Wheel standard and turnout drawings

[James Welbaum]

Do drawings exist of of the wheels that were under the locomotives and freight cars showing dimensions? Or of turnouts showing frog angle, length, radius so on so forth?

[Mike the Choochoo Nix]

if you have the frog number or angle and the length of the points and of course the gauge everything else can be calculated. This assumes that the switch was laid properly with no kinks.
M.Nix

[Dave Crow]

James,

I believe I was told  the rigid wheelbase of the various pieces of equipment likes a minimum frog number of 8.  The frogs (and the subsequent points) we machined for the north yard were number 8.  The frog angle is approx. 7.125 degrees (7 deg 7' 30"), and the switch points were 2 deg 12'.

Yes, the Maine State Archives have the Portland Company drawings, including one for the hollow, cast iron freight car wheel. 

Dave Crow

[James Patten]

Dave, I don't know if you meant the Maine Historical Society, in Portland, which has the Portland Company archives.

[James Welbaum]

I found the drawing reference. It however seems that this is not viewable online so I sent an email asking for a copy. Thanks

[Jason M Lamontagne]

We do have standard number 8 switch design, and wheelset design.  These two must reconcile against each other at the frog check gauge.  We use minimum check gauge on switches 22-1/2”, wheelset back gauge of 20-7/8” on wide flange contour wheelsets and 21-1/4” on narrow flange contour wheelsets.  Most original Maine two foot wheelsets, including PoCo used narrow flange contour, and 21-1/4” back gauge.

I’m sorry I don’t remember the radius of closure rail on our no 8 switches but I can look it up if you need it.  Actual lead is right around 31’.

Jason

[Rick Rowlands]

Wheel and track standards are also of great interest to me as well. The J&LNG adheres to the same back to back standard as the WW&F but due to our prototype being a steel mill railroad we adopted much sharper curves.  Our tightest curve is 40 ft. radius and our tightest switches are No. 4 which come out to about 46' radius. We however use rail in the 85 to 115 lb. range.

Same track gauge but two vastly different ways of doing things.