I was only mildly interested in railroads until my son came along. He’s 7 now and has been train obsessed since he was 2.
After looking around at the 5 local shops for a long time, we finally decided on HO because of space and availability of items and purched an Athearn Iron Horse set (BNSF #2257 - gp38-2). The engine ran pretty poorly out of the box - it may have been sitting around at the LHS for a while.
I’ve improved the running characteristics by stripping it down and cleaning up the gear boxes (way too much lube in there), and using 2-26 on the motor. It’s a lot better now, but I’m still wishing for better low speed control.
The set came with the usual EZ-track oval. All I can say is at least it’s NS. I’m looking for some opinions on where to go from here. I’ve heard that the Backmann EZ-track turnouts are not the best, so do I just ditch what I have and go to flex or do I buy some more EZ-track just so we can do more with the set. We’re looking to do a permanent set up, but it may be a while before we get to that. Does anyone know if it’s possible to take the track out of the roadbed like you can with the Atlas TT?
I was a beginner just two years ago and I ditched EZ track because the turnouts were bad and any elevation caused problems on the rails. I highly suggest you go with cork roadbed and atlas flex track. Solder the track for the curves. You can find info on how to do that all over the internet. EZ track does not allow you to remove the track from the roadbed unfortunately.
Welcome to the forums. Glad to hear there is some young interest in modelrailroading’
Can’t help you much with your loco question, except to say that I have seen posts by other folks saying some locos come with way to much lube.
As for the track, no, I do not believe you can seperate the track from the gray base, as the ties stay with the roadbed. However, even if you decide to go to flex or sectional track without roadbed, you can modify a piece of cork or foam roadbed to fit against the end of the E-Z track. Molded roadbed can be painted and ballasted to look quite good or you can use it in less visible areas. Also you can keep the molded track for when the young engineer wants to set up his rr somewhere else and use whatever you choose on the layout.
As for track, Atlas is usually the least expensive. Their flex track seems to get wide approval. Many use their turnouts also and some folks prefer Peco or Walthers/Shinora turnouts with Atlas track. There are also several other brands of flex track and turnouts. Look up the various brands in the Walthers catalog or website. Search some of these forums for past comments. See which sounds best for you, ask some more questions here.
Glad to see that there are new people joining the hobby, as always.
Unfortunately, had you come here and asked advice first, I and others would have advised you to skip the starter set and make investments in quality products from the start. Fact is, those sets often contain junk.
Now, granted you’ve got a 7 year old hanging on your leg, so taking a break from the actual running of trains may not be an option (my 8 year old is currently annoyed with me because I am here yapping about trains rather than in the basement working on them with him). However, I’d recommend that you take some time to get acquainted with the hobby and do some preliminary planning on your layout (involve your son in this, too) – what era, what location, what railroad, what elements (yards, bridges, turntables, industries, etc), type of operations (point to point, switching, continuous loop) DCC or DC control, and what scenery features you want on your layout, how big you want (or can afford), and so on, then go out and start making acquisitions of quality merchandise that supports your ultimate plan.
EZ track can have its issues, and your power pack may also be weak or faulty. The track could have some manufacturing gunk on it. So if you need to be up and running, just tolerate the crummy performance until you get something more permanent going. I wouldn’t waste a lot of time and money trying to improve on an inexpensive train set.
I haven’t had any problems with the EZ-track but I wouldn’t build a large layout with it. However, I think you could buy a bit more to expand your options, especially if this is being set up and taken down or is on a floor. Once you move to a layout with actual benchwork, you can (as someone said) meld the EZ-track in with your new track. If you’re only trying to impress a 7-year-old, that shouldn’t be a big problem realism-wise.
However, before you spend too much coin, do as others have suggested and research and plan. Saves time and money.
My one advice with Athearn trains is to run them. Of the 6 of them I have, all have been noisy to some degree and they all have gotten to quieter with the more use they get. I suspect is not the best machining on the gearing but once they break in they will improve
Any train set is going to be the "el cheapo train set quality, and will wear out more easily. I would NOT choose expensive {$200-$300} locos until he is old enough to really take care of and revere the trains. But many locos are of decent qulity and priced mildly that should give you better running and if he breaks it, not a real big loss.
We tried the Bachmann EZ TRack in Nscale and found the turnouts tricky. Although I bought a bunch of it, we abandoned it {I thought it was the new hottest thing} Boy were we wrong.
Now Jeffrey Wimberly, a profuse contributor here, uses only the EZ Track in HO and tweeks the turnouts as necessary…
I would NOT try to pry the track from the roadbed. I think it will warp the track and cause you problems with derailments.
If you want track without built in road bed, you have several choices: Atlas {the most popular}; Micro Engineering, Peko, Shinohara {some swear by their switches}.
There are also several kind that have embedded roadbeds.
Read up and plan a layout before buying anymore so you only buy what you need.
You will need to consider Ho scale code 100 or code 83 {although some use code 70}. Atlas Code 83 has more options in trackage than Atlas code 100.
For track, I’d recommend Kato Unitrack. It works somewhat like E-Z track - it has simulated ballast and “clicks” together - but uses fairly narrow-profile code 83 rail that is much more realistic. Eventually you can improve the appearance by painting some of the ties dark gray and/or brown so it isn’t as uniform, and you can paint the sides of the rail (I use “Neo-Lube” from the Micro-Mark catalogue). A little weathering of the ballast (powdered charcoal, chalk, or a wash of black paint thinned with water or alcohol) would help too.
But for now, you’ll find the track very reliable and easy to use. I’ve been in the hobby for a while, and chose Unitrack for my new layout I’m building rather than the traditional cork roadbed / flextrack alternative.
For engines, avoid the temptation to buy “a little of everything”. One good engine from Atlas, Athearn Genesis, Kato or Bowser/Stewart is better than several cheap engines that won’t stand the test of time.
Youy don’t mention your power supply. I’d want to verify that the problem really is with the motor before trying a remotor job. An Athearn engine should actually run rather well unless it is a defective item. is it possible to take your engine to someone, or somewhere, with a good qauality power supply to try it out?
I think I’m going to not buy any more ez-track and switch to code 83 atlas flex. We were originally planning on modelling Buffalo, NY in the 50s, but I think we’re going to go more freelance. In order to incorporate steam (a must for the boy) we’l move the timeframe to the 1990s and make an excursion line like Attica Arcade. Speaking of which, does anyone make an ALCo 2-8-0?
I’ll probably stick with DC for now until we want to run more than one train at a time. I’ll hold off on remotoring until then. I’m pretty sure that the low speed smoothness issues are motor and not track/power pack as the meter tells me I’ve got consistant voltage around the track. I do find that the guage in the curves is not entirely consistant though, so some of my issues may be pick-up or binding there.
Tuning up Athearn locomotives is a long established art. Much has been published both on this forum and elsewhere on the 'net. That motor is a bit expensive as motors go, and the source of roughness in Athearn locomotives is usually in the gear trains rather than in the stock motor. Was it me, I’d do some searching on Athearn and Tuneup and follow some of the recommendations before I splurged on a $23 motor.
An MRC power pack will give better slow speed operation than the power pack that came with the train set. Train set power pack have just a variable resistor as a speed control where as MRC power packs have transistor throttles that hold voltage to the rails steady regardless of current draw.
For a 7 year old boy, one of the fun things about electric trains is setting up the track, and then changing the track layout. For this you want sectional track (Snaptrack). Flex track is a nail it down and don’t move it thing which is not as much fun. Sectional track comes with and without a plastic “ballast” strip. The various types of sectional track with ballast strips do not intermate between the various makers, where as the stuff without ballast does. I have not noticed much difference between brands of sectional track, so long as the rail was nickel silver. Older sectional track with brass rail sometimes turns up at yard sales. Brass needs cleaning more often than nickel silver, but that’s what you have a seven year old for.
My son has been a train freak since he was old enough to make it up the stairs in our old house.
He’s 5 now & has collected quite a bit himself.
Personally, I’d go with flex track & cork roadbed. I got rid of all the EZ-Track I had
As for the locomotive, it will get better the more you run it. All mine have. Out of 80 or so locomotives, 60 are Athearn either the Blue Box, RTR or Genesis. None have been re-motored.
I bought an Athearn Via P42 from my LHS, got it home & ran like crap. I did what you did, stripped it down lubed, oiled & reassembled & it runs great now.
Yeah, I looked up all the stuff on tuning them up. That’s how I knew to do what I did. What’s strange about the motor is that it works well going forward until I run in reverse for a while. Then it starts to rattle and take a higher current draw. Actually the remotoring isn’t overly expensive compared to the $40+ I’ve seen for this kit other places.
On the topic of reworking this loco, I’d like to switch to LEDs instead of the bonfire. Any recommendations on sources for them? I saw in another thread where I could find the tiny LEDs I would need for this, but now I can’t seem to find it again.
That’s likely not the motor, that’s the gear train. The gears are getting runin going in one direction and are loose enough to slip out of mesh going the other way. Or the worm is skipping teeth on the worm gear.
I put constant lighting into mine. There is enough room under the cab roof to take a tiny perfboard to carry the four diodes and a 1.4 volt lamp to light the cab headlamp and number boards. Then a second 1.4 volt lamp can be installed in the long hood to light that head lamp too. Incandescent lamps look better than LED’s which are mostly too blue to look right.
Welcome to the Hobby and the forum. I basically got back into the hobby when my son showed interest @ 5 years old. (This was 20+ years ago) He recieved his Grandfathers trains as well as a Bachman Train set for Christmas (Really toy quality, but he had fun w/ it ). Replaced that Pancake F7 Junk w/ an Athearn SW1500 in a matter of months ( this 20 year old BB is still running perfectly today).
You at least started off w/ a half decent set. Since you have already done some research on the tune-up tips for the BB loco you must be getting a feel for the workings of that fairly simple machine. I agree w/ others that the main issue now is your power pack. There are many used MRC units out there that can be had for reasonable $$. As to the running qualities, I would wait until you get a better power pack before assuming there are motor problems. It has already been stated that running to break-in the unit is nec. I have found that even some of my best running Athearns will run poorly after sitting idle for extended periods. I found that running up the chassis in both directions on a simple test track usually does the trick. The commutator/ brushes seem to be most of the problem ( of coarse once gears have been cleaned and lubed)
I don’t see any new ALCO Consolidations out there. Bachmann used to make a Baldwin one, but those appear to be out of stock for the moment, too.
I have a Consolidation from IHC’s Command XXV line, but unfortunately, they’re out of business. I hear Mehano is now making the IHC stuff, but I only see the base line (not Command XXV) at Trainworld; I’m very pleased with the performance and detail level of the higher end model, but I don’t know about the low end version. Also, it’s a generic loco, not really detailed to represent any particular road or manufacturer.
And BTW, I have to disagree with Galaxy – the age at which your child is ready for HO is a very individual thing. My 8 year old has been using HO stuff since he was 5 1/2, and he’s never broken anything.
How can I tell if it’s the steel or NS wheels? I read somewhere that the more recent RTR sets had NS wheels. If I have the steel, I’ll probably trade out to 40" NS.
Good advice on the motor; I’ll look at a new power pack as well. I was going to wait until DCC conversion before doing the rewiring, but I might do it now as well as the continuous lighting.
I’ve found some photos online of this engine in service. It’s head lamps are moved to the nose from above the cab. It also looks like it only had the heritage BNSF scheme for a couple of years and is now on the wedge as of 2008. Last I could find it was working the yards in the midwest somewhere (Kansas City I think).
Thanks for the info. A generic consolidation would be preferable - that way I can model it to the Attica Arcade prototype that I would like to do. The A&Arr also has a Baldwin 2-6-0 that is out of service. I could do an alternate reality with that being the engine they use for their excursion if I could find that.
My kid is very careful with this. He absolutely refuses to run it full out in reverse because he’s scared of derailing.
Unless it’s been sitting on the shelf in your LHS for a long time (probably ten years), then it most likely has NS wheels. Make sure they’re clean – they can pick up gunk at the factory.
If you enjoy detailing locos, then you’ll have no trouble finding ones that you’re interested in. If you don’t mind the odd remotoring job, so much the better. You can pretty much pick up any old generic 2-8-0 (or 2-6-0) and make it suit.
Also, re your other post, I think your son will do just fine with HO. Sounds like he’s very respectful of the equipment.