Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

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wa6mdi
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Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by wa6mdi »

Anyone have any experience with the Titan Trains Titan Jr electric version? Thinking about one and I have yet to see one at any of our local tracks. Wonder what the general opinion is?

Thanks
Dick
Cjcheely
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by Cjcheely »

Hello

I watched a brand new titan jr have issues at train mountain with the ampflow motors they use.

Chris
wa6mdi
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by wa6mdi »

Hmmm, Interesting...

Thanks
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cbrew
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by cbrew »

Morning Dick, its bee na while, I hope all is well.
I would personally stay clear of anything Titan, they seem to be slipping back in to the ole timely delivery issues again due to over booking orders. and as Chris said, they do have an issue with the design spec of the electric motors. in short. the issue is a duty cycle issue. the long steep grades at TM turned the motors in a toaster.
If it is not live steam. its not worth it.
rkcarguy
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by rkcarguy »

Anything with long grades is going to be a stretch for something electric moving a considerable amount of weight. Get a motor with enough power then you'll have battery problems. In my opinion, solid.....or liquid fuels all the way.
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cbrew
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by cbrew »

rkcarguy wrote: Mon Aug 06, 2018 12:23 pm Anything with long grades is going to be a stretch for something electric moving a considerable amount of weight. Get a motor with enough power then you'll have battery problems. In my opinion, solid.....or liquid fuels all the way.
not if its designed right. there is a plenty examples running around with properly designed systems do just fine.
I personally hate listening to a lawnmower all day, it is either steam or electric. (with proper sound with a mute button)
If it is not live steam. its not worth it.
rkcarguy
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by rkcarguy »

I don't care for the lawnmower noise either, but I am going to do my best to minimize it with a large custom muffler. Long sections of larger exhaust pipe deepen the tone. Not only that, but once you have a good muffler, there is still intake noise that is the lawn mower engine saying "haha nice try I'm still here". This can also be mitigated by adding a sound deadening product to the air box and adding a "snorkel" for the intake air that goes down and forward away from the operator. I don't see any reason why I won't end up with a deeper ton version of the noise that comes out of the Honda generators if I do my homework.

Question for the electric guys...if you have a long grade in the 2.5%+ range on your RR and are pulling some real weight, say 2-4 tons total, what kind of run times are you seeing from your batteries? I'd think they would be sucked dry pretty quick.
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cbrew
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by cbrew »

you are heading down the right track with the lawnmower noise, I have learned that a good part of that noise is from the engine itself, so its not just mufflers intake box etc, I still have a vtwin and gen head in the shop that was going to make its way into a gas electric locomotive and i just could not get it quieted down enough for my taste. so i changed gears and went full electric. Four 500 watt motors (one per axle) and four group 29 rv batteries and never ran it long enough to effective resting charge voltage, (~4 hours at Train mountain), the sister locomotive ran day in and day out at the last triennial pushing three 10 foot passenger cars weighting in ~400 each before loading with big guys. he reported she was a little sluggish while acceleration on the steeper grades, but handled the train just fine. the loco weights in ~800 lbs, plus the 3 cars, ~2000lbs. and and with four seats per car, I would not be surprise if there was 1500 to 2000lbs of flesh on that train from time to time. (or more) it really is as easy as adding more battery reserve. and dont forget these have regen braking, which pumps a surprising amount of power back into the batteries on these long down grades. i seem to remember you are building more in the grand scale area. if that is the case, you make be better off using large gen set and correctly spec-ed motors
If it is not live steam. its not worth it.
rkcarguy
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by rkcarguy »

It's hard to say, I simply have to try it and see how it turns out. The GX390 has a little gear noise but most of the sound seems to come from the muffler. Unfortunately I won't be able to enclose the engine because it's a bit too thick and is going to stick out the back of the cab on the S12, but beggars can't be choosers. A friend of mine mounted a generator on his travel trailers tongue, and he made this insulated cover with foam and expanded metal inside it that really silenced the sound to just more of a hum. The cooling air still appears to cycle in and out the bottom, no signs of it running too hot or anything.
I don't want to thread jack this post anymore, we could discuss further in my grand scale thread.
wa6mdi
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by wa6mdi »

Thanks Guy's. This is exactly what I wanted to know. And please don't worry about hijacking the thread. My two choices seem to be electric and gas, but I'm not a fan of the V twin engines.... nothing wrong with them from a reliability stand point but just way too noisy. So I guess the next thing is the Honda 5.5 hp series. I plan on asking the question on another thread, but does anyone make a switcher such as the SW 1500 or similar with the Honda?
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cbrew
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by cbrew »

wa6mdi wrote: Tue Aug 07, 2018 6:32 am Thanks Guy's. This is exactly what I wanted to know. And please don't worry about hijacking the thread. My two choices seem to be electric and gas, but I'm not a fan of the V twin engines.... nothing wrong with them from a reliability stand point but just way too noisy. So I guess the next thing is the Honda 5.5 hp series. I plan on asking the question on another thread, but does anyone make a switcher such as the SW 1500 or similar with the Honda?
these guys is a v twin, but may be able to discuss down grading to a smaller honda.
https://thetrainworks.com/product/sw-1500-gas/
If it is not live steam. its not worth it.
rkcarguy
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Re: Titan Trains Titan Jr electric

Post by rkcarguy »

The Honda GX200 is the same size as the GX160 5.5HP, just something to consider.
While I don't think the single cylinder is going to be that much quieter, there will be more room left inside the cab to get sound deadening in there whereas the V-twin just clears by a fraction of an inch.
As I've shared before, the company I work for built some natural gas compressor modules that were silenced with a layer of rock wool and acoustic foam inside the sheet metal body, with perforated metal holding it in. Even with the bottom still being left open for cooling, the sound went from deafening to just being like standing next to a vehicle idling.
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