I am just getting back into mrr and i got some track and various cars and 4 engines. 2 of the engines are dummies. Eactly what are they and can someone elighten my. I have learned alot so far for being here a few days. Thanks.
A dummy engine is simply an engine without a powered drivetrain designed to be pulled behind another powered loco as part of a set.
Dummy engines have no motor. They look like another loco but are really just another piece of rolling stock. I think the reason they were popular is that it would look like you had a consit of several engines, but were only drawing current for one. Of course they actually reduced the number of cars your powered loco could pull, though one of the two dummies belonging to my sons, roll very easily. With DCC and the ability to speed match, you can really run locos together and both pull like the prototype. Previously only locos of the same manufacturer (and not always then) could run togerher at without one either draffing or pushing the other.
Hope this helps.
Have fun,
Dummy locos make it possible to match the appearance of having a lot of power on the front end, without the expense of purchasing more real tractive effort than was needed for the typical short model train. They are also useful as scenery around a major diesel repair facility.
While purpose-built dummies are almost always diesels, de-motored steam locos could also become scenery at the busy roundhouse of a one-loop-around-the-table layout (or the graveyard behind the enginehouse of a strapped short line.)
I own one loco that is a semi-dummy. It’s a JNR EH10, a catenary motor which, in prototype, has two drawbar connected Bo+Bo carbodies. The model only has two powered axles, so the carbody with the power truck is loaded with lead at one end. The other carbody carries just enough weight to allow it to track properly. It’s powered by a vertical motor, so extending power to the other truck is not an option.
Chuck (Modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Now I’m as confused as the original poster!
I have two powered F7A units, and one each dummy F7A and F7B. Since I have a small, flat layout, one powered unit is all that’s necessary to pull most of the trains I run. So, I have the luxury of having extra pulling power available, and I can add a dummy unit for looks alone.
But, I also like sound, so I’ve added a sound-only decoder, which also controls headlights, to the F7A, and I’ll probably do the B unit one of these days, too. Dummy units are ideal for adding sound. I’m in HO, but if you are an N-scaler, then a dummy will allow sound in a consist which otherwise just wouldn’t have room inside a shell.
I have used a dummy loco to put in a sound decoder. The advantage is that there is a lot of room to place the speaker - often a problem. You have to put pickups on the wheels of course and you give the sound decoder the same address as the loco you are consisting with. Works well. You can also use the sound dummy with other consists for a “cheap sound solution.”
Alan
I was workign on something like that using a Stewart F7 dummy. Nice thign about Stewart dummy units, they have metal wheels and the same trucks as the powered units, minus the gears - so to get power all you need to do is solder wires to the trucks. Lots of room for a sound decoder and a really big speaker, or multiple speakers - my favorite one was the one Bruce used to have posted ont eh Litchfield site, two woofers, a crossover, and a tweeter all stuffed in a Stewart B unit… That probably had some really good sound, with speakers big enough to actually reproduce it.
–Randy
Speaking of using demotorized steam as scenery, a long time ago, I came across some Pemco steam locos at a train show for what seemed like a giveaway price, $10-12 range if I remember. They were good looking pieces so I figured how bad could they be and I bought three of them with the thought of using them later on the layout I am currently working on, even though I hadn’t even built my current house yet. A few years ago I got the layout to the point I could begin actually running some trains and by this time, I had decided to go DCC. I knew I would need to retro fit these old DC locos but decided to test drive one of them using address 0000. It was at this time I discovered that the loco was nothing more than an empty shell and the motor and drive was in the tender. I couldn’t help but laughing when I realized what I had. At that point, I realized the best thing to do with these three locos was to give them a home on some dummy tracks at my engine terminal where they serve well as scenic features. One of them is parked in the backshop where it fills that space nicely as well.
Contrary to urban legend among DCC users, good running DC locomotives of the same brand and design can and do run just fine together.
And, very often locos of different brands can also be run together on DC, if their gearing and speed profiles are close enough. For example, my Spectrum 2-6-6-2’s run well with my Proto2000 2-8-8-2’s and my Broadway Limited 2-8-2 Heavies run fine with my Spectrum 4-8-2’s and Bachmann 2-8-4’s which I have converted to 2-8-2’s - all on plain old DC - well OK on pluse width modulated DC for good speed control.
And my 3 and 4 unit set of various diesels, Intermountian, Proto, Genesis, BLI, etc, all run well together.
All without the magic of DCC consisting or speed matching.
Back in the earlier days of the hobby, dummy locos were popular to give the two or three unit look with only one loco powered. This saved on cost, and, older locos often drew more power and unless one had a really heavy duty setup, may easily exceed what a power pack could supply.
Also, there were fewer big layouts pulling long trains that really needed that extra power.
Today, I don’t own any dummies and when I run three locos to pull a train, its because it takes three locos to pull 40 cars up a 1.5% grade.
Dummies are still out there, but have fallen out of use/favor as trends in the hobby have changed.
Sheldon
I have several dummy engines. They come in handy. I have several sound engines and to keep the cost down i run the dummy engines with the sound engines to look like more power. I have level track with no grades so pulling them is no problem. I have had as many as three power engines and two dummies pulling a 24 car train. Dummy engines or non- working power engines can be had on the cheap to turn into dummies.
Bob
Thanks everyone. All good info.
Tsk, tsk gentlemen, in these days of “political correctness” we should now be refering to these engines as “power challenged”…
LOL!!!
Mark
“Nice Geep dummy”
“What’d you just call me?”
–Randy
My best sounding unit is a ported, channeled, and tuned bass reflex that I put into a Stewart F3B unit. Unfortunately I painted it all black so one cannot see the details very well. I originally had it larger but the internal harmonics actually sound better this size. They really sounded good with an 18" tube but obviously I couldn’t fit that into any HO unit.
The next evolution of this design will not have the decoder directly in front of the front firing speaker.
I’ve also tried double and quad speakers all “firing” simultaneously (synchronized?) into a common central chamber with a single exit. The thought was It would move twice or four times as much air through the exit making better sound. Didn’t work. I am assuming it is because the sound wave can’t make nice 90 degree curves easily when they hit exactly opposing waves. In other words it is not a simple air compression issue but a wave bending issue.
And now that I have strayed way off the original purpose of this thread I’ll shut up.
I have several dummy steamer on my layout that I use in lashup. Sometimes I will doublehead a pair of mikes and only the lead unit is powered. I have some engines that are 20+ years old and the motors gave out and raher then pulling the sheets over the headlamps I gutted the motors and weighted them and they became dummies. I have a couple of dummies that I created after I bought some DOA’s at a yard sale and found that they were missing parts and didn’t run, so I gutted the motors and disassembled them in various stages of being rebuilt an a engine shop. I do have a small collection of dummy diesel but I mostly use them on my passenger service for the look. I run alot of fast mail on my layout so the dummies look good there.
Another good use for dummies is Push-Pull passenger service or DPU freight engines. While you can do all that with DCC, it can be less work with dummies.
I also plan to use a few dummies in conjunction with sound equipped engines to save on expenses. For example, a sound equipped SD9 and a dummy SD9, or a sound equipped Trainmaster and a dummy Trainmaster. I would not, however, mix a sound equipped SD9 and a dummy Trainmaster. The sounds would be too different.
Just last night i saw an east bound freight with two BNSF c44-9w’s in the lead and a third running backwards at the end of the train. A helper or in tow? I could do that with a dummy but with a power it probably wouild run at a speed that would uncouple the freight.
Bob