I’m reviewing Athearns AC4400 in their Ready-to-roll line.
THE PROTOTYPE
The AC4400 was built by GE starting in 1993 and was produced until 2004. 2598 were built for north american Railroads. It has been replaced by the ES44AC. Every Class1 railroad except NS and CN owns at least 1 AC4400. It’s essentaly a C44-9W except it has AC traction motors. They are commonly found on coal and intermodal trains.
THE MODEL
Athearn has done a good job on this model. The paint is excellent and even the smallest decals are legible with the aid of a magnifying glass.
However, I don’t think the prototype actually wears that paint scheme.
This model has Athearn’s new hex-style driveline which is quieter than the old “Blue-box” type. It has a can motor w/ dual brass flywheels and a NMRA compliment 8 pin DCC socket (aka. it’s DCC-ready)
Mine was quite noisy out of the box and it derailed every few inches. After running it back and forth it would stay on the track and after running it 10 minutes forward and 5 minutes backward at 1/2 speed (my ususal break-in procedure) it ran quieter. It only pulled 13 cars that have plastic wheels. Only slightly more than a B-B GP. Top speed is 75 MPH on 16V DC. Lowest speed was 5-10 MPH (i tested this long ago but forgot the slowest speed) It goes around my 18" curves fine, BUT I spent countless hours tweaking the track to get it to stay on. Once you get your trackwork right, it runs on 18". It has directional LED headlights which are very bright[:D]
After about a month the motor began to make a terrible grinding for several minutes until it warmed up. It’s so loud I can go upstairs (my layout is in the basement) and can still hear it growling away. It will quiet down but you have to keep the speed at less
Thats odd, because my experience with my ac4400 is totally different, In fact It runs as quiet as the much more expensive BLI ac6000 . I don’t haul any large trains so I can’t comment on the power. Mine will crawl with the best of them. I don’t know what to say [:I]
Thanks for the review, it was very informative. . . but I don’t think you can make a blanket statement regarding the grinding noise. Did you evaluate the source of the grinding noise? It may have been the result of debris that was picked up from running and worked it’s way into the gears. Is your layout clean, etc? Do a little investigation first, then publish your results.
I don’t have an AC4400, but I did purchase my first Athearn RTR GP38-2 last year in the BNSF paint scheme. It worked just fine at first. It ran better than the Blue Box units and sounded quieter; however, recently it has been making a really horrible grinding sound just as “dingoix” described. I took it apart and thought that perhaps the wheels on the trucks were locking up. I tried fixing it, but it just barely helped. I would like to be able to trust Athearn when I buy their products, but every unit I buy from them I end up having to do major work on. My Atlas, Kato, and Bachmann units never act up like my Athearn units do. Athearn does a great job on paint and detailing, I just wi***hey’d do something about the quality of their motors.
I’ve had this unit since November so of course I investigated. Even w/ the drivelines unhooked the motor still grinds. A friend of mine who is in the model train detailing / paint / repair business told me lots of people have brought in RTR AC4400s with that problem. I’m going to e-mail Athearn sometime and ask them about this. Maybe they’d even send me a new motor.
NS railfan, e-mail athearn as I’m going to. heck ,maybe a bunch of E-mails and they’ll realize they have a problem.
Do these units still have the white rubber mounts for the motors, or is the motor mounted with screws? I know the older ones have rubber mounts and wanted to know if these had anything different besides the new hex drive.
As for that grinding, you may be on to something with the motor bearings. Since they are brass bushings, they probably wear quickly with no lube and let the armature strike the magnets. I wonder if that could be the grinding noise you are hearing.
Either that or Athearn is still good ol’ Athearn! The original sound system!
There are 4 screws in the fuel tank that hold the motor in. The bearings may be the problem as it slows WAY down when the grinding starts. It’s nothing like old Athearn noise. This is REALLY loud. If you had a TV or radio on loud enough where you could clearly hear it, this would drown it out.
I noticed you have not commented on the incorrect cab windows and many other details for this model, but only the motor noise. If the model had great correct detail, it would be worth a new motor for sure. .
I didn’t know anything was wrong w/ the cab windows- what’s wrong? It is worth a new motor but I don’t know if I’m going to replace mine or run it like it is. I still need to lube the bearings and see if that helps.
If you look at the side cab windows, the small one in front was only used on the first dash nines and AC units, but that window should be the same size as the rear side window for all of the later production.
The dash nine series from the 4000 numbering to the 5800 series all have the same side windows as the new Tower 55 model. The Athearn still uses the smaller oval front side window like the first production units were built.
Many other details are actually incorrect, but do not show up like the windows, at least for me. It is still a nice looking model.
I love it. The detailing & it’s quiet.
The one thing I don’t like is the fact my BB AC4400’s can out haul it but oh well. It’ll stay on the intermodal runs.
Based on my wife’s cousins experience with two Athearn Genesis SD70/75 series, I can sympathize. Both of his $100+ Genesis units are as loud as my 25 year old Blue Box units. One of them had a warped truck. He angrily told me that he will never buy another Athearn locomotive again. This is a guy who makes a decent income and paid cash for his units. Athearn lost a good customer.
Of course, in their defense Athearn is trying to deliver a good product, but it’s important that we as Athearn customers let them know that more throrough testing of their units are needed and the potential problems analyzed and corrected if they don’t wi***o lose many more customers.
Hmmm, pretty good review, if I can’t get a Kato though, I’d like to get a CEFX version and atleast try one out. My experience with Athearn RTR has been great so far.
When this runs good, it runs great and I reccommend it. It’s quieter than B-B but doesn’t pull as well, detailing is much bettter, but every one I’ve ever heard of has grinding coming from the motor.
OK, sorry to hear that the Athearn doesn’t run as well as you expected. I just had a bad experience with a Bachman Spectrum (yup that was me complaining, I am now bent on fixing that for good nice detailing, just realized the fan blades on the hood will spin if you blow into them).
—BUT— how did you modify 18" radius track to allow a six axel diesel to run over it without derailing itself. None of my six axels will do that. Is the radius still 18".
[quote] Originally posted by dingoix
I’m reviewing Athearns AC4400 in their Ready-to-roll line.
It goes around my 18" curves fine, BUT I spent countless hours tweaking the track to get it to stay on. Once you get your trackwork right, it runs on 18". It has directional LED headlights which are very bright[:D]
I had to ensure that spot where 2 pieces of track join is ABSOLUTLEY perfect. Most 6-axles will run on 18 but your trackwork has to be PERFECT. Evan a Kato SD80MAC can run on 18".
