selector wrote:I am not impressed by the video's quality. I don't feel I have had a good look, mainly because the server kept interrupting the feed, and finally I tried to back out of the media player and it all hung up on me....can you say re-boot? And, if it really does only have one engine driven, which to me would be bizarre, then it goes to an also-ran.
I tried watching it to. It kept hanging it self and it was very frustrating. I gave up.
On the other hand, it was a nice engine, but it was smaller then I thought it was.
Maybe I'm just damaged by Big Boys.
Magnus
Its circa 1920ish, using technology of the day, the best idea to maximize tractive effort to get drivers under the tender. About sized a 2-8-8-2 of that time.
I like that MTH is making it, but the details are not of the Virginian version which is a 2-8-8-8-4, but the 2 versions were similar, same boiler and various details, but different. They have it lettered for the Virginian, but thats wrong, thats an IHC trick, like we don't know the difference.
... and make all three drivers sets operate as one. One motor, two motor or three I dont care.
Weigh it down so it can pull that slow heavy train uphill without stalling.
What were they thinking? I pondered this over the stove tonight while making dinner.
Do they rip a set of drawings or a picture off the internet or out of a book? Hand it to China Boss at his factory and say build me this?
Wait for prototype model to arrive and announce it?
Disregarding for the moment the necessary things like tractive effort, control systems and other things that are of value and a pratical necessity in our layouts?
Not to mention the implied hidden feeling of having to buy into thier DCS system to gain full control of such a beast. That's what? 150-250 dollars more if you have own power supply?
No.
I say that there is too much thinking about money and not enough about practical things like what cars can it pull up hill, how small curves can it go ... things of that nature.
Maybe I am facing the fact that I am in the wrong scale, sell off my HO stuff and get back into O scale where the only concern was where the hook the wires up at; and how many.
I love the engine even more after seeing the video. Boy, is that a sweet loco!The lighted marker and classification lights are a nice touch.
This has been a problem on my layout forever, but this engine will put a stop to it--dirty rails. Can anyone say ALL WHEEL PICKUP???
Phil
tomikawaTT wrote:"A Triplex, Of all the Engines why a Triplex?"Maybe they couldn't find good drawings of the beautiful (and successful) Algerian State Railways 4-6-2+2-6-4 French-built Garratts.Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
"A Triplex, Of all the Engines why a Triplex?"
Maybe they couldn't find good drawings of the beautiful (and successful) Algerian State Railways 4-6-2+2-6-4 French-built Garratts.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Thank you for your Post!
That helps me think things through alot. I do admit to having large radius curves in HO and would like the third set powered. However if the traction tires are done well I would like to see how it does on a woodland scenics 3% incline with a group of cars.
Despite my comments earlier which borders on a bit of a rant, Im still interested, mildly in this engine. Must be that Russian Iron that is growing on me.
amedleman wrote:The M.T.H. HO Triplex features two of it's three drive trains powered. The tender drive train is a dummy as powering it would require either it's own motor or a universal joint between tender and boiler. Such a joint would restrict the turning radius which is currently rated at 22". Installing a motor in the tender would consume valuable space required for the electronics. Because M.T.H. is confident that the Triplex will have exceptional pulling power and believe that today's marketplace places a premium on sound, command control and smoke rather than the perception that pulling power will be better with a third motor, we elected to go with a dummy drive train in the tender. After all, those Big Boy's on the market today only have two 8-wheel drive trains, just like our Triplex, and nobody seems to be crying for them to be redesignated as a "Big-Big Boy" and outfitted with a third powered drive train.The M.T.H. HO Triplex is constructed from die-cast metal and includes some weighting for additional pulling strength. Owners can choose between traction tire equipped drive wheels (one set) or all metal wheels. The traction tire wheels greatly increase pulling strength.The locomotive features lighted markers on both locomotive and tender. The locomotive lights will not be red like those seen on the tender in the video currently online. The tender will retain its red marker lights. A new video will be produced in the coming weeks that shows the lighted locomotive marker lights. These are lighted LEDs, not incandescent bulbs. Like the M.T.H. HO K-4, the Triplex is equipped with both a DCC and a DCS receiver. You do not need DCS to operate this locomotive in command mode. M.T.H. will always produce its HO locomotives (yes more are scheduled for release in 2008 beyond the Triplex) with DCC receivers. DCS does give the user many more features than DCC, but with DCC's visibility in HO, producing locomotives without DCC recievers could jeoparidze a locomotive's popularity.While the current video was quickly shot and uploaded to the M.T.H. site, future videos will be brighter and more indepth to demonstrate the locomotive's features. One thing that this video should demonstrate, however, is that the Triplex is far along in production and delivery will occur in early 2008. As the months between delivery pass by, HO customers will learn more about the engine, its design and features to be able to make a fully informed decision as to the model's quality and value. Currently a full spec list is available at www.mthHOtrains.com.
Andy
Thanks for the Video
After watching the video, I noticed the stack on the tender is not smoking. This is the stack for the rear engine and should have a smoke unit to look correct. The tender not being powered is fine, but simulated exhaust should be included. The model should be a good puller since it is die cast metal and it is different from any model on the market.
Why is MTH marketing the Erie version as a Virginian locomotive. The two Triplexes were not alike and some major differences exist on the two locomotives including the driver size, the tender shape and the Virginian was not a compound locomotive.
Anyway, it is a one of a kind. Thanks for the video.
Cheers
My selfish viewpoint is: (1) I don't care about or want any smoking stacks, (2) my planned layout isn't large enough to handle the tractive effort a 24-driver locomotive, and (3) hopefully the locomotive performs well at extremely low speeds.
Mark
As a practical nature, the first thing that will happen on ANY new engine is the smoke unit removed or disabled. I consider them wasteful of interior model space, wasteful in necessary smoke oil consumtion, wasteful in electricity use on a model and finally never really convincing outside of very large live steam models.
I cannot have anything that puts "Stuff" into the air of my home. There are two people with health issues in my home. Indeed one of the reasons train shows were difficult was the use of smoke units. Therefore smoke units are not welcome and a automatic "Deal-breaker" for new engine sales.
If MTH focused on smoke as a percieved necessary item in HO scale.... boy are they wrong.
Once in a great while in O scale there is a little smoke but it's generally for show over a few minutes and then the fan is brought in to the room. I think I have a video on my machine of a O scale desiel set snorting smoke into the room. The cloud forced me to tape the thing from 30 feet away and use zoom to catch it. Away from the smoke.
I wasnt going to say anything about the smoke until the review of the MTH post indicated that they considered smoke attractive in HO. That is not correct.
Pulling power, All wheel pickup, smooth and compliant operation as well as protoypically correct or nearly so construction.
The Virginian engine is incorrect. It needs a 4 axle tender set in the rear. How is it that one needs to buy one of these models then bash a some sort of Wonka-factory rig with 4 wheels under there. Yes perhaps there were production challenges with a longer tender or other issues... so.. what. Throw in a few dollars and make it happen at the factory.
Maybe you get more sales outright instead of resistance from those who desire a correct Virginian model.
Im sorry if I stepped on any toes here, but as a customer who is allowed to buy a few engines several times a year... I must be absolutely certain that X engine will be as trouble free and be very well built. If that puts me into the Brass steam, so be it.
I might only buy one brass engine every 5 years instead of every year because of cost. What does that do to the rest of the hobby? Slows down the numbers of engine orders... that's what.
I still consider the triplex but am more of looking at ways to butcher the product by disabling the smoke, removing the unit out of the boiler and ensuring good pulling power under there along with a possible powering of that driver set. I dont believe for one second that you can drag a set of steam driving wheels with it's associated linkage for very long without something going out of whack.
Secondly, dont worry about that 18" or 22" radius. Ive stopped using those small radiuses long ago except in industry or yards where necessary and in places the big stuff cannot get into and derail. Yes I just have a loop or point to point with 31 inch radius... but I am a happy choo choo driver because my mind is stress-free about radius. I buy anything in HO and run it without a second thought to the itty bitty problem of 22" radius everyone seems to love.
Throw in a linkage kit similar to a baggie of traction wheels for those of us large radius users so we can put that 3rd set of drivers to work. This isnt some Tyco train set engine with a tender drive and a flawed coasting front boiler/driving wheels. (Call them derailing wheels but a subject for another day, best left in the haze of the 70's)
Dont misunderstand me, Im not bashing the triplex. But what I am trying to do is make MTH and all other maufactors in HO scale what I would like to see as a customer. Especially in the brave new world of 500 to 1000 dollar plastic HO steam.
Of course I can stick with all desiel and eliminate just about all of my worries and run trains for much cheaper. That would be cheating wouldnt it?
The engine looks great but not a good choice for those who have small layouts. I have a 5x9 and would fear my main line would not take it well. I was also told and maybe wrong that model train builders are getting away from steam generators.
I like the engine and it looked neat but $500 is alot for any engine. You can get a blueline diecast bigboy for $250. $500? I am thinking I will pass on this engine but would like to try a MTH engine sometime. I have been buying BLI/PCM and athearn Genesis engines with some good satisfaction. I would still like to try other companies products to compare.
doc manago wrote:MTH, please, do that the Triplex will handle 18" curves, with more motorized axles, as to get a equalized running, and more speakers because the engine is too long. Thanks...
Scot
At first I thought this was a bit too out in left field for my layout. However after reading some of your comments and thinking this through this would be an idle engine for heay grades and pusher service.
Though the video was jerky it gave me the impression it is a smooth runner and will easily run at slow speeds.
Hopefully, and probably something MTH may want to consider making is a unlettered version as many of us have our own shortlines and this would be as I've said an excellent addition. Just a thought...
As far as the MSRP, well we all know they are all high and will be about 20-30% cheaper at the LHS. Not bad for what you are getting.
Fergie
http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/showgallery.php?cat=500&ppuser=5959
If one could roll back the hands of time... They would be waiting for the next train into the future. A. H. Francey 1921-2007
Mr. Edleman wrote:
Because M.T.H. is confident that the Triplex will have exceptional pulling power and believe that today's marketplace places a premium on sound, command control and smoke rather than the perception that pulling power will be better with a third motor, we elected to go with a dummy drive train in the tender. After all, those Big Boy's on the market today only have two 8-wheel drive trains, just like our Triplex, and nobody seems to be crying for them to be redesignated as a "Big-Big Boy" and outfitted with a third powered drive train.
In HO, smoke is nothing more than a novelty. If you made a trade-off in offering a universal drive shaft for the third set of drivers so that you could provide a smoke unit, for the vast number of HO modelers, you made the wrong decision. Besides, there is no steam exhaust out of the rear engine exhaust stack on this model (at least not in your videos), so you only got half of the equation right.
I would never use smoke on my home HO layout, as I don't care to have the residual film all over everything on the layout. Using smoke in three rail O at a large exhibition hall, yup, I love it. In closed quarters, instant asphma attack for this boy.
As far as a "Big, Big Boy", this is a pretty ludicrous statement. Nobody is clammoring for one since there weren't any in real life. While I personally don't have any major heartache with a non-powered rear engine, it is obviously a concern with other potential customers, and those comments should be considered more carefully by MTH instead of dismissal with the flippant comment provided.
The locomotive features lighted markers on both locomotive and tender.
Save yourself a lot of criticism, and make sure the front class lights are white. Not green, not amber, not off-white, but white. Control of these lights through a DCC function key would be a bonus.
Like the M.T.H. HO K-4, the Triplex is equipped with both a DCC and a DCS receiver. You do not need DCS to operate this locomotive in command mode. M.T.H. will always produce its HO locomotives (yes more are scheduled for release in 2008 beyond the Triplex) with DCC receivers. DCS does give the user many more features than DCC, but with DCC's visibility in HO, producing locomotives without DCC recievers could jeoparidze a locomotive's popularity.
You are to be commended for making your locomotive DCC capable. And if the speed steps match the decoder speed steps, it is a bonus. But I am curious as to your statement regarding the DCC and DCS receiver. Are these two separate receivers? If so, why does MTH insist on making people pay for DCS capability when 99.9% of the potential users for this locomotive couldn't care less if the locomotive has DCS capability? The only people who care about DCS in HO are those who already have experience with DCS in three rail O, with Purple in their blood. It is a non-starter in this scale. The MSRP could have been reduced if DCS capability was not offered, or the "kit" of parts to drive the rear engine through a universal could have been offered in it's place as someone else suggested.
(yes more are scheduled for release in 2008 beyond the Triplex)
Please, take to heart the suggestions on model offerings for HO. Just like you did in O scale / gauge, offer a Northern Pacific Z-6, and then do a Z-7, Z-8, WM challenger, D&RGW L105 and if you just got to amortize that engine tooling a UPRR challenger, even though it has already been done to death. And for your own business sake, don't redo locomotives done in the last 3 years by BLI, Athearn, Walthers P2K, and Bachmann Spectrum, or are already announced for sale. If MTH did the NP Z series challengers, with DCC and sound, I'd be swiping the plastic repeatedly.
Regards,
Jerry Zeman
scottychaos wrote: doc manago wrote:MTH, please, do that the Triplex will handle 18" curves, with more motorized axles, as to get a equalized running, and more speakers because the engine is too long. Thanks... Scot
The length of this model is much shorter than any of the large articulated steam models from the 1940's era.
The good thing about the sound is one of the exhaust stacks is near the speakers in the tender.
CAZEPHYR wrote: ......the Virginian was not a compound locomotive.........
......the Virginian was not a compound locomotive.........
The Virginian WAS a compound (just like the Erie). The steam was first used in the middle engine, one cylinder exhausted to the rear engine, and the other to the front, then up the stacks. Using only half the steam for firebox draft hurt the boiler performance on both versions.
nfmisso wrote: CAZEPHYR wrote: ......the Virginian was not a compound locomotive......... The Virginian WAS a compound (just like the Erie). The steam was first used in the middle engine, one cylinder exhausted to the rear engine, and the other to the front, then up the stacks. Using only half the steam for firebox draft hurt the boiler performance on both versions.
You may be right, but the book "The Locomotives that Baldwin Built" states on Page 122 that the Virginian engine was built as a simple engine with six 34" X 32" cylinders. I am basing my statements on the Baldwin book. The pictures show the Virginian 700 to have the same size cylinders.
I am disturbed by something else.
The MTH proclaims 120 speed steps in 1 scale mph incretments. (Spelling?)
I am running Chief with 128 speed steps and another thought came to light.
What happens if I drive a Triplex at 120 scale miles an hour? I think it will throw all it's rods, wheels and scrap itself into a junk pile.
Or worse.. max out at max speed on the motor and crawl at 10 mph on the track.
Im sowwy.
I was not going to dive into the wording about the deliberate choice of a smoke unit versus a universal coupling but the statement tells me that manufactors as a whole dont listen to HO scale buyers of engines who actually drives these engines down the track pulling trains.
I hate to think of a 500 dollar ooh and ahh mantel peice sitting in a glass case, sad and unable to pull a train. What a waste.
I second the post about re-inventing engines already produced these last few years by virtually all manufactors.
amedleman wrote:Finally, an apology to those who felt slighted by my "Big-Big Boy" analogy in my previous post. I read several posts that construed that the Triplex's pulling power (even though such posters have yet to see or run the model) would be compromised because we only are powering two instead of all three of the locomotive's eight-wheel drive trains. I believed that such statements inferred that two powered eight-wheel drive trains were insufficient and I simply intended to point out that the M.T.H. HO Triplex won't be any less capable than today's HO Big Boy's because the Triplex has the same number of powered drive trains.
Finally, an apology to those who felt slighted by my "Big-Big Boy" analogy in my previous post. I read several posts that construed that the Triplex's pulling power (even though such posters have yet to see or run the model) would be compromised because we only are powering two instead of all three of the locomotive's eight-wheel drive trains. I believed that such statements inferred that two powered eight-wheel drive trains were insufficient and I simply intended to point out that the M.T.H. HO Triplex won't be any less capable than today's HO Big Boy's because the Triplex has the same number of powered drive trains.
Thanks for that, Andy. We don't want to get too testy, but it did come across as a facetious remark and I thought it unwise.
I think the vast majority of us are used to powered drivers, regardless of their configuration or location on a model. So, the idea of towing a third set, which you are proposing, would not be far removed from our comparision Challenger towing a 2-8-0, say, even though non-resistive because it is detached from a motor. I am sure some folks pull a loco that way when they have no recourse to simulate doubling. But, for the price you are asking, and with your claimed avant-garde approach to the hobby, and with your incipient entry over the last two years to what is a tight shop/market, I think you could have found a way to slip something more contributory into that tender. At least, not being a builder or seller , that was my expectation when I first saw the offering. Too bad, because the model has obvious appeal, but it would have been a resounding slam dunk had you bit the bullet a bit on this one.
Finally, would you please respond to the question of the not seemingly few who are Virginian fans and for whom this loco leaves something to be desired?
-Crandell
selector wrote:Finally, would you please respond to the question of the not seemingly few who are Virginian fans and for whom this loco leaves something to be desired?
"the book "The Locomotives that Baldwin Built" states on Page 122 that the Virginian engine was built as a simple engine with six 34" X 32" cylinders. I am basing my statements on the Baldwin book. The pictures show the Virginian 700 to have the same size cylinders."
If that's what it says, then this book is wrong in this instance. The cylinder size in the case of the VGN Triplex is misleading, because one cylinder from each side on the center engine was feeding the two cylinders on either the front or rear engine. It says this in several other books dealing with VGN steam, and it you look close you can see the steam piping.
Virginian wrote: "the book "The Locomotives that Baldwin Built" states on Page 122 that the Virginian engine was built as a simple engine with six 34" X 32" cylinders. I am basing my statements on the Baldwin book. The pictures show the Virginian 700 to have the same size cylinders."If that's what it says, then this book is wrong in this instance. The cylinder size in the case of the VGN Triplex is misleading, because one cylinder from each side on the center engine was feeding the two cylinders on either the front or rear engine. It says this in several other books dealing with VGN steam, and it you look close you can see the steam piping.
Virginian
I had read the information about the Virginian Triplex on the web and understand that it does look like a compound type engine. The Baldwin book must be incorrect as it does state it was a simple type engine compared to the Erie, which was a compound. They were much different looking since they did not share the same size of drivers, boilers, cabs, trailing truck and tenders. I am still surprised MTH would label the Erie as a Virginian engine.
Do you have any pictures of the 700 after the rebuild??
marknewton wrote: selector wrote: Finally, would you please respond to the question of the not seemingly few who are Virginian fans and for whom this loco leaves something to be desired?Crandell, there's not much he can say. The VGN loco a very different machine to the Erie triplex - the only way to model it accurately would be to make all new tooling. I somehow doubt they'll do that.Cheers,Mark.
selector wrote: Finally, would you please respond to the question of the not seemingly few who are Virginian fans and for whom this loco leaves something to be desired?
Mark, you are undoubtedly going to be proven correct; too bad because a few of our friends would love to have their "train come in."
Here is a link for information from steamlocomotive.com. Even though a compound, all cylinders were the same size:
http://www.steamlocomotive.com/articulated/eriep1.shtml
Here is a link with information for both triplex locos listed in steamlocomotive.com:
http://www.dself.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/triplex/triplex.htm