I am looking into buying a new Genesis 4-6-2 when Athearn releases them. I have a SoundTraxx Tsunami decoder on hand that will work ok. The locos are supposed to have the Quick Plug setup. Is there a place for a speaker? The tender on the 4-6-2 look quite roomy. I cannot find a parts diagram. showing what the tender floor looks like inside. A diagram or photo would be nice.
I know the Athearn/Roundhouse DCC ready locos come with a place to fit a 1 inch speaker in the tender and there are holes in the floor for sound to pass through.
Thanks.
Rich
If you ever fall over in public, pick yourself up and say “sorry it’s been a while since I inhabited a body.” And just walk away.
Resurrecting old thread.
Just got a email from Athearn. The Roundhouse/Genesis 4-6-2 will be released April 2011. This is about a three year delay from the info I have about this loco. I am reading "might" be available.
I had a per-order with Caboose Hobbies and Caboose Hobbies just sent me a email, order canceled because of lack of quality in the final product.
richg1998 Resurrecting old thread. Just got a email from Athearn. The Roundhouse/Genesis 4-6-2 will be released April 2011. This is about a three year delay from the info I have about this loco. I am reading "might" be available. I had a per-order with Caboose Hobbies and Caboose Hobbies just sent me a email, order canceled because of lack of quality in the final product. Rich
What does that mean? How can they judge the quality of a product that is not here yet? I'll wait until I actually see one before I call it junk.
It will be offered with DCC and sound as well as DCC ready. I would suspect the tender will be sound ready. There would be no logical reason to make two different tender floors.
While it suposed to be based on the old Genesis Pacific tooling, it is a new supplier and is being retooled as needed from what I understand.
We will see.
Sheldon
Dude, Caboose Hobbies was quoting Athearn.
I emailed Athearn and got about the same answer. There is a quality issue and Athearn is aware of the issue.
This stuff is made in China. Remember the Shay and Climax gears? I have seen quite a few post in different model railroad forums about cracked gears in different locos.
Make the same tender chassis? Tell that to Bachamann. My Spectrum 4-4-0 and 4-6-0 were ordered about the same time, DCC ready and were not old stock.
The 4-4-0 was ready for a speaker. The 4-6-0 was not ready for a speaker.
First I'm not your dude,
Second, your post did not in any way even imply that the info came from Athearn. If it came from Athearn then fine, I guess we will not see them any time soon, if ever.
As to your Bachmann tender experiance remember, Bachmann had been making the 4-6-0 for many YEARS before putting sound in them - they likely still had PREVIOUSLY manufactured non sound parts to use up, even if it was newer/recent production.
The 4-4-0 was designed from the ground up for sound - no reason for two tender floors.
Fact is most if not all Bachmann DCC ready steam locos are NOW sound ready - EVEN the regular line 2-8-4 has speaker previsions and it has never even been offered with sound.
It is so obvious from some of here comments on here, not just from you, that many of you have no clue about how manufacturing actually works. That's OK, I know you just want what you want.
So do I, something other than another Big Boy, K4, Challenger, Gas Turbine, etc, etc.
Is anyone listening? Make some "normal" locomotives for those of us building model railroads, not model railroad museums.
My stomach gave a lurch when I read this thread. Perhaps I am making too much of it all, but I get a feeling the HO plastic market is in for a big change, and that the market for steam, generally, is beginning to experience the first signs of its demise. I wonder if the various manufacturers are beginning to see a drop off in the sales of steam and that diesel purchases are rising in relation.
No, I don't think the sky is falling...but to cancel an entire steam order, one that could be a very welcome offering to a great many steam fans, because of 'quality issues'...? To throw in the towel like that?
Wow.
Crandell
Crandell,
I hate to break it to you, but I could see this comming for a while now.
First of all let me say some will likely be offended but here goes:
Much of the wave of product in the last 15 years was driven by the new "HO scale Plastic Brass Collector Market". Like all "Collector" markets in model trains, it is more subject to economic ups and downs than "serious modeler" spending.
Also the industry has hurt itself with all the duplication. In stead of letting the other guy sell all the Big Boys while your company sells all the K4's, they have all duplicated each others efforts and likely not sold many more K4's total as a result, but now they each only sold half of them.
I will again use this example - get out a 1980 Walthers Catalog and look at the offerings of Roundhouse and Athearn. You can count the duplication of effort on your FINGERS, and that is in the area of freight cars, not locomotives. Just the opposite is true today.
It takes profit to invest in new products and it is clear that profits are tight. Especially when companies like Rapido and BLI make it clear they can only make what will sell out quickly.
Athearn is bigger and stronger, but maybe they too have had their fill of the divided market and are willing to let MTH and BLI see who goes out of business first making the same stuff over and over.
NEW MODELS THAT HAVE NEVER BEEN MADE WOULD GROW THE MARKET. Existing modelers, (no offense intendered, but again, here goes) serious modelers who follow a theme or prototype would buy MORE if their needs were met. They are not buying Big Boys or K4's or NKP Berk's unless they MODEL THOSE ROADS. And by now every serious UP modeler surely has all 25 Big Boys on his layout and while most PRR modelers may not have 400 K4's, they have enough for their "divison" of the PRR. These types of modelers DO NOT BUY STUFF THEY DON"T NEED JUST TO BE BUYING SOMETHING. But they will get up off money for the things that fill a need it the model senerio they are creating.
Bachmann and Athearn are the only major players who have tried for the most part to stay out of this endless game of "one upsmanship". And even though the market is missing a good 4-6-2 that is not a PRR K4, they may feel the market is too weak right now and production costs too high. AND, their supplier apparently can't deliver the product they want at a price they think will sell. Of course they do get dragged into it when others make models they already have, or already have in the works. But for example, Athearn dropped plans for a full line of SP Daylight cars after BLI and MTH said "game on", I would have too if I were them.
I think we are about to see a big shake up in this hobby, and it might take about 20% of the customers with it. When there is no longer a "fresh" supply of fancy, RTR, noisy, smokey, famious locomotive models for the buy and run crowd, how many of them will loose interest? It has ALLREADY happened in O gauge, just ask Mike Wolf (not that he would tell you the truth). Why do you think he came after the HO market?
Mean while, those of us who build model trains and the model railroads they run on will continue to spend our anual hobby budget on whatever is out there that we can make work. Be it RTR that we bash into something different or kits from small basement companies like Tichy or F&C or new old stock at train shows - the modeling hobby will go on.
It does seem like an odd excuse. "quality issues" sort of assumes they've received at least the first pre-production samples. If they're that far into the production cycle and kill it, that's a lot of money down the tubes. Even if they have to redo most of it, there would be SOME return for all the investment. More likely this may be some fallout from the Sanda Kan takeover by Kader - did Sanda Kan do work for Horizon?
--Randy
Modeling the Reading Railroad in the 1950's
Visit my web site at www.readingeastpenn.com for construction updates, DCC Info, and more.
This could possibly be related to a news item a month or so ago (in MRN magazine?) that the Sanda Kan factory in China told several importers that they are cutting back on production schedules and will no longer make products for them. Perhaps Athearn is one of those importers having to scramble to find a new supplier.