This review is on Bachmann’s original F9A with the 8 wheel drive chassis.[:D]
Bachmann’s original F9s have a better drive than the ones driven by a pancake motor, as well as a better shell. This shell has dual headlights, see-through fan vents, and more molded on details, like grab irons and a coupler lift bar on the front pilot. Although there is a pretty good amount of different details, they’re not done real well. Many things, like the doors and windshields, are noticably oversized, while the portholes and ladders are undersized. If you’re good at super-detailing, or scratchbuilding, or something similar, you might be able to fix these problems. This version of the F9 is actually painted unlike the later ones, which were molded in color and didn’t look good at all. All the coats of paint are very smooth and even, with decent color separation. The printed lettering is fine, but it’s thin enough that it isn’t a good, solid white. The horns are more detailed than the later ones, but they had large seams that didn’t make them look very good. The number boards are a little high, and actually slightly cover the molded on marker lights. The trucks don’t have much detail, but what detail they do have is very flat. The newer, more detailed Bachmann sideframes are a perfect fit, so they’re easy to replace. The couplers are mounted to the frame (I’ve since replaced mine with Kadees; not an easy task), and they had to make them stick out very far to compensate for the large truck gearboxes, so multiple F units won’t couple very closely without severe modification.
The F9 ran smoothly at all speeds, and only made an average amount of noise at realistic speeds. It reached a top speed of about 118 scale MPH at 12 volts, and drew 0.33 amps running free. The lowest speed I could maintain was about 7 scale MPH. When stalled at 12