale Hi-F and couldn't find a thing. N scale is so small I would love to see a picture of how they did it.

My son has quite a few N scale trains.

Bob

roddie Thu Feb 06, 2020 7:12 pm

getback wrote:I have seen these before and wonder how effective they were , now i know lol Why are there 3 difft. grooves for the belt different gearing or back up ? i see you have to take it down to the bones to put them in .

Looks to me like a drill-press's speed-adjustment through the use of "Christmas-tree pulleys"

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P7210010

.. except in this application; it's a power vs. speed equation. If your locomotive has a lot of weight to pull; you'll want to use the smaller motor pulley and the larger drive-pulley. If your loco is pulling coaches; you'll want more speed.. so you'd be more inclined to use the opposite orientation.

The scale-speeds for a model freight train aren't very fast. It's very realistic to have a loco that can creep from a start.. and slow to a creep as well.. without stalling.

GallopingGhostler Thu Feb 06, 2020 7:38 pm

roddie wrote:The scale-speeds for a model freight train aren't very fast. It's very realistic to have a loco that can creep from a start.. and slow to a creep as well.. without stalling.

As a child, I enjoyed speeding up the trains until they flew off the track. Having train wrecks was a lot of fun back then. Shocked

Dave P. Thu Feb 06, 2020 7:47 pm

I'm sorry George, but this comes to mind thinking of you messing with trains.

https://youtu.be/5kS-vk9mPR8

David S Thu Feb 06, 2020 8:28 pm

rsv1cox wrote:Hi David, Got a picture?

I did a search on N scale Hi-F and couldn't find a thing. N scale is so small I would love to see a picture of how they did it.

My son has quite a few N scale trains.

Bob

Hi Bob,
For some reason I can not get my photos too post on here.If you pm me with your email address I can send you some photos of my Lone Star n scale trains.

David S

batjac Thu Feb 06, 2020 8:57 pm

Had to look these up on YouTube.

The Spinner Mark

GallopingGhostler Thu Feb 06, 2020 9:49 pm

Dave P. wrote:I'm sorry George, but this comes to mind thinking of you messing with trains.

And this is the real train that Gomez Adams purchased through his stock broker:

This Site Rocks!

Those rubber band drive locomotives seem to run well. The mining locomotive I had was very controllable, ran well inspite of the rubber band belt drive.

fredvon4 Fri Feb 07, 2020 8:00 am

the fastest rubber powered train video is astounding how many cars for one engine to pull....let alone do a scale 65+ mph

getback Sat Feb 08, 2020 7:47 am

David's Trains ..

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Lone_s10

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Lone_s11

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... Lone_s12

getback Sat Feb 08, 2020 7:49 am

Nice !! i see there 4 wheel drive Very Happy

rsv1cox Sat Feb 08, 2020 8:22 am

David S wrote:
rsv1cox wrote:Hi David, Got a picture?

I did a search on N scale Hi-F and couldn't find a thing. N scale is so small I would love to see a picture of how they did it.

My son has quite a few N scale trains.

Bob
Hi Bob,
For some reason I can not get my photos too post on here.If you pm me with your email address I can send you some photos of my Lone Star n scale trains.

David S

Sent this morning David. Included a couple pictures of my own. Marks N scale engines and my HO.

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P1010165

Have you ever heard a rubber Band.... P1010166

I enjoyed those videos Mark.

Never thought RB loco's would stimulate so much interest on the CEF. Weird population here. Smile

Bob

fredvon4 Sat Feb 08, 2020 9:53 am

weird....... weird............weird??

of course...sniffed glue/dope/exhaust early childhood...ran with scissors.....rode bikes with no helmets......road rash a lot......firecrackers on airplanes and in trains.....

not weird Bob old soul....normal

rsv1cox Sat Feb 08, 2020 10:18 am

"rode bikes with no helmet" That explains it Fred. Smile

One of the funniest skits I have ever seen featured "Running with scissors" Red Skelton maybe.

Bob

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David S Has sent pictures of his trains for me to post >>

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