I thought the review of this engine would have included an opinion of the quality of the sound of the sound card produced by Sountraxx for Bachmann.
I wonder if this lack of an opinion is Model Railroader’s way of adhering to the saying “if you can’t say anything good, don’t say anything at all”
Is the hybrid soundcard produced by Soundtraxx as good as a off the shelf regular Tsunami or has it been downgraded in performance by the Bachmann standards of production.
I understand your question, and I would agree but for one thing: appreciation for sound is highly subjective in the hobby. We have threads once a month (it seems) where we hash out the benefits of sound over the quite clackety-clack of non-sound operations. Some of us wouldn’t dream of buying a non-sound engine unless we were going to have a decoder installed, and some of us even rip out the DCC guts of highly desired engines just to rid ourselves of the annoyance.
Other aspects of the model can be evaluated empirically, such as its fidelity to the prototype in terms of dimensions, details, decals and paint, tractive effort compared to similar engines, voltage requirements, smoothness of movement at low speeds, and so on.
It would be one thing to say, “This model comes with a hooter whistle file installed where the prototype had a Hancock three-chime.” Okay, that’s a definite miss. But the chuffs or brake squeals, and other things are harder to peg.
I don’t know if that rationale plays out here, but it seems plausible.
The reason I posted this observation was that the Heritage steamers reviewed by Model Railroader indicated good sound qualities. I notice that when BLI steam engines were reviewed there were far more comments about the sound decoder.
I agree, sound is quite subjective. I myself enjoy the Bachmann’s Tsunami inspired steamers.
I had thought that having Soundtraxx produce sound decoders specifically engineered to Bachmann’s standards would have warranted a few comments from the reviewers.
Okay, I follow you. And, I agree, if the practice is pretty clear, why the omission this one time? I guess I am showing my lack of recall on the subject of reviews. I don’t read many of them anywhere, and have not recently looked to see if such factors are included. If some engines get specific mention in that regard, what does the ‘miss’ mean this time?
"The model. Bachmann added a new cab and tender and modified other details on its United States Railway Administration 2-6-6-2 (C&O class H-5) model to create a C&O class H-4. But other details, such as the placement of the domes and the wheelbase, still match a class H-5 locomotive diagram."
I found this part of the review quite interesting and enlightening enough so to make me stay away from buying one. You can’t dress up a pig and call it a cow. It’s still a pig. If I am going to shell out close to the $500 MSRP for a locomotive I want it to be faithful to the prototype in virtually every respect. Not some lets take pieces from here and parts from there and call it brand new. I fully understand retaining the drive components, motor etc. but at least they could get all the details right.
Regarding the quality of the sound decoder Now nothing against Soundtraxx as I love Tsunami decoders and own a couple of dozen by now so I can’t speak from personal experience but judging by Bachmann’s past experience using old Lenze decoders that were bottom of the barrel (you know the ones that have extremely poor low speed performance and growl like an old coffee grinder) I would be extremely hesitant on this one.
Well I can respect that choice if exact detail is that important to you. Personally I have looked at photos of all the C&O 2-6-6-2’s and this model does capture the “flavor” of it s prototype close enough for me, so I bought one.
BUT, I did not and would not have paid anything close to $500.00 for it. I bought my DCC, no sound version for $221.00 at Peach Creek Shops and just sold the decoder I removed from it for $16.00 making the net cost of my DC model $205.00.
I also have three other Spectrum 2-6-6-2’s, one a C&O lettered H5 and the other two lettered for my ATLANTIC CENTRAL and fitted with Bachmann long Vanderbilt tenders. All four are good looking nicely detailed locos and run great.
As for sound, I’ll tell just how subjective sound quality is, even the best HO on board sound systems sound like variable static to me. I’ll skip that thank you.
One very suspicious poster has inferred that in all likelihood the quality of the sound of the Tsunami “inspired” sound decoder would be inferior to an off the shelf Tsunami sound decoder. The rational for that statement is the quality of the Lenz hybrid DCC decoder used by Bachmann.
This decoder is extremely limited and lacks BEMFcontrol. It is very common for owners to swap out the standard factory decoder.
The posters comments certainly are not unexpected given the poor quality of the Bachmann DCC decoders. A lot of people will be suspicious of the quality of the Tsunami Bachmann inspired decoder.
Up to about 6 months ago I had a Bachmann Tsunami equipped 3 Truck Shay. The sound was great and definitely wasn’t scaled down. There would be no reason to do so, especially since the Tsunami name is attached to the Bachmann features. They would simply ask for their name to be excluded if it was a lower end decoder.
OK, I don’t have the loco in question but I do have a Consolidation with factory sound and in my opinion the quality of the sound is first rate. I’m not comparing it to other sound decoders but my own recollection of what steam sounds like and I did hear a lot of it growing up in Winnipeg where there was a lot of steam running in the late '50s.
I understand that the only difference between the B-man decoder and the regular Tsuanmi is that the B-Man version does not include all of the options found in the regular versions.
Mine dont have sound, so sorry guys, no help on that, but the little H-4 most certainly does closely resemble the actual locos. The sand domes should be farther forward on the H-4, and yeah, I wish Bachmann had moved them, but they didnt. Ill live with it. To be honest, until it was mentioned here, I hadnt even noticed it. They run nice. Bachmann got the signature features (walkway, pump placement, cab) right, and the overall appearance is quite H-4ish.
I dont know where the price of 500 dollars comes from, but I paid less than that for all three of my N scale ones (no sound, does it make THAT big a difference in cost?) and am quite happy with them.
Once again I find myself agreeing with Sheldon, hasn’t anybody ever heard of “close enough” as they are all just “representations” of whatever engine or car they are modeled after. If you want “exact” then I’m sure firms like W&R can fill that bill for you, of course there is still the question of the wheel width and of course that big old clunky electric motor inside, I don’t think real steam engines were ever powered that way.
As for spending $500 for a Bachmann version that escapes me, you could have bought a nice PFM version in brass for that or less. I have seen them offered for as little as $300 with nice paint jobs on them. I have both and from 3 feet away you can’t tell the difference.
As for the sound, again Sheldon has nailed it, sound from an HO engine is something akin to Mozart through a 2" tweeter speaker. Yes, it’s still Mozart but it’s not something I care to listen to all the time.
Personally the sound engines I have, Broadway or Athearn only, have the sound turned down to where you have to be standing next to it to even hear it. For background “noise” I have CD’s playing of my favorite music to “relax” me and let me concentrate on whatever project I’m doing on the railroad.
I’m sure not everyone agrees with this, it’s just “my” opinion on the subject.
Lots of railroads had 2-6-6-2’s of various designs, there is however no “universal” name or classifcation for them.
Understand that the names you listed are generally specific to particular railroads, not universally accepted names like Mikado, Pacific, Consolidation, Ten Wheeler, etc.
Of those you listed, only “Challenger” and “Yellowstone” were names used by more than one railroad to discribe those locos, and not all roads with those wheel arrangements used those names.
“type Y” refers to N&W 2-8-8-2’s, other railroads called or clasified those locos differently. On the B&O its an EE class.
Only on the N&W 2-6-6-4’s are called them Class A, on the B&O that’s a KB1, and is a completely different design and a much older loco.
Only the UP had 4-8-8-4’s - Big Boy
Only two roads had 2-6-6-6’s, I don’t think the Virginian called theirs “Allegheny”.
“Class H” is the C&O class for 2-6-6-2’s, on the B&O for example that’s a class KK.
A 2-8-8-4 is an EM-1 on the B&O, nerver heard a B&O person call them a “Yellowstone”. To my recollection only western roads called them that.
Over the years some modelers have taken the liberty of “crossing over” some of these names and class designations, but they did not necessarily represent names actually used by other railroads who had similar locos.
Street price for the N ones is about 150-175 dollars; not bad at all for a good looking big ol’ mallet. The N ones dont pull like I wish they would, but like i said, I was able to get a trio of them for less than 500$, so I cant complain. I am worried about motor longevity after the issues the earlier H-5s had, but I guess if it happens, motors can be replaced. Nice little engines, and perfect or not, they are the only other eastern mallet besides 2-8-8-2s for those of us in N. Not the Kato mike or the Spectrum 2-8-0, but theyre nice.
Hrumph! nobody could answer the question asked ! Well I do have a DCC Sound equipted H4. so here ya go’… Is the Bachmann sound as good as the full blown Tsunami…no’ not really. It does not have all the features of the later. and most likely only has a single inexpensive speaker than most of the newer locomotives coming off the production lines today.
And while I love the locomotive I must admit to finding the sound, Tsunami based or not’ just a bit wanting’ not bad enough to to rip it all out mind you but…
sounds of the Bell…whistle…steam release etc. are fine the problem lies with the chuff which is to my ears is quite tinney and which might be solved with a Hi-base speaker…or two if they’d fit in its vanderbilt tender in place of the stock one, but I’ll let you judge for yourselves with the following videos.
What I was referring to was MSRP of course as Sheldon mentioned, regarding their past poor performance regarding decoders Bachman deserves a smack up side the head. That Lenze decoder was an absolute joke so much so I have zero faith in any decoder that comes in a Bachmann Engine as mentioned I have replaced all of mine with the majority now being Tsunami equipped. If the soud isn’ up to snuff in all honesty the decoder can only be held responsible for a very small part of that. The bulk of the issue is with the quality of the speaker, the baffle chamber or lack there of.So being as I am not totally satisfied with “some” of the factory sound set ups particularly Bachmann’s I now by DCC ready locomotives, which Spectrum have been for years at least everyone I’ve purchased in the past 7 years. No the sound is that of a concert hall and then again my tin ear wouldn’t know or appreciate the difference any way. I upgrade my sound locomotives using my own baffles fabricated from sheet lead and primarily use bass reflex speakers.in my O/P the sound is as good as it’s going to get and much better then factory so I am pleased with he results.
As far as the details not being correct on their H4 yes stupid little things like that bother me, I fully understand your points about being good enough or how it looks from 3 feet away etc.but it’s just one of those little things that I feel the manufactures who gladly take all of our money so why not do the job correct and make the model look like the prototype. Some guys will get all up in our face when your H8 is pulling three freight cars in a train that weren’t built until the early 1960’s and your modeling late 1950’s etc. As everyone always says it’s all about the details right so weather it’s the wrong boiler or an incorrect boiler or what ever if I’m paying for a model of an H4 thats what I expect to get.
Finally, this review which has been posted for some time on the subscribers only section of this web page has finally made it to print. check out the August issue.
I have finallyl broken in my new H4 with the sound and I can not say enough about the great running characteristics of this engine with the new Tsunami/Bachmann decoder.
Yeah I got mine undecorated and lettered it for my ME&O