Hello, The other day I purchased the above New steam engine on a sale for $30.00. I took it to hobby store in Denver and they told me it would cost around $130.00 to convert it to DCC!!! I can buy a new one with that price. I don't know if it is worth it to convert it to DCC. Do you know of any place that charges reasonable price to do that? Thanks. Mo
Not really knowing where you took the loco, please don't tell or we'll get sensored, but it appears to me that with all the looking around I've done for getting decoders installed, the labor is being charged it works out to be $40.00 per hour for hard wired decoders. It sounds high, unless you know how much time can be spent on an install and what the risk of damaging a customer's engine or popping a decoder by accident. That probably doesn't do anything to make you feel like someone tried to take of advantage of you but that's the reality.
Thanks..I did not mean that Thanks, and I did not mean anything about someone tried to take of advantage of me. As a matter of fact I have been told that it would take about 3 hours to do that. Mo
There are other 4-8-4's out there, but not the Santa Fe that Bachmann produces. You can get the following 4-8-4's, none with DCC installed though, but some are easier to put a decoder in than others... Con-Cor - S2 Con-Cor - GS4 Bachmann - N&W J Class (easy DCC install) Kato - GS4 (factory decoder install easy but lacks features) The Bachmann Santa Fe Northern is not a hard install but to really do it right, it needs tender pickups added. The Richmond controls kit is the simplest answer and works well. Other than that, just issolate the motor from the frame and stick the decoder in the tender. You do need to create a way to attach the pickup wires to the frame on the loco.
For $130 it better have sound. If not, you my friend are being ripped off. I would say just buy a z scale decoder and do it yourself. It really isn't difficult at all, and if you are doing dcc you might as well learn how to do it sooner then later.
Moshken, Approach this project yellow over red. I just visited a website http://www.trademe.co.nz/Browse/Listing.aspx?id=46426172 advertising a locomotive fitting the description you shared. This is NOT, NOT a new locomotive. The comment here "Like New" is questionable. I don't know if this is where your locomotive came from. As said before, this is not new and the number is a dead give away. Another tell tale, look at the wheels if they are a shiny silver they are from the older runs. If so and they are shiny... then steeeeerrrrr clear of fooling with DCC, as this is one of the older pieces of junk. It's not worth the effort, time or expense. You've been bafooned. GO OUT AND BUY AN HONEST TO BACHMANN, NEW UNIT. If a price seems ridiculously low or to good to be true...it probably is. A tell tale that you are buying a new unit: If the wheels are factory blackened you can rest assured, this unit is one of the new ones and well worth the expense. Give no more time to your $30.00 loco. A logical place for this stove would be on the deadline awaiting the torch or said another way, in the trash can. And, don't believe everything you read. The advertisement was all but misleading. YAH oops Yeah! Before I purchase stuff advertised on the internet I usually do my homework to be sure the item is what they claim it to be. Just a little straight talk and sound advice on a cold and blustery day. Have fun!
Again without naming names, I got a decoder installed in my Atlas Shay, which is a more involved installation (which is also why I paid someone else to do it) for about half that. I depends what you get for your money of course but it sounds a bit steep for a bare bones, wire in a decoder job. I was getting a bit excited when I read this thread's title, I was thinking we were getting a new Northern.
My son just got one of these as well, so I took it apart to see if I could wrestle a decoder in there. It looks like it would be pretty easy to do it right in the engine (without sound of course). My only question is about running the smoke generator. there is a circuit board in there that looks like it times the puffs. Does anyone know how to connect this to the decoder?
