I just recieved an HO Athearn Genesis SD60M - BNSF heritage II scheme, lettered 9286 - from a friend as an early birthday present. FWIW the detail is good, and it seems to run well from what little I’ve used it.
Are other Athearn diesel going to be gearing the same as this is? Will their SD’s be geared the same, but the Geeps different? How much different is it geared from Kato or Bachmann diesels, especially Kato’s SD40-2 and SD70MAC?
Thanks
If you’re running straight DC block control, the Genesis will probably not play well with other brands. Kato are usually geared slower and Bachmann faster than the Genesis products.
Why don’t you just put the two different brands on the track together and see how they run? Even if they are significantly different, it’s not going to harm either one to run them together for a short distance.
I think out of all the Genesis locomotives the SD60M’s runs the best.
I was asking mainly just out of curiosity. I don’t have the model train budget to buy another engine just to compare gearing.
What is the drawbar pull on this engine? How many cars?
The Athearn Genesis SD60M was reviewed in the October 2008 Model Railroader.
According to the review, the model weighed 20.7 ounces and had a drawbar pull of 3.36 ounces. This is “equivalent to 47 free-rolling HO freight cars on straight and level track”. In case you’re curious, the current draw when slipping (the engine’s wheels, not you) was 0.08 ampere, and when stalled 0.10 ampere. (I personally question these last two numbers as they seem low, but I can’t say for sure.)