Any idea why?
Well, the short answer is "they didn't sell or they'd still be out there." I wonder if the more detailed models mean that more of the manufacturing costs goes to the body rather than the drive these days.
Disclaimer: This post may contain humor, sarcasm, and/or flatulence.
Michael Mornard
Bringing the North Woods to South Dakota!
Why do you want a dummy locomotive?
Just make one by removing the motor drive.
Amtrak America, 1971-Present.
Broadway Limited offered dummy B units with their A-B sets of recently released Baldwin Sharks. I would have much prefered a powered unit.
I believe Jason Shron of Rapido once commented that the motor and drive components add only a fraction to the production cost but trying to inventory the additional SKUs for dummys was not worth the effort.
Regards, Ed
Correct, Jason Shron did say that recently too. The difference in his costs between a powered unit and one without the motor and gear train isn't a lot, so the final retail price will not change much.
Since there won't be a dramatic difference in price between a dummy unit and a powered one, most customers would opt for a powered unit anyway. So why bother stocking two units?
Jason's correct. Unfortunately it's no longer worth it for scale model locomotive manufacturers to produce non-powered units.
Ironcically this subject has come up in DCC discussions before. A number of DCC-Sound modelers have performed excellent work in utilizing unmotored locomotives as "sound only" units. With the generous amount of space inside of a dummy unit, there's room for larger or multiple speakers. If the DCC-Sound system is properly installed and baffled, the resulting sound is amazingly crisp and clear, especially at low volume. I was amazed when I heard a modeler's sound only F-7B in an MU lashup. It was like listening to a G Scale unit!
Check ebay regularly and you'll still find dummy units from Life Like Proto 2000 and Athearn (old Blue Box).
Below is my dummy P2K E6B in the ACL scheme. Plan is the installation of a LokSound V4 decoder with QSI Hi-Bass speakers.
"I like my Pullman Standards & Budds in Stainless Steel flavors, thank you!"
They don't sell - actually they never sold well. When I ran a train department in a hobby shop, many years ago, very few people bought dummy units.
Think about it this way, if you are modeling a large Class I line, and you have the room and the resources, you are going to build a larger layout and pull longer trains. As your trains get longer, to justify muli unit lashups, you are more likely to actually need more power.
Sure most of the diesel trains on my layout that have three or four powered uints could do with just two powered units, but by having them all powered the loco fleet becomes more versatile.
AND, as more modelers became interested in prototype operations as opposed to just display running in circles, that versatility became more important.
I've been doing this since 1968 - never owned a dummy unit..........I have never even considered the idea.
The "sound car" idea might be the best argument for dummy units - but I don't do sound...........
Sheldon
ATLANTIC CENTRALI've been doing this since 1968 - never owned a dummy unit..........I have never even considered the idea. Sheldon
Nor have I. Even my Athearn SW7 calf was powered. I used a powered SW7/powered Calf consist for years at one club I was a member of..Like the prototype I had the power to pull cars-in my case around 30 on most freight trains plus the long cuts when I was building outbound trains.
Larry
Conductor.
Summerset Ry.
"Stay Alert, Don't get hurt Safety First!"
I think in the era of motors that drew 1 amp or more, there was a place for dummies. One of the problems with Athearn dummies was that they were the same number as the powered units; not a huge problem to overcome, but still an issue. I had a customer who exclusively bought dummies to make custom pen & pencil sets. I have plans to make an old blue box F7B a sound unit, but I am so far behind my dcc decoder projects; that may never get done...
I still see unpowered for B units, some with sound. Of course not all diesel types have a B unit.
Enjoy
Paul
DAVID FORTNEY Any idea why?
For starters there are non-powered units being sold still, so the statement in the title is false. Here is an example.
http://www.athearn.com/Search/Default.aspx?SearchTerm=F7A+RND&CatID=THLD
The B units are dummies (non-powered).
Bowser also still sells unpowered B units:
http://www.bowser-trains.com/history/emdf7loco.html
As others have commented, non-powered units are not very profitable so very few are sold anymore.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
My thoughts were not on B units but more on road engines like the SD series, GP50's and the like.
DAVID FORTNEY My thoughts were not on B units but more on road engines like the SD series, GP50's and the like.
It's been ages since non-powered geeps or SD's or U-boats have been manufactured new, probably the 1980's or 1990's at the latest.
Again the reason are lack of sales. Back in "the day" dummies of geeps and SD's were offered probably because at that time, people could buy a few to allow them to simulate MU consists and afford it. In the past 20 years or so, buying dummies has largely fallen out of favor since modelers prefer to buy all powered units. Market demand is what the companies are responding to.
LION still gets dummies. Him buys SUBWAY TRAINS. Set has one power car and 3 unpowered cars. LION IS STILL WAITING (Anthony Bianco) for new MTH subways. Him pre-ordered one set P-D-D-D with two more D-D units for a six car train, the standard of the Route of the BroadwayLION. LION has had (or is) replacing all of the motors in the Walthers/Life-Like units, him has high hopes for the MTH units, but will have no qualms about yanking the boards and motors if him has to.
ROAR
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS
Subways are a very different genre; different beast.
riogrande5761 Subways are a very different genre; different beast.
Ditto with the Con-Cor, Pennsylvania railroad MP54 electric MU cars. The powered units were more than capable of hauling 3 to 4 unpowered units. So in that case Con-Cor was selling quite a few unpowered MP54s.
They were something like $80 less than the motorized ones...
Ed
riogrande5761It's been ages since non-powered geeps or SD's or U-boats have been manufactured new, probably the 1980's or 1990's at the latest.
And they still show up on e-Bay usually missing the railings and they still don't seem to sell.
Back in the day you needed all the power you could get to pull long strings of wheeled bricks. With newer cars being much better at rolling down the rail you do not need all those power sucking electric motors.
I have a ABA set of Athearn bluebox F 45 locos with the B being a dummy unit. It contains the decoders and one large speaker. Both A units have a speaker. Even with the volumn turned way down you know there is some serious power coming at you.
Oh about the F-45s, they still use the original big ol gray motors but with modern machined brass flywhells.
Hello all,
I recall reading the reason dummy units were produced in the DC era was because of the poor tolerances of early motors and gears. The same locomotives produced by the same manufacturer might not speed match at the same voltage.
By using a dummy a consist or MU could be replicated without the bucking of two or more speed mismatched units.
I can attest to this. When I ran my pike DC I had two GP40s from the same manufacturer that fought so hard against each other that they would break apart unless the "slower" unit was the lead unit to corral the "faster" unit.
With the advent of DCC and the ability to speed match through the manipulation of CV's the "need" for dummy units waned. That's not to say that they completely disappeared; as has been noted by other posts.
As has been noted, there has been a resurgence of dummy units as sound platforms.
To say that "no diesel non- powered units anymore" is not quite true.
Hope this helps.
"Uhh...I didn’t know it was 'impossible' I just made it work...sorry"
As I have said before, the only dummy on my layout is me.
I can't tell from the picture which of these old friends is powered.
They're ancient Athearn BBs that I spruced up. I added a sound-only decoder with lights to one of them. (The engine on the right has its headlights off because they were too much for the camera, by the way.) I've also got an old dummy B unit for the set.
I don't run very long trains, my layout is exceptionally flat and my rolling stock has all metal wheels, so one engine generally suffices for most work. I run one AA consist with a silent powered unit and a dummy sound unit, and one AB consist with a sound powered unit and a quiet dummy.
This pair is an Athearn blue box GP9 and a Walthers GP9m. The GP9m prototypes were actually rebuilt GP9 engines. Just to mess with the minds of rivet counters, I numbered the GP9 to be the same engine that was rebuilt to make this particular GP9m. The GP9m is powered and has no sound. I put a sound-only decoder in the GP9. It was originally a rubber-band drive that I gutted.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
If a train is long enough to require more than one engine, it probably really needs more than one engine.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
Phoebe Vet If a train is long enough to require more than one engine, it probably really needs more than one engine.
Not necessarily. Most of us don't run trains long enough to actually need multiple unit lashups, but we want to run multiple unit lash-ups for appearance sake. Back in the 1970s and 1980s my diesel fleet was mostly Athearn BB and while it may not cost the manufacturers much more to produce a powered unit, the retail price of the non-powered units was significantly less. I liked to run my F-units in AB sets and that would usually mean a powered A-unit and a dummy B unit. I had a few dummy GP7s as well including a cabless unit.
Today my layout is DCC but I still run primarily my F units in powered AB sets with one ABB set. On rare occasions just for grins I will combine them into an ABBA lash up.
This thread caught my eye because I started a thread with pretty much the same question two years ago. If anyone is interested, here's the link:
http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/88/t/226960.aspx
EDIT: It's been so long since I've done it I've forgotten how to make a clickable link. Help appreciated.
One more thought. On DC layouts polarity was an issue so if you wanted to run a powered F7 AA set, you would either have to reverse the polarity on one of the units or run them elephant style. Having a dummy loco for the second unit made things simpler. DCC of course resolves that issue.
A nice thing about the "dummy era" was if you changed the railroad and/or era you modelled, it was easy to change a diesel from one railroad to another. Say you switched from the East Coast 1950's to Pacific Northwest in the 1970's. You could remove the body from an Athearn F7 decorated for New York Central, go buy a "dummy" decorated for BN for $10, and put the dummy body on the powered chassis.
jecorbettyou would either have to reverse the polarity on one of the units or run them elephant style
Russell
I think part of the modern appeal of dummy locos is due to the remembered idea that Athearn dummys were 50% off the MSRP. I have a Walthers 1991 Catalog, and that's generally the case. $20 powered F7A = $10 dummy F7A; $35 powered PA-1 = $17.50 dummy PA-1; etc.
I have the feeling that some folks remember those days and think that today's $250 non-sound powered diesel would only by $125 if it was a dummy. It was 50% off 25 years ago, it should still be 50% off today, right? Um, no. In reality, it would be that same ~$10 cheaper that it was back in the day.
In the yon olden days, the motor and drive was most expensive part of any Athearn. Today, the drive costs very little compared to all the labor in assembly and paint for the shell. Therefore, dummys would still be almost as much money as a fully powered one, so why not power it?Edit: Russell, on old Athearns and the like, the chassis was electrified as part of the pick-up from the trucks. If you used metal Kadee couplers and put them on the metal chassis with the metal clips, two locos would spark if they were back to back. I saw it plenty of times back in the day.
Paul A. Cutler III
jecorbett One more thought. On DC layouts polarity was an issue so if you wanted to run a powered F7 AA set, you would either have to reverse the polarity on one of the units or run them elephant style. Having a dummy loco for the second unit made things simpler. DCC of course resolves that issue.
No, all DC locos move in the same direction without regard to front or back. Example, track in front you, rail closest to you is positive, all locos move to your right. Rail farthest from you positive, locos all move left.
Most all of my trains need at least two powered units, typical train length 40-50 cars. Most freights are pulled by 3-4 powered units, DC powered.
Typical steam powered freight is double headed.
Typical premier pasenger train is 10-12 cars and is pulled by two diesels.
jjdamnit Hello all, I recall reading the reason dummy units were produced in the DC era was because of the poor tolerances of early motors and gears. The same locomotives produced by the same manufacturer might not speed match at the same voltage. By using a dummy a consist or MU could be replicated without the bucking of two or more speed mismatched units. I can attest to this. When I ran my pike DC I had two GP40s from the same manufacturer that fought so hard against each other that they would break apart unless the "slower" unit was the lead unit to corral the "faster" unit. With the advent of DCC and the ability to speed match through the manipulation of CV's the "need" for dummy units waned. That's not to say that they completely disappeared; as has been noted by other posts. As has been noted, there has been a resurgence of dummy units as sound platforms. To say that "no diesel non- powered units anymore" is not quite true. Hope this helps.
What brand were those GP40's........
I've been at this since 1968, I still run DC, and nearly every train is pulled by two, three or four powered units - been doing that for 40 years with no problems.
With today's modern locos, I even run steam locos of different brands and wheel arrangements together. Example a Proto 2000 2-8-8-2 and a Spectrum 2-6-6-2 run just fine togeter on DC.
Disclaimer - none of my locos have decoders or sound, they are true DC locos.
Like Sheldon I been running 2-3 powered unit consist for years even my old Trains Inc,Alco Models and Hallmark brass diesels was ran in twos and threes as was my Athearn and Hobbytown diesels..