I got the 44 Tonner blues

[nfrailway]

I had a great running Spectrum 44 tonner (two motor) that I foolishly sold. So, I bought another one ( two motor ) new, never used. This one runs like crap. The gears slip when starting and it's jerky. What gives ? Like I said, my first one was great.

[nfmisso]

Sounds like it got too cold, and the gears cracked.

[Jetrock]

Either that or insufficient lubrication--try using a little Labelle oil on the gears and the worm screw. Either that or one of the motors is just not working at all--try testing each set of trucks separately and see if one fails to move.

The two-motor 44 tonners can be kind of variable. Some run like tops, others don't. The second-generation one-motor 44 tonners are more consistent.

[dragenrider]

Jetrock said it best. I have several of these and one runs like a champ and can rival a P2K for smooth starts and stops. The others...well, lets just say I have a large box of parts. [xx(]

[METRO]

My experience with Bachmans has been about the same: Great or crap, no real middle ground on these. My 44 Tonners all run great, but the Dash-8 that I picked up, wow I never knew that 60 bucks could buy me such a crappy locomotive!

Spectrum is hot or dead cold, just depends on the model I guess.
~METRO

[philnrunt]

I agree with the gang, I had 2 early 44 tonners, the motor windings disintegrated after about 4-5 hours of run time. Took them back to Hobbyland and got some scenery material. On the other hand, I have 2 Dash-8s, they run great, smooth as silk. These must have been the ones Metro needed.
It sure would be nice if LL or Kato or Atlas would come out with a few industrial locos.

[DanRaitz]

I've got both the dual motored 44 tonner and 70 tonner. Nice runners but can be made into GREAT runners by rewiring the motors into series vrs parallel (as built). There is a article in the September 1993 issue of Model Railroading, by R.B. Mitchell titled "DE-TURBOing the Bachmann 70-tonner". This article gives directions on how to go about doing this to both the 70 & 44 tonner.
This techinque will give you a locomotive that will run VERY smooth and greep along at slow speeds.

Dan

[cwclark]

I had a bachmann 44 tonner about 20 years ago and it ran for about twenty minutes and i never ran it again..it was slow, jerky, couldn't pull more than 2 cars at a time and always stopped on unpowered turnout frogs...i got rid of it and never bought another Bachmann product ever again..i finally replaced it with an Athearn SW 1500 switcher and i still have it and it still runs ....Chuck