I would suggest an alternative approach.  Purchase a sound equipped Bachmann S4 and swap the shell with the Bachmann S2.  I believe if you shop around you will find that purchasing the Sound Value S4 to be cost neutral when compared to buying the full-featured Tsunami plus speaker and enclosure.  You will also find this alternative approach much easier to complete.

I have installed the T-750 in several Atlas S2 and S4 locos.  I also have a couple of the Bachmann S4 sound locos.  There isn't enough room in either of them to install the T-1000 (at least without doing a lot of heavy duty surgery).  The plus to using the Atlas loco is weight which equates to pulling power.  The Atlas frame is a very heavy chunk of cast metal.  It has much more pulling power than the lighter weight Bachmann unit.

Tom

Typically, CV 2 controls the starting voltage.  You may want to set this to say 20 to start, and then make adjustments up or down from there.  You want to get the starting voltage adjusted to the point where it begins to move at throttle position 1.

Good luck,

Tom

Jonathan,

Nice work, but there is a somewhat easier way to do it.  Berritt Hill Trains sells pre-wired self adhesive LED lighting strips.  They come with up to 15 LEDs per strip.  These work great in full length passenger cars.  They provide nice even light throughout the length of the car.  You can trim them shorter in groups of 3 LEDs should you have less than full length equipment.   The strips also come with a capacitor built into the circuit.  It holds power for about 3 seconds, which is more than enough time to eliminate the momentary flickering associated with most passenger car lighting.

Tom

Folks,

I finally found time to tear down the 4-4-0.  I can confirm that the domes are held in place by two screws from within the boiler.  There are two recent threads talking about Bachmann 10 wheelers.  One of them has some good discussion and photos about how to remove the boiler.  The method to remove the boiler from the 4-4-0 is the same.

A word of caution, when you first turn the loco over you will see two screws clearly visible below the cab.  These hold the cab to the boiler.  Only remove them if you want to remove he cab.  The two screws you need to free the boiler from the drive mechanism are very small and nearly totally obscured behind behind some piping.  Also, to free the front of the boiler, you need to remove the two diagonal pipes running from the smoke box to the front pilot beam.  Steam pipes from the boiler to the cylinder heads, sand pipes, and the reverse lever mechanism will also try to thwart your attempts toremove the boiler.  Trust me, I know.  This is the 4th one I've torn down to make modifications and lighting enhancements.  But, this is the first time I've ever needed to look for those dome screws.

Regards,

Tom

I am not Mr. Bachmann, but I have experience with several of thes 0-6-0t locos.  What is going on wth yours is not normal.  I suggest you call the Bachmann Service Dept and make arrangements for warranty repair or replacement.  You want to call them and not send e-mail.  It has been my experience that takes them weeks upon weeks to respond to e-mail.  They ae very helpful and responsive on the phone.

Good luck,

Tom

After looking at the videos I am also inclined to think that it is a decoder issue.  Have you done a factory reset?

Tom

Folks,

I have not forgotten about this.  Hurricane Sandy is causing me to put in a lot of overtime at work dealing with the closure of our lower Manhattan office due to flood damage.  I now hope to tear down the 4-4-0 some time this coming weekend.

Tom

Mine will pull 6-7 free rolling cars on straight and level track.  The cars all have metal wheels and a minimum weight of 3.5 oz.  It will pull 2 cars up a 1% grade.  It will only pull 1 car up a 2% grade.

You might try to install some A-Line lead sheet weight to the cab roof to add a little more pulling power.  Don't over do it.  You run the risk of making the unit out of balance over the drivers if you add to much.  I can't tell you how much weight to install because I installed sound in mine and mounted the speaker to the inside of the cab roof).

Tom

UP 844,

Smoke is a personal preference.  I personally do not like it.  However, I have several DCC installation clients who love it and want it installed in their locos.  As Rich points out, most smoke unit installations are not "plug 'n play."  Depending on the locomotive, it can involve frame or loco shell drilling and milling to make room for the unit.  You also need to select the proper Seuthe unit based on the physical size of the loco and whether the boiler shell itself is metal or plastic.  If plastic, it is best to select one of the pre-insulated models.  Further, depending of the diameter of the loco's smoke stack, there is often a need to carefully drill it out to a larger diameter to accommodate the smoke unit chimney or to replace the stack completely with a larger diameter brass one.

Next week I will start work on a 4th Bachmann Richmond American for a client.  It is the worst case scenario.  I need to mill the frame to make room for the botton portion of the Seuthe #22, mill the inside of the boiler to make room for the top portion, and replace the smoke stack to make room for the chimney.  When it's done, I will have close to 6 hours involved in performing this work.  I then still have to do the wiring.

Tom

The Seuthe line is probably the best aftermarket unit you can find.  The problem is, when you turn it on, it smokes a constant stream of smoke until you either turn it off or until it runs out of fluid.  When it runs out of fluid, you better turn the power off fast or it will burn out the heating element in a matter of seconds.

Both MTH and BLI offer smoke units in their locos with the smoke timed to puff in coordination with the sound chuff.  This is much more realistic.  However, I do not believe these are available for aftermarket sale.

Back to the Suethe, do you plan to use it with DC or DCC?  For DCC, when one of my clients requests smoke, I always install a micro relay switch to control the smoke unit.  This allows a decoder function to control the on/off function of the switch and allows you to feed full track power to the smoke unit in the on position.  The advantage of this arrangement is you have the ability to turn the unit off when it runs out of fluid, it feeds full power to the smoke unit to provide a good amount of smoke, and it saves you from cooking the decoder.

The Seuthe units draw 125 mA of power or more.  Most decoder functions provide 120 mA max.  Some decoders say they provide 200 mA, but the smoke unit current draw will eventually cook these units as well.  ESU sells a very inexpensive micro switch that is perfect for this application.

Good luck,

Tom

How steep are the grades on your layout?  How sharp are the curves?  The combination of these two factors will contribute to the equation about how many cars it can pull.  Also, what type of cars do you plan to pull?  Are they free rolling?  How much do they weigh?  A loco that can pull 30 cars on straight and level track will only be able to pull a fraction of that number on a steep grade with tight curves.

Tom

Another trick you can try is to add thin lead sheet weight to the drive mechanism's base plate on the underside of the loco.  I've done this for clients who wanted to get more tractive effort out of the modern American 4-4-0 and this 2-6-0.  This also places the weights directly over/under the drive wheels yielding maximum affect while not throwing off the loco's balance and center of gravity.

If you look at the loco as it stands on the rails, you will see that the underframe sets relatively high off the rail head.  I take sheet lead (available from A-Line) and cut it into strips matching the width of the base plate.  I then cut it to the proper length.  You then need to carefully remove the base plate and use it to mark the screw hole locations on the weight.  You then need to drill out the marked locations to create pass-through holes with a diameter slightly larger than the heads of the base plate mounting screws.  These holes are necessary to allow you to remove the base plate once the weight is affixed for future lubrication and maintenance.

At this point, reinstall the loco's base plate.  Then carefully align and install the weight to the base plate.  I like to use a couple of small dabs of vinyl caulking to do this.  Make sure the holes are properly aligned over the screw holes and don't allow any of the caulk to foul the holes either.  The last caution is to not use sheet lead that is too thick.  You want to make sure you still have clearance for grade crosssings, guard rails, switch frogs and so on.

Two other tricks that I have used are to place additional weight on the back of the smoke box door. And to add weight to the floor of the cab.  For example, the cab floor behind the firebox on the Modern American is lower than the floor beneath the engineer and fireman seats.  I fill this area with sheet lead and then use Squadran Green putty to hide the side and rear edge.  Once painted black, no one will notice the change.

If all else fails, add a second loco to the consist.  That's what many prototype railroads had to do based on the terrain.   For example, the Western Maryland's H-9 2-8-0 locos were real brutes with tractive effort of nearly 74,000 pounds.  Two units could easily handle a 60-car train on gentle grades.  However, on the Thomas Subdivision's Black Fork Grade, each H-9 was reduced to pulling 5 loaded 50 ton hoppers.  To get around this, the railroad had to assign mid-train and end of train helpers to get over the grade.

Good luck,

Tom

I believe the answer is yes.  The chuff you hear is on the exhaust portion of the piston stroke.  As such, you would have to infuse steam first. Depending on the relative position of the cylinders, you could get at least a quarter turn of the driver before you get a chuff.

Regards,

Tom

In general, model train prices climb on Ebay every fall and go that way well into February.  When the sun begins to shine again and temperatures warm, people's interests begin turn elsewhere and prices begin to fall back.  If you are looking for bargain trains on Ebay, July and August are the best.

Tom

If you can wait until next week for an answer, I'll have one for you.  I'm installing a Seuthe smoke unit in one for a customer and will have to completely tear down the loco to do.

Regards,

Tom