by ApproachMedium
So, has anyone had the chance to pick up one of these? They are a bit pricey, I know. I just found one at the greenburgs show this past weekend in Edison NJ for $185. I got the SP version, 9952. I have to say I absolutely love this locomotive. I only bought it because I am a fan of oddball and off the wall things. The U50 is defiantly it! So far the loco runs great right out of the box. In fact I wouldn't even think its an athearn it runs so well! Its very silent, despite it having alot of metal in its construction. Whoever engineered this thing was really thinking. The trucks have metal centers and the articulation pieces are also made of cast metal. The mounting points are in such a way that the locomotives mass is positioned well over its two inner powered trucks. (the two outers are NOT powered but do pick up electrically) With this it went over any track I could throw at it, dirty or clean without any problems. I found that it had no issue hauling up to about 30 various freight cars and well over 30 coal hoppers on its own. The track we are running on is Code 83, hand laid track and switches.
The detail on this locomotive is also excellent. The see thru grilles with the traction motor blowers and radiator fans in them really make the model complete just like the real one. The hand rails I found are very durable, however the step ladders are not glued on and will pop off from handling. They are very simple to re-attach, however for my time of testing I prefer to keep them off just so I dont loose them or break them. I think this far exceeds some of the recent offerings I have seen from them on their Genesis line, esp in the hand rail department. I have found with many of their RTR and newer genesis models then hand rails are very flexible and will come apart very easily and break. This however, does not have that problem.
All of the lighting worked just fine by plugging in a 9 pin TCS T1 decoder, and if I decide to remove the board completely and replace it with another the lights have their dropping resistors located locally at the bulbs so that dropping resistors are not needed to keep the 1.5 volt bulbs lit up. I plan on as soon as its released replacing the board in this loco with the Tsunami U50 specific sound board. Something this awesome deserves good sound! With that Athearn includes two large speaker mounting points on the bottom of the metal frame for the speakers. They will fire directly at the track and use the entire enclosed body of the engine as a sound chamber which should provide excellent reproduction of sound. When I complete this next stage in the models life I will be sure to report back and post some video action of the sound system!
The detail on this locomotive is also excellent. The see thru grilles with the traction motor blowers and radiator fans in them really make the model complete just like the real one. The hand rails I found are very durable, however the step ladders are not glued on and will pop off from handling. They are very simple to re-attach, however for my time of testing I prefer to keep them off just so I dont loose them or break them. I think this far exceeds some of the recent offerings I have seen from them on their Genesis line, esp in the hand rail department. I have found with many of their RTR and newer genesis models then hand rails are very flexible and will come apart very easily and break. This however, does not have that problem.
All of the lighting worked just fine by plugging in a 9 pin TCS T1 decoder, and if I decide to remove the board completely and replace it with another the lights have their dropping resistors located locally at the bulbs so that dropping resistors are not needed to keep the 1.5 volt bulbs lit up. I plan on as soon as its released replacing the board in this loco with the Tsunami U50 specific sound board. Something this awesome deserves good sound! With that Athearn includes two large speaker mounting points on the bottom of the metal frame for the speakers. They will fire directly at the track and use the entire enclosed body of the engine as a sound chamber which should provide excellent reproduction of sound. When I complete this next stage in the models life I will be sure to report back and post some video action of the sound system!
No good deed goes unpunished.
