I can see about 3 advantages up front over Athearn’s Turbine. It has a metal body, the side ventilation is better, and since it still only has 4-axle drive, they give the option of traction tires. It may end up having better lighting too, and they’re offering it DCC ready for $420 (single units $350).
As far as the overall proportions on some of the details, I think Athearn did a better job with theirs. But for those who didn’t like the Athearn but still want a Turbine for less than the price of brass, this one may be a winner. I like my Athearn, so I’m going to keep it.
I wonder if Athearn and MTH will be competing with the U50B and maybe the C855?
I have the Athearn and I like it. But I can only pull 6 passenger cars up a 2% grade. So I think I will get the MTH also, it has twin flywheel equipped motors. It should pull like a beast.
Mike, if it is a matter of power, I would agree that you may be on to something. If it is a matter of traction, then dual engines and flywheels might actually be bad. It would be better to have one decent motor and more frame weight taking the place of the small second motor and flywheel.
Yes it’s a power issue with the Athearn. The wheels do no slip at all, just slows to a crawl. I’m hoping the MTH will perform like my two Aces, which pull like Clydesdales on steroids. LOL [;)]
The motor used doesn’t have enough power? Interesting. The motor in my Turbine has enough power to slip the drive wheels and barely notice, and it’s got enough traction to pull as much as any very heavy 4-axle diesel (probably 60 cars or so). I wonder if they changed motors during production?
I had the Athearn turbine(s) actually , I had ordered two of them but after initally trying them out on the club layout, I quickly became disappointed with their performance.
I was just expecting more for a model of this price range. The locomotive will not pull more than 6-7 cars on a scale 1.5% - 2% grade and the lighting was absolutely embarrassing…I can’t beleive Athearn would allow this model to have been released this way - but they did.
I subsequently sold both of these and purchased one of the MTH Verandas when they first came out.
The MTH is diecast construction with very acceptable detail(some debate this but I can’t really see much difference vs. the Athearn) and its on board sound (protosound 3.0) is based on sounds recorded and remixed digitally from the 1950’s from an actual turbine(Have not verified this but it sounds really terrific) and, the lighting is far superior to the bulbs in the Athearn.
All this in a model that cost just about the same as Athearn’s version without sound or decoder.
I can testify to the fact that this locomotive would pull your car up the driveway -okay, that’s an exaggeration -you get the point.
The differences are very clear… so I would imagine that the GTEL’s coming from MTH will be equal to, if not better performers than, the MTH Veranda.
I’m planning on only one GTEL to round out my turbine fleet.
Ick. Anyone else noticing that the MTH passenger sets after the NYC trains are all straight repaints of themselves? Gggrreeaatt. Would not have expected that from MTH. I wonder if ANY of them are protoypical, and for what roads.