The E8 made it to South Florida, and I am happy with how it looks. The shell is detail and the molding on the detail is crisp. The chassis seems to be more robust then the GP38. I will run it when I get home. My plan is to run it in DC then DCC it. One thing I found interesting is the trucks. Its not a true six axle truck. Its more like the truck on the MTL SD40.
Looks like there is all sorts of room in there extra goodies. Now just have to wait for the right railroad. ~Paul E.
John excellent! Don't forget about the extra truck in the packaging. These are heavy beasts. I suspect they will pull like crazy. Rob
The E8 is a good runner. It pulled twelve of my heavyweights without problems and with no wheel slippage. I could do a slow start to full speed, and its relatively quiet, and its not a coffee grinder. Its not a true six axle loco. The center is a pony axle just like the MTL SD40. The shell is well detail and the moldings are crisp. Its good or better then anything MTL ever made. I think that has been one thing that AZL lags behind before. The fans are really nice, and so are the hatches. They must be photo etch to get it that detailed. Once caution, the pilot its not attach to the shell, but its loosely attach to the chassis. The pressure from the shell keeps it from falling out, so watch out when you are taking the shell off. The fuel tanks come off by pulling it down. Just like the SD40. I used the TCS AZL4 decoder. I think its the first truly dcc decoder in the z scale market. After taking off the shell, all you have to do is take off the old board out and replace it with the AZL4 decoder. The only complain I have with the E8 is the motor tabs. They are not parallel to each other, and are bend out at a angle. It didn't seem to create a problem, so no blood, no foul.
John, Great video, although I think you've got the positioning and orientation of the Pullman cars a bit off. Regarding the 6 axle truck, I really don't see how you could do it with a rimmed center axle and still run on a curve tighter than 300mm. I was wondering why you wanted to convert the unit to DCC before testing? It seems to me that DCC with BEMF hides some operational issues with the motor and drive train that you'd notice on DC. I generally run all my units through a DC characterization and do any tune up as necessary before going to DCC. Mark
Mark, I wouldn't know the right orientation of the Pullman cars if my life depended on it, so what is the right position and orientation of the Pullmans. I tested the engine on the DC track before converting it to DCC. I converted my old layout to dc to see if the run well on dc. I converted couple of my SD40 to true six axle trucks, and it can run it on 9" curves. That's a little wider then 195mm. The SD70 does it with no problem, but the its center gear is not powered.
John, The SD40s and SD70s have a truck wheelbase that a bit more than 2 ft. shorter than E8. By my calculations, the trucks need about 250mm. I'd be interested in the results if you change the center axle, but mathematically it looks like it would have problems with 220mm. As far a the Pullman configuration, the details can be rather interesting. In general (unless otherwise specified by the railroad) the order would be non-Pullman cars, Parlor car, Dinner car then sleepers, with the cheap seats forward of the staterooms. Dining cars were oriented with the kitchen forward as a means to keep the non-Pullman passengers out of the Pullman section. Foreign cars to the road generally went at the end of the train, frequently behind the observation car. If the foreign sleeper was added to the train with a baggage car, the two would be coupled together at the head end. The roads generally wanted to minimize switching duties. Mark
Pullman cars can be of more than sleeping cars as Pullman on some railroads staffed and operated passenger services for the host company, so even the conductor could be a pullman employee. however brakemen and train men were employed by the railroad. I traveled a fair bit in both US and Canada by train before 1954. What I remember is at head end was fast express reefers then post office cars then express car used for express and mail storage, as it was staffed and secure could be combined with baggage or could be followed by a baggage car, then coach cars seats only, then buffet smoker then day night berth cars (seats by day and upper and lower berths by night with curtains could be one each side of buffet car), then kitchen end of dinning car then sleeping cars and finally a lounge observation platform car. In late 50 when in high school I used to see GM&O combining trains at Alton Il. long trains more than 6-8 or more cars were just run as an extra section behind the flyer named train or numbered train on the schedule, and shorter one were just added to end of the flyer minus tail end car and head end cars, now all this was heavy weights as i never traveled by rail from 1959 to 1990s when everything was stainless, and I paid much less attention to those trains as I was a steam heavy weights era man and my models reflected that.
