USAT Heavyweights

Overview:

These have been advertised for several years, I received mine in late March 2020. I ordered the full set of 10 cars

 They came packed 2 to a box, drop shipped from Charles Ro (thanks to RLD, that means they made only one trip instead of 2)

When unboxing:

1. open both ends to push out
2. open the foam clamshell and lift the car out
3. lay car on it's side and slide the plastic wrap off, being careful not to catch it on the underbody detail
4. remove the packing around the truck
5. A tip from Paul Burch when he unpacked his diner and combine, there is a small package (read: easy to overlook) with stirrups that can be added to the car. It's clear they could interfere with the truck swiveling on tighter curves. The diner has one supplied and the combine has 2. They are packed in a recess in the very end of the foam, on one end.

pictures here are from the 2019 NGRC in Oregon. Currently, they have been re-scheduled for release in April 2020

Observations:

What the heck?

I took them out, and tried to run a train... what the heck? Derailments and stringlining. At first I thought I had some track issues, but I can run a 10 car consist of the USAT streamliners. After recently struggling with Aristo heavyweights, I even removed a couple of S curves.

So why are my brand new cars, which are essentially identical in construction to the streamliners derailing. FRICTION!. Why are the heavyweights different than my streamliners? They both use the same carbon brush arrangement on the back sides of the wheels.

BUT! While the streamliners are nickel plated with a mirror (and I mean it) finish, the heavyweights have a blackened, matte finish. way more friction.

I noticed I could hardly pull the train myself, no wonder it stringlined.

I bought a scale a while back, figuring I wanted to compare rolling friction caused by my encounter with the Aristo-Craft Napa Valley train of heavyweights, so I bought an inexpensve luggage scale with the intent to add a coupler:

This was a good start, but when pulling a car the screen pointed sideways, so I would have to lean over and put my head near the rails to operate it.

What I needed was the display mounted on the top side, as I was pulling a car:

So I pulled the display out and used some double stick foam tape to mount it facing up. I also removed the swivel assembly and bolted a Kadee to it directly. It works. I will eventually make it prettier by cutting up the original fascia and bolting the display back in and mounting it.

Now to measure. The unit will "hold" the measurement after it stays stable for 3 seconds.

So, without cleaning or lubing, I decided to do some measurements

First to measure, my Aristo full baggage car, which has power pickup from the axle journals, so very low friction, it has 3 axle trucks.
0.24 lbs

Next the aristo RPO car, which is longer
0.14

USAT observation
0.30 to 0.32 pounds

4 usat cars
1.12 to 1.14 pounds

All this on the straights, a little more on curves

the test subject is the USAT combine car, which they call the club lounge

0.22 to 0.28 before modification

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