DCC

The local model railroad club, which I joined recently, is a DCC only club. So if I wanted to bring locomotives to play on the display layouts they have to be DCC equipped.

Currently I have a pair of Bachmann GP7's that came from the factory with DCC decoders, but that was all. I decided to go ahead and convert a few. First I selected my Bachmann J class only to find out the wiring going between the tender and locomotive was shot. I have an Email to Bachmann about repairing it, but I've ordered the wiring harness in case I don't get an answer. Their customer service tends to suck a bit.

Next I decided to tackle the LifeLike SD9 that I run on my home layout. Following these instructions (with the exception of completely disassembling the shell, not necessary since it comes off in one piece) I first modified the trucks for improved pickup...which I highly recommend, if you have this locomotive...and then following these instructions (with the exception of modifying the rear weight as described in these instructions) I installed the decoder.

It was then I screwed up. I didn't test it on DC as the Digitrax instructions say to do, I just put it on the programming track and attempted to program it. The system couldn't find the decoder, all it did was blink the lights. The instructions say this is A Bad Thing, so I took the power off immediately. I then tried to run the loco on DC and the lights would just flash once when I turned the throttle up.

I tried disconnecting the motor and then the newly installed LED lights one at a time to no avail, so then I just connected the power wires to alligator clips and connected the decoder directly to the programming track. The system could still not detect the decoder, so either the decoder was bad from the factory or somehow I fried it. Fortunately Digitrax will replace it free, even if I screwed it up. Now THAT is customer service!

So then I turned to my newly acquired Model Power Pacific. It ran great on DC, so why not. Installing a decoder in a Model Power Pacific is a dead simple task as long as you aren't trying to hook the headlights up, and it only took a little time to do. The loco ran forward and backwards with no problems on an oval powered by a cheap train set power pack, so off to the programming track it went!

The programming went smoothly and soon I was happily running the locomotive around the track. The problem is it won't run on DC now. Whenever I try to run it on DC it surges; full power, down to a crawl, then back to full power. My layout DC is a PWM throttle so that may have something to do with it, but it is disappointing to say the least.

And now my best running Pacific on DC is once again the ancient Atlas.

As a side note, I also acquired a new Pennsy locomotive, a Minitrix K4.

I am disappointed to say that it runs just as poorly as Spookshow says it does (I have the one with the red gear, of course), mostly because the two drivers on the fireman's side that are wired for pickup have traction tires on them (!!! Really? You couldn't have put the traction tires on the middle drivers, neither of which are wired for pickup???), but fortunately I found some instructions to make it run better.

I have the Bachmann trucks on order (along with the J class wiring and a couple of Pennsy shells for my GP7s) and as soon as they get here I will install them and hopefully overcome it's power pick up problems. Hopefully the Motorman will return my email and tell me the good news that he has a motor upgrade kit for it as well.

So kind of a mixed bag lately railroad wise, but all in all not too bad.

Recently

So I bought another Model Power Pacific.

I got an alert from a model RR group on the Book of Faces about a great deal through Amazon (this is the loco but it is almost 3x the price I paid for it) and since MP's operations have been taken over by MRC I thought maybe, just maybe, MRC has rectified (SWIDT?) some of their QC issues. At any rate, I thought I would give them another chance.

The loco arrived in Amazon fashion, nicely packaged and undamaged. Upon unpacking the loco I was pleasantly surprised to see a knuckle coupler on the tender, which was actually firmly attached to the locomotive. Two points ahead, and this just from opening the box, so apparently MRC has done them some good anyway.

The locomotive went on the track and much to my happy surprise ran all the way around my 11" curves without even once lifting up its front set of drivers (the other two will pop up as soon as they enter the curves). A careful examination of all three locomotives does not reveal any differences in the way they are set up, the drivers seem to move an equal amount on each one and all drivers on all locos are in gauge as measured by a MicroTrains N scale wheel gauge, so I cannot explain why the Lackawanna loco does not lift while the B&O and Chicago & Northwestern ones do.

I put all three locos on the tracks and the Lackawanna loco runs dead even with the B&O (and they both run faster than the Chicago & Northwestern), but it is a bit noisier; I can hear gear whine out of it that is not present on the other two.

After running it in for an hour (30 min frontwards and 30 min backwards, no problems) it was time to see what it would do. This is when I ran into my first issue. The McHenry coupler, which I am not really crazy about because the shank is too long, refuses to couple automatically with the MicroTrains coupler on the front of my Bachmann shorty combine. No matter what I do it will not just back in and couple, I have to twist and wiggle the car and tender to get them to couple.

Once the cars are coupled, however, the loco pulls the entire 6 car string effortlessly. I haven't tried them on my 5 car string of Rivarrosis, this would be a tougher pull since those cars do not roll as freely as the Bachmanns do, but it runs along happily just as it should.

I experimented a bit with replacing couplers and discovered that the MicroTrains Z scale coupler goes right into the pocket vacated by the McHenry, and the screw goes right into the hole as well. Unfortunately the MT Z scale coupler has to be shimmed up to mate, but once done it works great. I don't have a short shank N scale MicroTrains coupler at the moment (one is on the list for the next train shop visit) but as soon as I do I will see if it installs just as easily. For now though the McHenry will do the job.

Since Lackawanna is not one of the roads I model it is not likely that this loco will see much use on my layout for the time being, but of course this may change if I decide to paint over the green on the semi-streamlined running boards and tender. It runs so nicely it would be a shame not to use it, after all.

So in conclusion, yay for knuckle couplers and attached tenders, not so much for noise, nice running and a big YAY for not lifting the front set of drivers on the 11" radius curves. My best running Pacific is no longer an ancient out of production Atlas (although the Atlas is my second best running Pacific).

Because of this locomotive my opinion of Model Power has been upgraded from "meh to negative" to "meh to positive" and I have a feeling that the more I run it the more I will end up liking it. Well done Model Power and MRC, may your partnership continue to pay off.

MP part 2

I just got in the other Pacific I ordered, from another vendor.

I have to take the tender apart tomorrow to repair the drawbar connection. Just as well I suppose since I have to replace the coupler anyway.

I am now 3 for 3 on Model Power Pacifics, I have three and none of them were ready to run when I got them. The first one was from a private owner, so I bought someone elses problem, but the last two were straight from dealers stock.

My statements concerning Model Power still stand.

Model Power

The buzz is all about Model Power going out of business. I've seen on the trainboards and such all sorts of excuses and blame passed around; some say the banks, some say the business practices, some say suppliers, a soft market, etc etc etc, but I can say I know exactly what it was...hit or miss product and poor to non-existent quality control.

I have two MP Pacifics (and one on the way) and so far neither one of them have been good performers out of the box. The only reason I even have them is because they are the only manufacturer that currently offers a USRA Pacific, and now that they are gone it leaves a hole in the N scale steam lineup.

The first one, which now serves as spare parts for the other two, had a gear train that never did mesh correctly and no amount of tweaking and tuning would ever make the motor gear stay in contact with the drive gear. I tried several times before giving it up as a bad idea; taking the darn thing apart is an exercise in frustration, every time you move something you pull another wire loose and the running gear has been accurately described as a "Chinese puzzle box" which, if you ever need to take it apart, is almost impossible to put back together.

The second one, which arrived just this afternoon, looked great but as soon as I took it out of the box I found the drawbar was disconnected from the tender. It is usually held on by a plastic stud that is melted down to hold the drawbar, the mushroomed end had broken off of the stud and there wasn't enough left of it to reconnect the drawbar. So, I had to take the tender shell off, dig around in my parts box to find a suitable screw, drill a hole and reattach the drawbar. In the meantime the smokebox front fell off and had to be glued back on, and of course one of the wires broke loose in the tender and had to be reconnected. This was, I reiterate, a brand new right out of the box locomotive; besides the hobby shop I purchased it from I am the first and only owner of said loco.

I also purchased a Model Power Mikado, mostly to compare it to the Kato and Atlas locos, and it was a good trouble-free runner right out of the box. Spookshow says the Mikado suffers from the same QC issues as the Pacific so it looks like I just lucked out and got a good one. The gold standard for Mikados continues to be the now-discontinued Kato of course, hopefully they will resume production for at least another run or two sometime in the future. I have two of the Katos, one with the GHQ Pennsylvania L1 conversion (and the other one will get it as soon as I get around to it), and they are phenomenal runners; all the hype is true.

One last thing...Rapido couplers with no knuckle coupler offered? Seriously? In this day and age?

So to recap - hit or miss products, seemingly non-existent quality control, and little to no apparent effort to improve either one. Bachmann, on the other hand, has steadily improved in both quality of product and consistency. If you would like to see how to do it...or how not to...these two companies are good (and bad) examples to follow. Yeah, good riddance Model Power.

It sure would be nice to have a quality Pacific from Bachmann or Kato, the Bachmann Spectrum line would benefit from another offering and Kato already makes a suitable chassis for it in their JNR models. For that matter, whoever owns the toolings now from the old Ted Brandon designed Rivarrosi Mikado and Pacific steamers that have been distributed by Atlas and ConCor, now would be a good time to bring both of them back with improved materials for the frames and better motors, maybe gearmotors to improve the low speed performance. One can dream at least.

And finally, for those of us who have been in N scale for a while, how odd is it to say "Gosh, I wish Bachmann would make a 4-6-2 steam locomotive!"