I had been considering purchasing one of these, but I can't find any decent reviews. Any opinions? I've heard they have the "dreaded pancake motors! oh dear!
Cheers,
Crewman1
Hi!
I've got one in ATSF livery and its pretty nice. For the money, the Spectrum locos are good deals in my opinion, and run/look great. Having said that, I have read on this forum that some of their locos were not all that great - a product of loose quality control perhaps. But, in my experience, my Spectrum locos are really worth the money.
ENJOY,
Mobilman44
ENJOY !
Living in southeast Texas, formerly modeling the "postwar" Santa Fe and Illinois Central
mobilman44 Hi! I've got one in ATSF livery and its pretty nice. For the money, the Spectrum locos are good deals in my opinion, and run/look great. Having said that, I have read on this forum that some of their locos were not all that great - a product of loose quality control perhaps. But, in my experience, my Spectrum locos are really worth the money. ENJOY, Mobilman44
I agree, the 2-10-0 is a great little engine, provided you receive one without any defects. I have a few of these engines and had to send two engines back to the manufacturer for replacement. One can only wonder about the quality control. However, the maker stands behind their product with the best warranty of all. The price is great.
I have 4 of them and they run very smoothly once broken in. SoundTraxx made a sound decoder specifically for this engine, but I don't know if it's still available if you're interested in sound.
Micro-Mark is selling them with SoundTraxx Tsunami sound already installed for $169.95, which is cheaper than what they were without DCC and sound when I purchased mine.
http://www.micromark.com
then enter item number 40279 for Santa Fe, 40280 for Western Maryland, or 84150 for Frisco. They also have a painted, unlettered version.
Cannot speak for the Decapod but I have the 4-4-0 and 4-6-0 and both great runners.
One thing to watch out for with the Spectrum locos and tenders, some are not compatible with each other unless you re-wire the tender. There has been a lot of discussion concerning this issue in the Bachmann forums.
I and some others have come across this issue.
To match a USRA Spectrum medium tender I bought separate up to my 4-6-0, I had to reverse all six wires in the tender and add a 1k resistor for the LED headlight. When you buy the 4-6-0 with the medium tender as a pair, everything is ok.
According to the Bachmann site, the Decapod comes DCC ready, no decoder, and DCC with sound which is a Tsunami decoder made specifically for Bachmann locos. This is the cheaper way as buying the DCC ready and installing your own speaker and Tsunami is somewhat more expensive. I found this out when I bought a 4-6-0 DCC ready and installed my own speaker and Micro-Tsunami decoder.
Shop around for prices. You do not have to pay full price.
Your mileage may vary.
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.
I think you're thinking of the non-Spectrum Bachmann line from years past - AFAIK the 2-10-0 has always had a can motor.
I got one from Micro-Mark with factory Tsunami sound installed. It ran good but not great until I went to "Gopher Rail" (Univ. of Minnesota Train Club's annual get-together) and heard a presentation on fine-tuning and tweaking engines and decoders. The presenter explained a couple of things about programming the Tsunami that helped me figure out how to turn on the Back EMF "cruise control" and some other settings. Now it can crawl along at about 3-4 MPH with no problem and can handle moving some freight with no problem.
The Tsunami in the Spectrum engines is a slightly stripped-down version but it still has great sound quality. (The regular Tsunami has over 200 CV's IIRC, this one "only" has about half that many!!)
Crewman1I had been considering purchasing one of these, but I can't find any decent reviews. Any opinions? I've heard they have the "dreaded pancake motors! oh dear!
I've got one and it's a nice little engine. It has the can motor. My only problem is that it represents an Alco decapod with side mounted air pumps. Frisco 1630 (the local decapod) is a Baldwin with pilot mounted air pumps. Chicago modelers would prefer pilot mounted air pumps.
In case you have not seen the loco and tender diagrams, here they are. There is a can motor with a belt drive. Still a spit chassis.
Notice, no speaker holes.
DCC ready. http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/H817X-IS001.PDF
DCC sound http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/H843X-IS001.PDF
If you're looking for a review, here's one I posted a while back: http://cs.trains.com/trccs/forums/p/100109/1165483.aspx
The 2-10-0 does not have a pancake motor drive. Bachmann has completely abandoned those at this point. After a little more run time since the review was written, my 2-10-0 is one of my most fantastic runners, and it's quiet!!
(note: I said in the review that it has a Mabuchi motor, but I've since found it is a Bachmann motor)
_________________________________________________________________
richg1998 In case you have not seen the loco and tender diagrams, here they are. There is a can motor with a belt drive. Still a spit chassis. Notice, no speaker holes. DCC ready. http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/H817X-IS001.PDF DCC sound http://www.bachmanntrains.com/home-usa/dwg/dwgs/H843X-IS001.PDF Rich
Well, the second one ("DCC sound") clearly shows speaker holes in the bottom of the tender, right under the speaker. Some Spectrum tenders have them, some don't. My non-sound USRA heavy 4-8-2 came with them, but my older light 4-8-2 didn't.
Try a 2-10-2 Proto 2000, they are very nice. They crawl at the lowest speed setting and can handle the tightest curves. They are great performers and well worth the money. You can get them online around $250 or less depending on the railroad you choose.
I enthusiastically endorse the Spectrum 2-10-0. I have one running straight DC with no sound. It looks great and runs great through the entire speed range. The only thing approaching a down side is its pulling power - it won't pull any but the shortest trains up my 2.5% grades without doubleheading.
"I am lapidary but not eristic when I use big words." - William F. Buckley
I haven't been sleeping. I'm afraid I'll dream I'm in a coma and then wake up unconscious. -Stephen Wright
My 4-4-0 DCC ready had a tender ready for a speaker with the holes. My DCC ready 4-6-0 did not. The Spectrum's are nice but do have an issue with pulling. You need to figure out how to add weight over the drivers. The Spectrum USRA medium tender I purchased separately does not have speaker holes.
As an N-Scaler I can give no personal testimonial as to the quality of this unit. What I can do is give a vignette of an incident which took place at a hobby shop in Phoenix a couple of years back: I wandered in there one afternoon and encountered a prominent HO-Scaler from this area. He had purchase one of these units about three months earlier and was very happy with it and was in the process of ordering a second one. Now that is a testimonial!
From the far, far reaches of the wild, wild west I am: rtpoteet
I have one of these Russian Decapods and am pleased with it. Mine is DC operation. Operation has been smooth. They come with a variety of different details (like headlights) to allow for some changes to meet different prototypes. I was trying to match Charleston & Western Carolina #400. Dis-assembly of the tender got rather tricky, so I didn't change out the tender truck sideframes as I would have preferred.
These are small locomotives; I can turn mine on a 65' turntable. This is quite a "freight mauler" for my line, but once in awhile I really enjoy watching those 10 drivers turn. The gangway ladders from the tender stick out too far to allow entry into my roundhouse. A fair number of these locomotives ended up on a number of lines across the country, and some stayed in operation for quite a long time. Not a bad price.... "recommended" IMHO.
Bill
GTX765 Try a 2-10-2 Proto 2000, they are very nice. They crawl at the lowest speed setting and can handle the tightest curves. They are great performers and well worth the money. You can get them online around $250 or less depending on the railroad you choose.
Two very different engines. Are you just trying to promote the Proto? At $250.00 they had better run good, that is about three times the going rate for the Spectrum 2-10-0. I have no complaints about the slow speed running aspects of the various Spectrum 2-10-0's I have.
I had one of the early release 2-10-0s and returned it to Bachmann for credit. It would visibly short out crossing Peco medium radius switches (bright spark), and stop/restart crossing Walthers #6 curved switches. For my relatively small layout, it simply would not make a complete circuit without shorting the DCC system. I assume the middle blind drivers were bridging the two frog rails. I did not check the wheel gauge. Maybe the newer ones are better.
I have five of the Russians from the original run when they were not available with DCC or sound installed from Bachmann. Four are the Western Maryland version and one is the NYSW version. I have installed Soundtraxx Tsunamis in the WM engines and I "hard-wired" them in rather than use the Bachmann boards. I got 1" oval speakers from Tony's in Vermont and drilled holes in the tender floor for them. I wired the Bachmann headlight & backup lights to the Tsunami decoders and they work just fine.
They have run smoothly since I got them and with the Tsunamis installed have become my favorite locos. Each is smooth and has great response to throttle and sounds. As mentioned before, though, they are small engines and don't pull a lot of cars. There is room for extra weight if you're creative. Mine are as built since I run short trains and have very gentle grades with a 24" radius mainline. Doubleheaded with another pushing is almost more excitement than I can stand!
Roger Huber
MRRSparky I had one of the early release 2-10-0s and returned it to Bachmann for credit. It would visibly short out crossing Peco medium radius switches (bright spark), and stop/restart crossing Walthers #6 curved switches. For my relatively small layout, it simply would not make a complete circuit without shorting the DCC system. I assume the middle blind drivers were bridging the two frog rails. I did not check the wheel gauge. Maybe the newer ones are better.
It is unfortunate that there seems to be defective/problem engines making it through the system.
I have a number of Spectrum engines and have had to send some back to Bachmann for replacement as well.
However, once you have a unit without problems they are fantastic little engines, good slow speed control and excellent detail. They are priced well, also have the best warranty out there.
I also have a number of Proto Heritage steamers, but would still recommend the Spectrum over them. The Proto's are all first run and have their own set of problems
Raised on the Erie Lackawanna Mainline- Supt. of the Black River Transfer & Terminal R.R.
I have four of them that I rebadged into my own name other then a few little quirks like one engine would only run in reverse until after I broke it in for about a day then it ran fine. I had one with a broken step sent it back took a little while but got a brand new one in it's place.I am not totally satisfied with Bachmann's quality control by no means I have had several QC issues with only theri steam loco's but they do stand behind their products usually no questions asked. I think they are a good deal for the money. I also bought mine from Micromark when they were on sale.