Read somewhere in a post here that the Lionel and MTH Dreyfuss can pull the entire new 20th Cent Ltd 12 car set from Sunset, but that the 3rd Rail designed for it can't.

I have seen the videos of the MTH and Lionel doing fine. IS ANYONE RUNNING THE THIRD RAIL DREYFUSS with these cars? Any issues?

(I would just run my Lionel with them , but due to the vast difference in color I wanted to get the 3rd Rail loco to match the awesome set. However if it won't pull them, maybe I should jut deal with the color issue and save some dough.)

Any help is appreciated. Thanks.

Ernie

All I can offer is that our NYCJim, who has the NYC 1940 train set from Golden Gate Depot, has the 3rd Rail Empire State Express Hudson for his K-Line 21" ESE train set. During Trainfest (Milwaukee, Wisc. the week end of Nov. 14 & 15), we could try pulling his 20th Century set with the 3rd Rail ESE Hudson. Also, I have the 3rd Rail J3a "Super Hudson", and we could try pulling the 1940 20th Century train set with THAT.

What radius is your 3rd rail Hudson running on? The bigger the radius, the more your loco will pull. You can also add more weight over the drivers if there is room. Sunset puts big Pittman motors in their large engines, so maybe it will handle the extra weight. Do you have grades on your layout? My MTH Dreyfuss Hudson will easily pull 35 freight cars up a 1% grade with ease. This engine weighs eight pounds and is pretty solid.

Thanks for the replies and the upcoming field test.

I am just getting back into trains after a 7 year hiatus due to loss of my train room, it was for good reason: My newborn needed a room. Now I have moved back to the east coast (Long Island) and am thinking about joining either 1 of 2 clubs here with really nice layouts. So they will be my 'room' for the time being.

Both clubs offer 072 minimum curves and are well built. Inclines I can only guess at but they look negotiable. I have a line on that set and am trying to obtain all the info before laying down that large sum.

-Matching Color of Loco and cars is important to me. The 3rd rail matches best I guess. Makes sense. The MTH looked close, but lighter, and the Lionel (which I already own) looks a good bit darker. I will be getting the '38 cars, and heard the blue on the lionel stripe is also much darker than the blue on the Sunset cars. I know it sounds picky, but I have been waiting for scale cars of the 20th Cent LTd (my fav train) since I bought the Lionel Dreyfuss when it was new.

Any opinions or thoughts are always welcomed, and thanks for all your help on this great site.

I have a good suggestion. The rear truck on our 3rd Rail Dreyfuss has a spring that pushes down on the truck and lifts some of the weight off the rear driver. If one cuts this spring in 1/2 it will allow the full weight of the engine to bear down on the rubber tired driver.

I have a group of gentlemen that enjoy bringing me engineering improvements, and this was one of them. They successfully ran all 12 cars on their flat layout.

Of coarse, our next run of cars we will focus on lightening them up considerably, while maintaining a high level of detail.

These men also suggest to use a mixture light machine oil and graphite on each axle of the cars. They should roll very well after that is applied.

Cheers,

Scott Mann

I was able to increase the traction of my 3rd rail selkirk quite abit by loosening the two rear screws of the plate that holds the drive wheels in and putting two round toothpicks under the plate from the rear truck side and then screwing the plate back down. It lets the reardrive wheels with traction tires on put more pressure on the drivers and now will pull 11 18 inch mth passenger cars.
If mfgs would put the rollers on the lead car of the passenger train and put in a power supply and have it send voltage to all the other cars by a connection between the other cars it would eliminate the rollers on all the other cars and pull much easier. the rollers are spring loaded and make passenger cars pull much harder.

Well, to answer the original question, NO!!!

Trainfest is over, but during our three days of operation, NYCJim attempted to pull his 12 car 20th Century GGD train set with my and/or his 3rd Rail J3a "Super" Hudson and his 3rd Rail Empire State Express Hudson. Neither steam locomotive models had enough tractive effort to even start the train! Both models did, however pull the 3rd Rail brass NYC Mercury train set! We could only operate the heavy 3rd Rail NYC Century train set with MTH Hudsons or the 3rd Rail NYC Niagara.

Sorry.

In 2 rail we used a combination of softer springs on both the leading and trailing truck and filled the entire boiler using stockings stuffed with lead fishing sinker pellets. The increased tractive effort allowed the 3rd Rail ESE Hudson to pull the 8 car GGD ESSE. Without such mods the only thing the Hudson could do was slip its drivers on level track.