I do not own any of their locomotives at this point but a friend of mine does. I have done decoder installs for him and so far I like them. Decoders are not too difficult, in-line with older Atlas split frame installs, and the details are outstanding. I will prolly own a couple eventually. As for their Fox Valley line, I do not know, I have seen them in person but not played around yet.
I've only experience with their rivet counter line with sound. Detail is second to none. The only issue I have which seems to be common to any dcc equipped loco is that the low speed needs some adjustment to clean up the jerkiness at creep speed. For the price I'd get one over any comparable loco from a competing brand any day. My only real complaint is that they don't have a lot of variety especially for the older diesels. Would love to see a variety of GPs anywhere from the 60's to present.
I just got my first one recently. Was very please with it. Runs well. Only issue was I had some trouble putting on the small detail parts.
ScaleTrains DCC sound locomotives cost around the same as BLI locomotives but are far, far better in quality. I own a pair of ET-44ACs. I wish they made more locos in N scale. They also make excellent rolling stock as well - I own a good number of 5188 covered hoppers, Multi-Max auto racks, and 53' intermodal containers.
I have one, an ET44AC. It runs well. It appears to do slow starts more smoothly than my BLI model of the same prototype. But I’ve already tuned the appropriate CVs on the Scaletrains, but not on the BLI. Coming out of the box, the horn is a little louder and richer than the BLI. The prime mover sound is better on the BLI, though. Both have a startup sound sequence; the BLI’s is more protracted and engaging. Both have strobing ditch lights when you hit the horn. The Scaletrains’ ditch lights behave more realistically. Both locos’ lights flash at about the same rate, but the Scaletrains’ brightness builds and dims more like a big light behaves, rather than like a small LED on a model. The Scaletrains has better details, the best you can get, but the gap isn’t as large as online photos suggest. Both locos have about the same sensitivity to dirty track. Both locos are from each company’s previous run, not the current run.
They need to make something that was available before 1964 before I will buy anything. From what I've seen, though, I am jealous.
Life is a lot easier when you just run what you want and not worry about any rules. Sometimes it is fun watching a 4-8-4 Northern freight train racing against and Amtrak train being pulled by a couple of P42 Genesis locomotives. And sometimes you follow the rules with the appropriate trains. It is a hobby to have fun with! As for the Scale Trains, well I have my first ones coming soon. And I may also try a BLI as well. Anal retentivity is not part of the fun of the hobby.
"Yesssss, you neeeeeed that locomotive!" says the evil voice behind the curtain, feverishly operating the levers of life...
I have quite a few ScaleTrains locos and I am very happy with the running quality and the details. I have a bunch of the BN SD40-2's on order that are a little delayed but I'm sure they will be worth the wait. If there is anything they can improve upon it would be a deeper fuel tank to improve upon the speaker sound characteristics. I fine tune the sound volumes (way down) and adjust motor settings to my liking. They run on par with KATO and hopefully last as long. They are very easy to work on; 2 screws out of the couplers, remove the couplers and lift off the shell. ST uses a board with plug in for LokPilot or sound decoders. Be "carefull" re-installing the shell as you do not want to push the decoder down and away from the motherboard-very little clearance between the boards and shell. Use Kapton tape or foam as a wedge to keep the decoder from moving when installing the shell. I've had alot of practice. Great quality and the support from ScaleTrains has been great! How about some GP models.... Brian
So, I'm thinking of a two-loco consist, one a ScaleTrains ET44 with Loksound5 factory installed, and the other a ScaleTrains ET44 DCC-ready version, w/Next18 connector. Then I'd plug a LokPilot5 Next18 decoder in it. I don't see a need for two sound locos that are gonna be consisted anyway. Or am I missing something?
No you can do that. The only thing that you want to do is turn OFF "Delay Starting if Drive Sound Enabled" on the sound unit as this will introduce a delay in movement on the sound unit and the LokPilot doesn't have this feature because it doesn't have sound. They will be very easy to speed match. I also MU ST units with KATO units and they play nice. I might add one more "thing" about ST locomotives; I, personally don't like their couplers as it takes quite a bit of forward pressure to couple. The first GEVO's were not a good fit for substituting MT couplers; I made them work by carefully bending out the wedge frame pieces and ever so slightly widening the shell coupler opening. The later C44-9W units were easier to do and I belive that ST modified the later GEVO's to easily replace the couplers with MT. I can't confirm as I didn't purchase any of the newer units. Either way, it can be done as long as you are careful. Brian
Don't have any ScaleTrains stuff.....as already mentioned, they are concentrating on more modern stuff. But they came thru town last year and did a meet-n-greet, and I was really impressed by the reps, and the operating model for the company. The stuff they had on display was top notch . I'm hoping that since they bought Fox Valley, I'll see some of the stuff (Milwaukee Road passenger) that disappeared a few years ago. The reps said it was on the agenda, but didn't have a time line.
1. Well, setting up two locos to be consisted doesn’t obligate them to be consisted henceforth and forever. It does obviate the need for speed-matching them later. If I speed match every loco that comes to the layout, I have complete freedom to make & break consists among anything I have. 2. My Scaletrains ET44 was the first diesel I have bought. (An HO F7 I bought in the ‘70s notwithstanding). I have no issues with it, but went BLI on my next to have experience with another brand, particularly to have different avenues possible with sound. My next might be Kato, Atlas, Fox Valley. 3. Consisting them helps me evaluate them on an equal footing - matched speed, but run them ten feet apart and listen as each one goes by close - which engine timbre do I like, which one does better reproducing load-changing, horn, ditch light performance, etc.? Yes, I might have to mute them independently to evaluate all that, but I’m in evaluation mode, and I’ve not developed brand preferences yet. It’s better to do that when rosters and investments are small. 4. Outside of the limited scope of this thread in comparing Scaletrains, if my consisted locos are doubleheaded steam, sound for only one is going to be a bit of a letdown. 5. Then there are mixed consists: If you wanna run a Big Boy (or a UP 3985, or 844/8444 or whatever) in modern excursion mode, with a diesel backup, sound for both might also be good. But that diesel generally idles, so maybe you run it muted.
