I recently purchased a Spectrum Heavy Mountain from an online store with which I mainly deal with for most of my model railroad transactions. I have a couple of these engines and they are great running engines and having diecast boilers are fairly heavy and accordingly pull well.
The engine came with the long Vanderbilt tender which I intended to swap for a Hicken tender. Well I was pleasantly surprised that the engine I received was paired with a Hicken tender. I completely forgot that the one version of the Heavy Mountain came with a Hicken tender. Well now I can swap the long haul tender on one of my 2-6-6-2’s with the spare Hicken I had purchased.
I was about to order another of these engines and was informed that Bachmann was no longer producing Heavy Mountain steam engines. This surprised me as from all I have heard this particular engine is one of Bachmann’s better running steam engines.
I wonder why Bachmann would cease production of such a great running engine.
Yes they are currently out of production, but there are plenty out in the dealer network. If you have any trouble finding the version you want, try Star Hobby in Annapolis Md. Last time I was there they had a large selection and good quanities of most versions.
No doubt they will be back if there is demand and yes, it is one of Bachmann’s best locos. I have nine of them, they are a major part of the ATLANTIC CENTRAL roster.
I really like the two Spectrum heavy mountains on my layout. One of them is pictured in WPF a few days ago.
Only one problem.One of mine had its belt slip off a pully. It was not hard to fix. The belt is made of very tough material and is not likely to break. It has teeth that fit into teeth on the pullies.
