folks,
So as not to hijack the list down below on controllers; I am starting this discussion on motors.

Several of the traction museums need small 25 horsepower electric motors for Birney car body restorations. There may be other sizes needed.

Have anyone looked into making new motors? I have heard that General Electric still has patterns for their old designs. Can anyone confirm this?

Some of the museums like my own Western Railway Museum, and Seashore Trolley Museum have re-imported Japanese motors; but anymore of this seems unlikely.

We are very likely talking about big dollars to build motors; but if two or more organization get together; something might be possible.

Ted Miles, WRM member

I wonder if old 250 VDC traction elevator motors could be adapted and simply wired in series? For a while we will have some available as older buildings install new AC powered units. There may also be some form of industrial motor which could be adapted...... but which industry?

I tried without success to develop a source for new replica parts in China - failed because of a cultural issue - they couldn't understand how the nonprofit museum market worked. I told them that if they gave us their best price ( for trucks, motors, controllers, air brake compressors and valves, etc) we would then go out and raise the funding necessary to purchase what we need. This made no sense to them. Check out the Dalian double truck cars - much of the hardware is what we used 80 years ago. Perhaps somebody else with a different connection there could succeed? Either Hong Kong or Taiwan still runs double decker single truck cars. they must have developed the resources to support these cars in heavy revenue service, so it wouldn't be gearing up from scratch.

I have a generic walkover seat project started and slowly plodding its way while other things are taking priority right now.

I heard a rumor that Galveston, Tex. got the motors for their fake trolley cars from a mining supply company, possibly Miner Enterprises. Insiders in the tolley museum industry cation that these might be 250 Volt motors. I don't know if they can be rewound for 600 Volts, or if the frames are big enough for that conversion.
Mr. James McHugh of McHugh Railroad Maintenance Equipment [url]mchughlocomotive.com[/url] claims that he has the sources and capabilities to build Direct Current traction motors, and has done so for locomotive cranes.
Is anyone building new internal combustion - electric locomotive cranes, and what do they use for traction motors?

Wrong Miner. The entire cars were built by Miner Railcar, now Kasgro Rail. Three of the Galveston cars are currently at Gomaco for overhaul.

If lower voltage motors (or light bulbs) are put in series, they must be insulated and possibly designed for the higher supply voltage, to prevent short circuits and arcing. A pair of 250 Volt motors in series may have to be treated like a larger 500 Volt motor. Inspect some of the Sacramento Northern and Pacific Electric trolleys in museums that were designed to run with motors in parallel on 600 Volts Direct Current and in series on 1,200 Volts Direct Current.

There are a few reborn single truck Birney chicken coops now running on replica trucks powered by motors (and wheelsets) from the notorious Boston tunnel motor trucks - motors rewound for 300 from 600, now used in series. Of course they were made for 600 in their first incarnation, so your mileage may vary. They are also of much higher HP than 25.

Shall we make a wish list?

Trucks.
Motors
Wheelsets and axles, boxes and bearings
Compressors
Brake valves and cylinders
Canopy or main switches
600 VDC screw on porcelain based toggle switches
Controllers
Poles, bases retrievers
Window latches and tracks
Seats
fare registers
Door motors and controllers
Head, marker and interior lights

Pretty much everything but the chicken coop come to think of it.

One of the problems I see, without actually being able to prove that it is a problem, is these aren't railway service motors. They have awfully small bearings; fine for a motor mounted on a machine tool, possibly not so good to be bouncing down the track, over frogs, etc. with half the weight of the motor totally un-sprung. I would be very worried that the bearing balls would "brinell" the races during hard shocks, leading to short bearing life, and possible "bird's nesting" of the windings if the bearings fail to the point that the armature shaft drops.

A couple years ago someone had a report here of an experiment at the McKinley Ave. Transit operation, IIRC, where they were adapting large NEMA frame motors to traction motor duty. Has anyone heard anything further? How did it work out? As I recall these were three phase AC motors, but the bearing and shaft spec's would be similar.

For elevator motors you could try http://www.kolichelectricmotor.com/inventory.html they hsve a lot.

In todays TRAINS Newswire, it states that Brookville Equipment is building 6 off-wire capable streetcars for Tempe, AZ. Obviously someone is still building motors for hard-service applications like found in trolleys. Does anyone know who is supplying motors for Brookville? Also, streetcars are still very common in Europe. Perhaps a source exists across the pond.

The Brookville cars and most of the new European cars are AC traction.

If you want to know what happened at McKinney Ave with the motors. contact John Landrum (JVLate@yahoo.com).

He was teh active manager when the process was in design and progress before he was involved in an auto accident. He is still very active in the administration after a serious recovery time.

Harry

The motors themselves seemed to work fine, but the overall control system was (is) just utter garbage. They tried to reinvent the wheel and ended up with a system that at one point was prone to overheating because they stuck the VFD under the car with inadequate ventilation. Texas summers plus being over asphalt and concrete all of the time meant that they burned out multiple VFDs in the year and a half that I operated it. It seems that they've alleviated most of the issues by removing two or three rows of seats on one side and putting the VFD in a cabinet inside the car body, but I still see it getting towed to the barn fairly frequently for just quitting with no apparent reason.

Don't even get me started on the brakes. The dynamic brakes worked great, as did the air to stop you, but heaven forbid something break because there was no failsafe. You couldn't apply the air brakes manually, and you can't use the standard streetcar e-brake of putting the key in reverse and notching up. The VFD would cut power to the motors, rendering them useless.

If anyone wants a great example of how not to restore a streetcar with modern power, send an email to the address that Harry posted above.

Thank you for your thoughts. I have since found that one of the Southern museums has patterns made and cast several sets of journal boxes.

The Edmonton Railway Society has cast several Brill trucks for their heritage line in Fort Edmonton park.

Ted

VFD for DC? How does this work? You need some F to use a VFD.

Don't forget that streetcar motors are only powered for short durations, one of the reasons I think elevator motors might adapt pretty well.