I am experimenting with DCC using a NCE Power Cab trying to learn the finer points. Yesterday I put together some odd consists to see how they would go. I am wondering if those of you who have lots of experience use any rules on what you will lash up.
One I was experimenting with was a 4-8-4+4-8-4 articulated loco double heading with a diesel. The steam loco has a QSI factory fitted decoder. On the Power Cab the version came up as 7. The diesel has a NCE D13SRJ as a temporary decoder while I am waiting for its ESU Loksound V3.5.
What I noticed was that the diesel was running a bit faster than the steam engine, so in one direction it was pushing on the coupling and the other way trying to pull away. Moreover the momentum seems to work better with the NCE decoder than the QSI, so the diesel was spinning wheels while running out its momentum pushing against the stopped steamer’s weight.[:O]
Obviously these two locos were not matched. I could do some adjusting to get them to run at about the same speed, but had not done that yesterday. Actually the diesel would pull top passenger expresses at times and has a fair top speed in the real world, but the steamer is freight only (except in dire emergencies). So I would not want to permanently slow down the diesel too much.
So what are you DCC experienced guys game to run as a consist?[?] For example, will you run only engines with the same model decoders? Do you run only pairs of the same engine? Do you ever mix steam and diesel?
PS. I know the lash up was not common prototypically. However, at times diesel and steam did run together as consists. I read somewhere that the diesel should lead because otherwise too much cinders got into the cooling fans. So put the prototypical argument aside and just deal with the DCC questions.