Hey there Mr. Bachmann,

It seems like we have been waiting for the D&RGW stock cars for an awfully long time now. Have they been forgotten in the excitement to get out the 4-6-0's and announce the articulateds? Also, will they be a prototypical black car with white lettering (hopefully), or more of the same old boring oxide brown with black roofs like all the other On30 box & stock cars? Bachmann really needs to break away from those brown cars with black roofs for a change...

I also see that Walthers has stopped listing all but the undec, C&S, and D&RGW stock cars, and both the C&S and undecs are listed as "sold out" (their D&RGW release date seems like it's always a few months away). Will they be re-run if and when the D&RGW cars are released, or are they discontinued like the B&O, GN, and OR&W?

Regards,
Bill

Hey there Mr. Bachmann,

Is there still going to be a new release of the C&S mogul #21 (sku #25241) as listed in the 2009 catalog? Will it come with the new pilot and be DCC ready? Also what about the 4-6-0, which was stated to be "on the water" last month? Is it still afloat? The list has been very quiet this past few weeks...

Bill

I have noticed that the new N scale 44 Tonner I purchased yesterday loses track of it's headlight setting when it comes upon dirty track - the lights go out and then need to be turned back on with the F0 button. I haven't seen this happen since the mid-nineties when it was a normal occurrence with the decoders I had purchased to use with my Digitrax Challenger. On more recent decoders the headlight setting is remembered even after the locomotive is tilted off of one rail. I thought this problem had been fixed long ago through better decoders and programming. Is it just that the ultra small decoder in this tiny loco simply doesn't have room for the necessary circuitry to allow the decoder to remember what the headlight setting was before it momentarily lost contact on the dirty track section?

Regards,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL USA

Hi Mr. Bach-man,

Does the separately purchased N Scale Western Maryland USRA Medium tender (Bachmann item #89752) have a road number stenciled on it's rear wall like the tenders that come with the WM 2-8-0, or are they left blank in order to be more generic? If there IS a number stenciled on the rear wall, what number is it? I already have two factory decorated WM 2-8-0's with two different road numbers, plus a third NYC 2-8-0 that has a badly damaged tender that I would like to replace, but I need to know so I can decide whether to order a WM or an undecorated version.

Thanks,
Bill Nielsen

Some of the N scale tenders available for separate purchase are listed in the catalog as being "DCC" ready and are slightly higher than those listed without the DCC notation, yet they all seem to have the same two conductor drawbar arrangement. I have recently purchased a "DCC ready" 2-8-0 (WM #761) and it also has the same drawbar. How can a tender be listed as DCC ready with only two connections to the loco? For DCC in the tender there would need to be at least four connections between the loco and tender (5 if you want a headlight). If the decoder is on board the loco, as is suggested in the 2-8-0 instruction sheet, then the tender is not really DCC ready, though it MAY provide all wheel pickup. A truly "DCC ready" tender should also have some form of plug inside for the decoder, in addition to more connections between the loco and tender. Can Mr. Bach-man shed any light on this?

Also, this loco is listed in the catalog as having an operating front coupler, which it clearly doesn't have, since it is a dummy one piece molding and is rigidly inserted into the pilot. There is a Rapido style coupler with a snap in shank included as an extra part in the box, presumably for replacing the dummy, but since it also snaps in rigidly, it should hardly be called operating (actually, any Rapido stlye coupler, even one with a full vertical range of motion, should NOT be referred to as "operating"!). Any locomotive, especially a 2-8-0, needs to at least provide for installation of an operating front coupler (hopefully a Micro-Trains unit) in order to be fully functional...

Regards,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL USA

After a bit of experimenting, I've figured out a way to make some very inexpensive uncoupler ramps for anyone wishing to switch their Thomas HO/OO trains without having to resort to changing the couplers. First experiments using a piece cut from a common business card were promising but unsightly. The second experiment, using the business card as a pattern, involved using a piece of clear blister packaging and was much better looking (in fact, the ramp itself was hard to see), but the plastic proved to be too hard to adjust so that it would uncouple the cars without derailing them, due to it's extra stiffness and thickness (about .014"). While it would be nice to recycle a piece of clear packing material that costs nothing (and that's still a good option if you have the patience to find the right piece), I found a piece of clear Acetate that was .0075" thick at a local art store. It was really too large to justify purchasing it just to use for uncoupling ramps, but the leftovers can be used for windows in cars or structures, so at least it won't go to waste. I found that this thickness of acetate was just right, being just stiff enough to raise the coupler trip levers, yet flexible enough to deform when the travel limit of the lever was reached, rather than derailing the car. If you want to try to make your own uncoupler ramps, you might find suitable clear plastic in the window of a display box, or possibly in the clear cover variety of duo-tang (are they still called that?) report folders, now that school's out.  My final ramp measures 7/16" wide by 2-7/8" long, but these dimensions are not that critical. The critical dimension is the spacing of the mounting holes in the ramp, which needs to be about 1/16" longer than the distance between the mounting holes in the ties of your track (2-5/8" in my case). I used an 0-80 brass screw at each end of the ramp to secure it to the ties. This dimension will likely vary between different brands of track, I made my test ramps to fit some old code 100 Atlas snap-track which I had on hand, but similar methods should work with any brand of track, such as: Bachmann EZ-track, Kato Uni-track, and Peco Streamline track, etc. A photo can be seen at the following link:

http://s606.photobucket.com/albums/tt143/lenstwister/?action=view&current=Thomas_uncoupler_ramp.jpg

Regards,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL USA     

Hello Mr. Bach-mann,

What should be used for an uncoupling ramp with the Thomas Line couplers? I remember the old Mantua hook & loop couplers in the 1950's used an arched piece of flexible clear celluloid between the rails to lift the coupler link hooks as the train passed over but as I recall, this was not very reliable. Is there some other way to perform "switching" with the Thomas locos & cars, or is this not a common need for Thomas operators?

Regards,
Bill

Someone mentioned recently somewhere (I can't recall where) that the newest runs of the On30 mogul have additional electrical pickups in the tender. I'm not sure my LHS has any in stock, and if they do, I have no way to tell if it's the most recent run or not. Also, do the most recently released Moguls come with the working coupler pilots already installed? I've seen that the freight cars (boxcars & hi-side gons) are getting the new lowered chassis as the older inventory gets depleted, so I wonder if the same scenario is true for the Moguls. I think it's also interesting to note that the "new" On30 items listed in the 2009 Bachmann catalog are really NOT new items for 2009, they are all items that were released (or scheduled for release) in 2008. So the net effect is that not only are we not seeing any truly "new" On30 items this year, with the loss of the Porter o-4-0 & 0-4-2, we are actually seeing a decline in On30 items available. Also, the sound equipped OF Forney SR&RL #12 appears to have been dropped from the catalog as well. Does this mean that the On30 market may have already seen it's peak, and now is on the downhill side of new items? Especially worrisome since no other major manufacturers have released anything in this scale (sorry, conversions of existing On3 items doesn't count, besides those manufacturers can't really be called "major").

Regards,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL USA
Florida On30 Renegades

Quote from: Bill Miller on November 11, 2008, 06:34:40 AM
I checked the Great Planes (Tower Hobbies) web-site yesterday and they are now saying it will be June 09 before the 4-6-0's are released. They are almost always correct on release dates and up-date the web-site daily.

Has something happened to delay the release of these locomotives that has pushed the date back to June?

Mr. Bachmann,
Any confirmation of this rumor? If it's true, some of us may want to change our Santa's list, so as not to be left with nothing under the tree this year! I see Walthers still lists it as Nov '08, but then again, they haven't posted any pictures yet either! Inquiring minds need to know...

Railtwister

Mr. Bach-man and Mr. Riley,

With all the talk about a WWI type loco, and foreign (to the US) loco prototypes, I would like to again state that if Bachmann were to release a Beyer-Garrett type loco, especially if it was one of the smaller versions, in On30, I would find it impossible to resist. This is in spite of the fact that since the release of the Forney, I have decided to focus my On30 modeling on mimicking the Maine Two footers (and subsequently purchased three of them).  Yes, I did recently purchase a 4-4-0 in a weak moment (hey, it was just another one of those "irresistable" items), and I also have an O-F Consolidation (which I justify by thinking the prototype two footers would have had one eventually, as a logical step up from one of the 2-6-2's), but I really AM going to limit my focus to Maine 2 Footers, no, REALLY!

Please, Mr. Bach-man and Mr. Riley, just don't come out with a SR&RL 2-6-2 at the same time as a Beyer-Garrett, because that would really cause me to go into financial meltdown!

Regards,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL
Florida On30 Renegades at Yahoo-Groups

Mr. Bach-Man,

Not sure I should be posting this to the On30 list, but since I don't see a more appropriate place, here goes. The new SceneScapes product line looks great! I Have a question about the Foliage Fibers (SKU32631,32,33) - from the photos, it looks like this product comes in sheet form, but there are no dimensions given. Any idea as to what size (either inches or Centimeters is OK) the sheets will be?

Thanks,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL

Mr Bach-man.

I was looking through a couple of websites recently and found the Kennebec Brewery Reefer listed as "sold out". Has it been discontinued, or are we just waiting for a re-run/re-stock shipment?

Regards,
Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL
Florida On30 Renegades

Mr. Bach-man,

I am somewhat confused about the upcoming On30 4-4-0 locomotive, and what the different features are on the various SKU numbers released by Bachmann, since the descriptions seem to be a little ambiguous. Can you answer the following questions so I can place my order, or do I have to wait 'til they actually arrive (and probably are sold out) before we will know this?

1) What is the difference between " trim" and "pinstripes" Seems to me the only way to "trim" a loco is to use "pinstripes". Is the wood cab version only to have gold trim while the steel has only white?

2) The first  SKU # of either wood cab or steel cab version (unlettered) doesn't say it is coming "with red windows", yet the picture on the Bachmann site for the steel cab unit shows the black/graphite unlettered steel one with red windows. Do you suppose ALL versions are going to have red windows, and they're just telling us about it on some of them?

3) As for the extra parts included, are they going to have both spoked pilot and footboard type, spoked & solid lead truck wheels, and are they going to have interchangeable wood & coal loads, and also an oil tank for the tender in the box for all versions?

Thanks for any help in clearing this up.

Bill Nielsen
Oakland Park, FL