I’m a newbie and started out with Stewart/Kato FT’s. I decided to try some Athearn F7’s (both BB and Genesis). All 6 of my Athearns with flywheel drive run noisy. (even after lubrication, cleaning, inspection, etc) Some are even NOS.
Is this just the way it is? What makes Athearns noisy and Kato’s so quiet/smooth. Is it stricly the motor they use.
Just curious. TIA.
Price (new) makes the difference! The Athearn BB locos (bless them) were my first HO locos back in the early '60s. They were priced right for the times, and the quality was definitely there. Kato/Stewarts/Bowser came out (to my layout) in the early '90s. Their drives were an improvement over the Athearns, but of course cost more.
I ended up with a plethora of Stewart diesels (with kato drives) and they were just outstanding. But back in the '60s and '70s, those Athearn locos were outstanding too! In fact, some liked the noise the Athearns made as it was a tad realistic.
Hi there. BB and Genesis engines are night and day when it comes to noise. The Genesis should be quiet.
Simon
I don’t own any Stewart/Kato locomotives but I have a sack full of Athearn BB locomotives and none are what I would call noisy. My oldest Athearns are PA/PBs from the 70s and I wouldn’t call them nosy. I can hear the motor at higher speeds but that is from the higher motor RPM as compared to other locomotives.
I’ve lubed them with Lubriplate white lithium grease since the early 60s and they all run very quite.
I have remotored most of my fleet with the exception of two pairs of PA/PBs, I rarely run them as I prefer E7s and all of my E7s are Athearn SD40-2 frames with Cary shells. I remotored them using Mabuchi FK-280SA 13000 RPM motors and they run very quite, don’t remember if they were noisy before the remotering.
About the only noise when I run my trains is wheel noise over turnouts.
Mel
Modeling the early to mid 1950s SP in HO scale since 1951
My Model Railroad
http://melvineperry.blogspot.com/
Bakersfield, California
Aging is not for wimps.
If you think Athearns are noisy, wait until you run an MDC/Roundhouse locomotive.
There use to be a book that detailed how to fine tune Athearn Blue Box era drives to run much quieter and smoother. Some of the noise is poorly balanced flywheels, a new set from NWSL or Timewell would fix that, sloppy fit in the drive shafts letting them flop around to much and molding flash on the gears in the trucks. The good old degrease, toothpaste in the trucks and run for a set duration in both directions, while using and eye dropper to keep the paste from turning hard, this was followed by a complete tear down and flush of that from the trucks and gears. A relube and she was ready to go, running much smoother and nearly as quiet as a Kato drive was back then. Sometimes one got lucky and the engine ran nice and quiet from the factory. The Blue Box units come from a different era of model railroading. When the modeler was expected to be able to do fine tuning, adding road specific details and stuff like grab irons, ladder rungs and lift rings. But those engines are bullet proof with metal hand rails that are bomb proof.
Kato even 30 years ago was using a higher grade of plastic. Their gears are Delrin and very quiet, some of the best drives ever made in HO. They also got the slop out of the drivetrain and got things aligned very well (far better than anything else at that time). Even today, everybody is still trying to copy Kato and achieve that quiet sound, with mixed results.
Some of the Athearn motors themselves have a more pronounced hum (motor noise) than Kato. Depending upon WHICH Genesis F units you may have tried, well, some are just very noisy, and others from more recent years are better. There are a lot of older Genesis models floating around on Ebay…that may not fully measure up to today’s Genesis models.
Kato stuff is still made in Japan to very high quality standards, but unfortunately relatively limited models are offered. Most of the rest use China and a few manufacturers have their product made in Korea.
Many of today’s current engines are exceptionally quiet, even rivaling or exceeding those older Kato’s, but you still generally get what you pay for. The other thing is that today’s current run diesels have much more road specific details than the relatively generic engines of 30 years ago. Much of the added cost is in those extra details and the sound, lighting, and dcc features.
Each of the manufacturers does make some absolutely terrific stuff, and what you need for your railroad, era, etc. may dictate whose model you buy. There are pros and cons to all.
In conclusion some of the decoder-to-motor matches are just better than others, and the plethora of electronics does create more noise in some models than others.
John
You can count me among those who Mobilman says enjoy the Athearn growl. I do have quieter locos too.
Jumijo, Roundhouse locos can be reasonably quiet, the steamers anyway. Now if you’re talking about the Boxcab or so called Climax, yeah, they’re a scream. Literally! Dan
Ah, the Athearn Growl, who needs a sound chip when you’ve got that noise. [swg] I do like my Kato drive locomotives as well though!
Yes, you’re dead right there, Mike, with all wheel pick up and drive, fly wheels and a proper motor, they were far advanced to what the Brits were producing at the time in OO scale.
Cheers, the Bear.[:)]
Thanks guys. It sounds like Athearn BB’s are just inherently noisier. The flywheel models do look well built and once you add a glazing detail kit to close the holes the detail is acceptable. Best of all they’re cheap, easy to work on and the variety is nearly endless. (about 5000 currently on Ebay). Too bad Stewart/Kato exited the HO business. They’re sure nice runners.
Somrtimes it just seems to be luck of the draw, got a Stewart that is noisey and one that is not, both are basicaly the same, still haven’t found out why.
Athearn Blue Box diesels with the plastic truck sideframes can be made very quiet.
There was a company, Proto-Power-West that sold upgraded Athearn chassis that ran just as well as Stewart/Kato F units.
NWSL also made kits for upgrading Athearn Diesel chassis.
You need to do three things:
Replace the motor with something much better. The Blue Box Athearn motor is very rugged and reliable, but is noisier than Kato.
Shim the worm gears so there is only about 0.010" end play. NWSL makes shims for this.
Replace the wheels with NWSL, Proto-2000, or Athearn upgrades. I use the Athearn pre-assembled wheelsets that come six to a package.
Some people replace the drive shafts with ball-and-socket joints, but I have never felt the need to take that step, unless using the NWSL kit that includes the parts.
There is nothing wrong with the Athearn Blue Box chassis. In fact, many premium locomotives use a virtual clone of this design.
When these were made, the market was happy with “Better Than Tyco”, and rugged dependable reliability.
-Kevin
Athearn shells aren’t tightly clipped to the chassis which doesn’t help.
The noise is amplified gear noise. The type of plastic used in the spur geartrain matters.
I bought a Bachmann Plus GP 35 and the worm gears really howl from time to time. The Bachmann drive towers seem a clever idea at first glance but they move back and forth a lot under power which I’m sure causes a lot of gear noise. I have a couple of Spectrum diesels which are much quieter but still growl more than an Athearn BB. Worm gear end float is part of the problem.
I bought a set of two Athearn F7A built for Athearn in Austria that run fairly quietly compared to any BB drive. Very similar flywheel drive. Genesis run quieter and current Genesis drives are pretty comparable to other makers using essentially the same system.
All of mine are. The only loose diesel shells I have encountered are on Stewart models that used the Athearn chassis, like the AS-616.
Is that what you mean?
This sounds different from the Bachmann GP-35 I had.
Could you post a picture?
-Kevin
Before the F3’s came out, using the Kato drive, many Stewart units used Athearn drives.
This. I remember when the Stewart F units came out, I paid $55 for one. A blue box F7 could be had for around $25 at that time. The Stewart was such a higher quality over the Athearn that the difference was worth it.
Did not know that, how do you tell, never owned an Athearn from that era.
How long ago? Bachmann has redesigned all the diesel drives over the last 10-15 years.
Sheldon
I guess it would have been in the mid 1990s. When I first swiched to HO scale, the SGRR was still set in 1968. The GP-35 was my favorite locomotive. I know I had more than a dozen of them from Kato in N scale. I back-dated the SGRR to 1954 a couple of years after switching to HO scale.
My Bachmann locomotives I bought ran pretty well, but this was prior to me owning any Stewart/Kato F units. Those changed everything.
If Kato would have brought out the GP-35, SD-40, and SD-45 in HO scale earlier, I might never have back-dated my railroad.
-Kevin
As stated above, Kato is still in business offering high quality but limited numbers of models. Stewart never exited the business. Steve Stewart wanted to retire. A bank financial analyst told Bowser that at the price Stewart offered, buying Stewart was “a good deal”. Bowser even hired several Stewart employees so they could retain their jobs, and they continued selling models under the Stewart name for a period of years. However, the purchase of Stewart turned out to be a so-so financial deal for Bowser that took them years to overcome because most of the Stewart tooling needed significant upgrades just to remain “current” with the competition at that time. For example, the Stewart U25B has been upgraded but some current HO modelers would not find it acceptable relative to other models that have been newly tooled today, so the sales potential is limited now that Rapido has announced a new model. Bowser has purchased more than 23 other model train companies, usually when owners wanted to retire. Some of the tooling was so bad (Arbor Models) that Bowser never re-released those models or kits and sold off the remaining parts for cheap to blow them out. They would have required complete brand new tooling (for a steam locomotive kit market that literally evaporated in a few short years).
As time goes on yesterday’