General Discussion (Model Railroader)

We are moving into more and more detailed models these days, right from the factory.  But it seems like we are stuck in the 90's for headlight quality, dim yellow leds when we have proper LED's that give off the light of a incadesent light bulb and with excellent brightness.  We have non opreational mars lights and beacons when the circuits to make them work exhist in the sound world but not non sound.  Take Bachmann's NKP Berkshire and GS4 Daylight engines.  Both should have a nice mars light flashing in the upper headlight.  This would be a value added feature from Bachmann and they could charge a bit of a higher price and thus make a bit more profit from each sale.  Then the modelers that want the mars to work, and dont go the sound route, would be spending thier $$ with Bachmann and not Richmond Controls or one of the other companies that make decent Mars light circuits.   His light circuits are the bomb, but he usualy has a huge backlog, like 6 months or so.  The lighting effects  you get once you upgrade to sound are just as good, but take programing and proper installation which sometimes is beyond many modelers.  Having a simple stand along circuit to drive the Mars, strobe, or beacon ect would be much more modeler friendly.  Athearn is moving the right way putting all the extra details on the locomotives and even putting light bulbs in the beacons, even though they dont flash if you dont by the sound version. Atleast the hard part of lighting the beacon is done.  The amortization of the circuit cost would be broken down by thousands of models produced, so I would suspect the actualy price increase on the model would be slight.  I want to see the model companies step up to the plate and finaly hit a home run on ALL models with excellent headlights that are bright and not a dim yellow LED, make any and all effect lights operational, be it a Mars light, Gyralight, Strobe or flashing beacon.  Some might say it will make the models cost more, yes it would as its an additional feature.  But if you have watched the hobby over the last few years, each run on an engine normaly goes up several dollers each run with no real improvement many times.  The adding of a nice lighting system would give reason for a model costing more than a previous run.   I dont normaly run sound, so telling me to just put the sound decoder in to gain the lighting features is a moot point.   Many other modelers feel the same way, that dont want sound and dont want to pay for it.  I would feel the same if that was the only way to get the lighting features.   A seperate lighting board should cost much less than a sound decoder.

I would like to see brighter headlights but,I fear that would add another $20-30.00 on the price tag-nothing seems cheap these days-we have seen a $149.95 DCC ready Alco switcher and $149.95 DCC ready GP40-2.

At this point I suppose 2 questions needs to be ask.

1)Are we ready to absorb another price hike that will surely come with brighter LEDs even tho' some may not want these niceties?

and

2)Where do we draw the line on our request?

However,BLI steam locomotives seems to have the brightest headlights to date.

There is a solution..Add these trikets to the high end DCC/Sound equipped locomotives where it will do the most good..

climaxpwr,

The two models you mentioned are somewhat unique, first, few prototype steam locos had mars lights, second, being Regular Line Bachmann models, they are thinking about cost.

Bachmann Regular Line is much improved and are nice models, but such features are likely outside the price/scope that Bachmann has set for that product line.

I too am a "non sound" operator and in my case a DC operator. I have lots of diesels with great factory installed mars light effects, some are over 10 years old. Proto, Intermountain, Genesis all have such circuits on the DC versions of their products.

And all such effects work even better on my Aristo Train Engineer throttles because they use constant 12 volt pulse width modulation. Lighting circuits see even the lowest throttle setting (before the loco moves) as full 12 volts, so the lights light full brightness before the loco starts and the stay the same through the whole speed range.

Again, I remind you mars lights on steam are a modern "railfan" service addition or were the rare exception at the end of regular service steam. So its not a big deal for most of us.

In fact, in the heyday of steam, most steam locos only had headlights turned on at night. In was only after diesels can into wide useage that the idea of mars lights or daytime running with conventional headlights was considered, introduced and/or required.

I have a lot of Bachmann steam locos, mostly Spectrum, and am quite happy with them. In fact I plan to get several of the Berkshire's for my ATLANTIC CENTRAL, but will avoid the ones with the mars light since, again, they were not common on steam locos in the era I model.

Sheldon 

The only steam with a Mars light would be the NKP, SP GS4 Daylight,  UP FEF Northerns have a red one, Milwaukee Road had a red one mounted up on the top corner and the CB&Q had a dual beam diesel engine style mars on one of thier class of steam engines.   Thats it unless your modeling your own fictional line and want them. F and E units along with some early hood units would benefit the most from onboard Mars circuits.  I think it could be added to Bachmann's exhisting decoder for very little extra cost when spread out over many runs of models.  For now I spend the money on other circuits,  This berk will be getting an old Ibenlite brand mars light in it.   Cheers  Mike

 The OP referenced steam but certainly would apply to diesel. The dual filament bulb standard for "mars" effect leaves a lot to be desired.  At the basic prices for a P2K or Athearn Genesis Es and Fs in DC, I would expect an LED with realistic effect. (For that matter, how about good headlights, period?)

I'd also like to see them installed on the DCC/sound versions, as well as the DC versions from the factory. Or at the very least a way to make it work.

The Atlas U30Cs are fairly easy to light the beacon, and Atlas usually has the detail part, but it's not lit.

One thing that hard to do with hood units and mars lights is having the mars light between the numberboards on the front work, without the numberboards blinking. I have a few ex-Q hood units that I'm trying to figure out how to make the mars lights work, without having the numberboards blink.

 I'd like to see that, and I'd like to see the models pre weathered, and pre detailed, and pre wired for sound and lights, and I'd like to have someone come to my house and unwrap it for me, and put it on the layout they build for me, and then run it for me. 

What a great hobby!

Lee

Yes, bright headlights are lacking in HO for the most part. BLI's paragon series had it down right, when they switched to blue line, the lights are much dimmer with a blue tint, of course it depends on the model. The J1 for example has a much better lighting system in the paragon version. The difference between both versions is very pronounced. Anybody can see it.

The Bachmann spectrum K4 is an excellent model, I own the 1920's multistripe version, and as far as I'm concerned the detailing is still better than the MTH die cast version (which is very nice). But when it comes to lighting, the Spectrum one is so dim, you can barely see it. I don't have MTH's version yet, they are pretty scarce. I'm still debating about getting one, but their headlight is much better, the price is double the Spectrum one, a little too steep for me.

Packer:

I'm trying to figure out how to make the mars lights work, without having the numberboards blink.

Couldn't you use some sort of styrene baffles to direct the light?  Maybe put aluminum foil or something reflective on the mars-light side to increase the brightness?

climaxpwr:

F and E units along with some early hood units would benefit the most from onboard Mars circuits.

Packer:

One thing that hard to do with hood units and mars lights is having the mars light between the numberboards on the front work, without the numberboards blinking. I have a few ex-Q hood units that I'm trying to figure out how to make the mars lights work, without having the numberboards blink.

duckdogger:

I would expect an LED with realistic effect.

Texas, you must have deeper train pockets than I,  Those are all high doller models and not cheap.  I am speaking of RTR Athearn, Bachmann, Proto 1K ect.   Yes the higher doller models get the fancy electronics while those of us that buy the lesser priced versions get nothing or just steady lighted lamps.  I am sure if Bachmann did a sound equipted version of the NKP 759 Berkshire it would have a flashing mars light, but they dont and I will be modifying mine to have one.   Not all modelers have that kind of disposable income, that quite a lot of $$ in motive power you have.  All very nice engines as well, would love to have the steam versions.  But a Division Point Berk is 1600 and the MTH version when it gets here will be $400ish, but I refuse to buy MTH products.  Cheers  Mike

tbdanny:

Couldn't you use some sort of styrene baffles to direct the light?  Maybe put aluminum foil or something reflective on the mars-light side to increase the brightness?

Texas Zepher:

???   Does the unit have separate lenses for the headlamps & number boards?  Where are you putting the light bulb?  Are you putting it deep into the socket, if not have you tried painting the sides of the bulb black?

The engines I'm asking all have the headlight (really where the mars light should be) and numberboards lit by one light pipe.

I'm thinking that I could cut the light pipes in a way that the numberboard pipes are seperate pieces. That way I can have one LED for the mars light and another for the head light. Then use fiber optics to re-light the numberboards from the one for the headlight. Maybe using microbulbs or fiberoptics all the way around would be easier than LEDs and lightpipes.

Ex-Q GEs were a lot easier since the mars light was in the nose, EMDs are tricky since they are between the numberboards...

wm3798:

 I'd like to see that, and I'd like to see the models pre weathered, and pre detailed, and pre wired for sound and lights, and I'd like to have someone come to my house and unwrap it for me, and put it on the layout they build for me, and then run it for me. 

What a great hobby!

Lee

Yes, it does sound like craftsmanship is dead.