They say a picture is worth a thousand words........so how many words for a video....or two.....or three............ .....please excuse the lousy camera work.

Can't say how the Liliput locos travel on Märklin track, but here are a few videos showing differnt types of Piko locos travelling on C and M track.

No problems have been encountered......so far, and the videos date back to 2011.

Hope this answers your question


C track

New club layout (8m x 5m) through points and double slips



New Modular layout (6m x 5m) through ballasted C track, points and double slips



Old modular layout (10m x 4m) through ballasted C track, points and double slips



Old club layout (3m x 1.5m) lots of curved points



Old modular layout (10m x 4m) through ballasted C track, points and double slips





M track


Private (Mike's) Layout did go through the hand operated points without any problems, the only problem was a digital loco working on analogue and not running smoothly with power interruptions.

I have both Piko and Liliput 3 rail locos and found that they run perfectly on M track and C track.

I have had a few issues with other brands, but I do not think that it is because of the wheelsets. In most cases, the problems occurred when lighter coaches or cars were inserted into a consist and the weight of the cars behind caused the lighter coach to pop off the tracks in a curve. I have also seen very rare instances where the buffers of some models interfere with the couplings or with the buffers of the adjacent car, causing the car to tip to the side. The solution in such cases is to place the lighter cars at the rear of the train so there is less drag on the car from the cars behind or in case of buffer issues, to switch to other couplings that do not impact on the buffers or provide more space between cars.

Most manufacturers do make AC wheelsets, so if you experience any issues, you can replace the OEM DC ones with the appropriate AC ones. This is especially important if you use the track to activate devices as the AC wheelsets allow the activation of the trigger section, which does not occur with isolated DC wheelsets.

A number of manufacturers authorize dealers to swap wheelsets on delivery. You can specify AC when placing your order and see if the dealer will swap them out.
As far as safe operation, I would be concerned about possible issues with wheelsets with DC spacing on M Track (especially older variants), but this should not be an issue on K Track or C Track.
For cars and coaches with power collection from the wheels, it is often possible to obtain the L and R rail contacts on the bogie by inverting one of the wheelsets per bogie, which will then have contact with both L and R rails

Regards

Mike C

I have changed the wheelsets on some of my Piko and Liliput rolling stock as they sometimes do not go through turnouts properly. This is most apparent on long wheelbase wagons and less so on bogie wagons and coaches.

Couplings need to be "trial and error" on individual wagons. I have found that the Marklin close couplers work fine on most of my Roco and Piko wagons and less so on the Liliput ones. I prefer as far as possible to keep to the Marklin couplers as many of the NEM couplers from other brands are incompatible with the Marklin ones.

I agree with what is said above. I have M track and have had problems with 2 rail wheel sets and the buffers one some rolling stock, namely Roco and Trix. Following on this forum, I realized the DC wheels sets were too wide for Marklin so followed the advice of pushing the wheels closer to get the right gap. I then found that some wheels have smaller cross sections than Marklin so derailments were happening because one wheel would in some case slide down between the rails. [ I experimented on a couple by adding some epoxy resin to some wheels to make them wider and that cured that problem.] Weight is an issue on the very light rolling stock also as mentioned above, so the answer is either add weight or put them at the rear of the train. I have never had anything other than Marklin Locos , so looking at the above comments, it appears the other brands made especially for three rail obviously have three rail wheel sets, Two rail locos probably have DC wheel sets which will most likely be a problem on Marklin M track. [ Could that be because the latest Marklin tracks have solid rails with flat top surfaces as apposed the the tin forms of the M track which has rounded top surfaces? ]

Dereck

Edited by user 16 August 2018 12:11:11(UTC)  | Reason: spelling as usual