Problems with brand new DCC-Sound SD45

[westfalen]

Well good news to report.

I received two pairs of new trucks from the service department last week.  Even under a magnifying glass I couldn't for the life of me see any difference between them and the originals to the extent that I had to mark the old ones before I removed them so I didn't get them mixed up with the new ones and put them back on the locos.  I thought I was wasting my time but both SD45s ran smoothly as soon as I put them on the track without any of the previous stalls and stuttering, even the one I hadn't given any running in after I gave up on the first one.  I took them to the club running day on Sunday and they performed flawlessly.

I have absolutely no idea what you did Bachmann but thanks.

Now I just have to renumber one of them.  How about doing diesel locomotives in multiple road numbers, or at least two or three, like the other manufacturers do.

[spookshow]

I couldn't detect any visible differences between the new and the old trucks either. Performance with the new trucks on my broken-in SD45 is the same as previously - decent enough for the most part, but it still suffers the occasional stutter/stall. Conversely, the Kato SD45 I have it consisted with runs just as smooth as can be 100% of the time.

-Mark

[gatrhumpy]

As an engineer, I'm curious as to what they did to the pickups.

[westfalen]

It's got me beat.  As myself and spookshow observed there are no visible differences but although results seem to vary you would hardly think they would go to the effort and expense of mailing two pair halfway around the world to me otherwise.  I would also be interested to know what their findings were and what changes they made.

I wonder because they look the same spookshow accidentally got sent old ones?  It would be interesting to hear from anyone else who has installed the replacement trucks.

[spookshow]

Maybe different (or less) wheel blackening? I dunno, just speculating in a vacuum.

-Mark

[gatrhumpy]

I'm not entirely sure. I am curious as to what changed. When I had mine, I cleaned (chemically and mechanically) the wheel blackening crap off the wheels. That did not help matters.

[salpiner]

Hello, all.
I've been eyeing this loco for some time. I finally pulled the trigger last week, hoping that previous issues have been addressed. I am happy to report mine runs as well as I could have hoped. Right out of the box, no stalls, great sound, and excellent running characteristics at all speeds (running Digitrax DCC). Whatever changes were made in production seem to have done the trick. I am extremely satisfied (and I am very picky)! I bought from LHS to facilitate return if necessary. Maybe its time to give these another shot...

[Bruiser02895]

Anyone else have a report on recent DCC Sound on Board experience with the SD 45?  Would love to run one at the head of my Kato SD 45s for the horn and sound but the lighting CVs on Bachmann DCC on board engines leave me very disappointed given what I can do with Digitrax and TCS decoders in regard to pulse, strobe, flash and ditch light effects.  For me the lighting is more important than the sound which I grow weary of pretty quickly.  Cool lighting effects never get old as there nothing cooler than running 4 or 5 EMD SD70 ACEs with synchornized pulsing strobe lights...... 

Can anyone report on the lighting options for the EMD SD 45s?  They look nice, but unless they are flawless runners with cool lighting effects, they are expensive paper weights.

[gatrhumpy]

If you want to upgrade the lighting effects, you'll either need to replace the decoder with another sound decoder or add in another function only decoder like a Digitrax TL1 or TL4.