New Lionel Big Boy features?

 

 

Steve from Ross Custom Switches is an active forum participant, so if you feel so inclined you can engage him on your concerns.  His answers might very well just be illuminating enough to compel you to reconsider your existing point of view as to who is really at fault.

 

I can save you some of the trouble for what it's worth though.  He's been quite vocal on this subject a number of times, and he outlines problems when designing his switches due to the lack of consistency and standardization between Lionel and the others regarding pickup roller spacing & width, wheel flange depths, wheel gauge, etc in addition to factoring in some older legacy issues such as sliding shoes on certain postwar operating cars. 

 

Like I said, it might be sufficient to give some pause before targeting who to pin the blame on.

 

 

See that's the issue, you acutally think it's someone's fault.  It in the nature of the beast when you have multiple manufactures competing for same business.  I think for the most part it all works pretty good, not perfect, but good.   Ever see the movie. Grumpy old men.  Enough said.  And no I will not reconsider my point.  

I don't own any of these mammoth engines, but this specific foible seems relatively minor to me.  I tend to turn down the volume on any sound effects anyway, as it's just so much noise after a bit.  I quite like whistles and bells, but chuffing or diesel whine is about as pleasant as loud snoring after about 10 minutes, at least for me.

 

On the other hand, if one reads the forum for a few years, or even less, there are  predictable patterns of complaints about each of the two major company's products that tell us more about individual poster's preferences than the products themselves. What is particularly informative is that those few who are fast to join complaints about one company pretty much have no criticisms of the other, and vice versa.

We've never had any issues with our Ross turnouts and dead spots, with any of the various engines we own. If wired properly, there is only 2 pieces of rail in those turnouts that are dead, and they have to be. The rollers cross over both of them at the same time,a hot, and a common.

You yourself indicated blame when you brought up Atlas and dead spots, did you not?

 

As to you not reconsidering your point, well, you know what they say about leading a horse to water...

Gee, I buy a wireless tether locomotive and then I promptly hang wires between the two units.  But wait!  Maybe I really wanted home-brew wires hanging between my locomotive and tender on my $2000 set!   NOT!

 

Looks like Jon has answered a few of our concerns from the Challenger problems.

A much different reply than what Hot Water received. Thanks Jon.

My Legacy Atlantic stalls on Ross curved switches. I am not a chronic complainer, I over came it and fixed it though the help of Forum members here, now I enjoy running.

I believe the point of this thread is to see if the vision line Big Boy will address earlier concerns previous customers have had with previous product.

 

 

What I get out of it is concerns based on probabilities due to past experiences with end products, not based on abstracts.

Roller issue:  Entry level locomotive, like the 0-6-0 tank engine around $100, ok?

 

$2500 top of the line engine, with coal load which goes down with use;  FORGETABOUTIT!  If you can't get power to the tender, then the coal will not move!  

 

That's the problem with too many things:  concentrating on the extras and forgetting about the basics!

The coal load moves very slowly, and momentary power interruptions are not going to affect the behavior of the depleting motion.

 

I agree with the forumites, we need to learn from the past and improve where possible.  Our most valuable resource is our customers.  We have to please at all levels of product, entry level sets to Vision locos.

 

I/we appreciate the feedback, and take it to heart.  We have made course corrections along the way, and largely due to the feedback from our customers.  Thank you!

 

Jon you also have to take into consideration that there are certain people on this forum who are never pleased and who's real hobby is complaining and arguing. The toy trains are secondary to that end...

 

I for one am amazed at what you have been able to make these toys do! Swinging bells.. awesome sounds...whistle steam...blowdown...cab chatter...

quilling... unbelievable slow speed performance... super smoke...amazing detail.. remote control operation...individual operation of multiple engines on the same track... great lighting effects... but I guess that's not good enough for some!

Or maybe it's because some people aren't simply driven by blind loyalty and, perhaps jaded somewhat by past experiences, simply and with valid reasons want a premium product of considerable expense to contain reliability as impressive as the features promised, and without having impending fear of facing a warranty return or refund.

 

I for one applaud Jon for his participation in this forum and this particular thread, and acknowledging people's quality and design concerns.  Hopefully when the rubber meets the road in this and other product releases in general that those concerns are consistently addressed & applied.

Or.... You could just put a 9V battery in the tender. 

Can we please stick to the original topic (i.e. vision big boy features)? It seems when someone brings up a Lionel issue, the conversation explodes out of control and becomes a battle of nonsense. Bottom line is it doesn't matter how many features the new BB has. I strongly feel that you cannot be on "the fence" or "the darn thing probably can go through my switches so I won't buy it" garbage when it comes down to a $2k purchase. Whatever. It boils down to do you have the money or you don't, which easily translates to "I gotta have it or I NEVER intend to buy it in the first place so I will just contribute to hating it".  Plain and simple. Those that don't want to spend the money will judge the BB even before it is release. Those that will purchase it will stay quiet and counting down the days when it is delivered. And please, if a $2k BB won't make it cleanly across the switches then trust me i will find a solution instead of complaining about it. I ain't gonna choose an engine based in whether is is compatible with track manufacturers. End of story.

....and as usual John I knew I could count on you to illustrate my point perfectly ...

Jon, No two layouts are the same.

IMO, that coal load really needs a "user" variable speed dial or a screen icon on Legacy to govern how quickly coal drops in the tender similar to how sound is controlled.

This way those with smaller loops like me get the same prototypical experience out of that feature as those with long runs without requiring fifty loops around the layout to watch coal drop one inch.   Or, having to use demo mode.

Joe 

I have addressed dead spots in switches by making sure all of the rails have feeds. The point rails are connected to the fixed rails at the joint using wire braid. Now even Beeps and Plymouths traverse them without stalling.

It appears Jon has already addressed the issue of sounds dropping out but if he hadn't or if I had an older engine with this problem I would not hesitate to tie all or the rollers together with a tether. Rather than make it obvious I would camoflage it in a feed water pipe. Win win. Add to the detail and make it more reliable. 

 

Pete

When an engine has a tether, I frequently add a roller to the tender for reliability through switches.  However, I really didn't want to add a tether to a wireless tether model.  I suspect my Big Boy will get a battery, maybe even something like the BCR with the charger so I can forget about it for all time.

 

 

Well, I'll have to respectfully disagree.  While the sound will restart, I don't want it clicking on and off, the battery solves that issue.

 

However, this is not a complaint, just a statement of the situation.  It's no big deal to do stuff like this, comes with the territory.

 

I'm working on my new "nice" side.

 

 

Joe,

The coal load operated in sync with the fuel / water simulation present in the latest vision locos with the IR Sensor transmitter.  I have detailed the operation many times on the forum.

 

There will be many ways for the rate of depletion to vary, but it is not user selectable.   The fuel and water utilization is variable based on speed and labor, and other operating factors.  For example, to run the fuel out faster manually raise the labor, or perhaps apply the train brake on the Cab-2.

 

The Vision big Boy will come with an IR sensor track.  This track will interact with the Cab-2; displaying the Fuel / Water levels in the Cab-2 screens.  This will match the loco behavior of the depletion of the coal and the water levels.  RailSounds announces the fuel and water levels, and you can refill them independently from the Cab-2.

 

The experience of running the Vision Big Boy immerses one into the cab of the loco in a multitude of ways, one can not simply change the coal load depletion rate of operation, the  interaction of all of the subsystems must be taken into account.

I think you'll be surprised how fast your "fuel" depletes.  While my layout is not all that large, after 15 minutes the fuel has started to go down. You can test it by using Aux1 crew talk(2) While running. It will report you fuel levels audibly On newer Legacy engines. 

 

I solve any tender pickup issues, on both MTH and Lionel models, by connecting the pickup rollers on the engine with the pickup rollers on the tender. 

 

For Lionel steam engines, I run a 2 conductor micro-mini connector cable between the engine and tender which connects the center roller wires together and thereby enlarges the electrical footprint of the model. It works like a charm, every time, without exception. The Lionel Vision Challenger was an interesting job because the Challenger already has a speaker wire going between the engine and tender. To keep from having more than one cable between the two, I removed the existing speaker cable and installed a 4 conductor micro-mini cable in its place. I ran center roller and ground on 2 of the 4 conductors and I ran the 2 speaker wires on the other 2. This way there's still just one cable between the engine and tender but it carries wires for both sound and power.

 

For MTH steam engines....these days MTH likes to not put rollers on the tender at all. They use the circuit board drawbar to supply power from the engine's pickup rollers to the tender. This works fine most of the time, but if the engine's pickup rollers are too close together or power is otherwise interrupted to the engine's pickup rollers, the engine cuts out. I solve this by doing two things...

 

1) I install a pickup roller on the MTH tender. Ironically, MTH tenders usually have a space on the tender trucks for a roller..they just don't use it these days. So I ordered a bunch of MTH pickup roller and I install one on the tender.

 

2) With a pickup roller now installed on the tender, I then connect that pickup roller with the pickup rollers on the engine via the drawbar (one of the many wires passing through the drawbar is center roller power from the engine). By connecting all of the rollers together, the electrical footprint is enlarged and the problem goes away. Again, this always works perfectly...every time without exception.

 

Hope that helps.

 

May I will do a video on it one day.

 

 

-Eric Siegel

>>>There will be many ways for the rate of depletion to vary, but it is not user selectable.   The fuel and water utilization is variable based on speed and labor, and other operating factors.  For example, to run the fuel out faster manually raise the labor, or perhaps apply the train brake on the Cab-2.<<<

 

Jon, What you are saying I think, coal consumption is regulated at predetermined rates set by operating conditions plus scale mileage.

What I'm saying, because all layouts are sized different, a train traveling say 50 miles making one complete loop around a layout from station back to that same station could be 30 linear feet or more then 200 feet.      

IMO, It would be more interactive prototypically for users to adjust coal depletion rates to the linear length of a loop on their layout plus operating factors so the engine burns coal at the same adjusted rate determined by distance traveled on each individual layout.     

Joe

The fuel levels don't reset with a power down so it may take a few sessions but it will deplete completely. And as I said it goes faster than you think. Even on a small layout. 

".these days MTH likes to not put rollers on the tender at all."

 

Hadn't noticed this.  Don't know why we haven't heard cries of "the horror, the horror" about this change in design? 

 

As long as a loco keeps running, I cannot see the big deal, of course, since

I mostly have the loco "prime mover" or chug-a-chug sounds turned way down or off.  Obviously, if this bothers one, it seems there are easy fixes for both Lionel and MTH locos.  This is Chitty-Chitty Bang Bang, not Heart of Darkness territory.

 

I hope everyone enjoys their Big Boy when it arrives. 

Eric,

 

Could you provide information on the micro-mini connector cable you mentioned?

 

Thx!

 

Alex

Here you go:

Micro Mini Connectors

Thank you, John!

 

I can think of several places I can use these other than for what Eric used them.

 

 

Alex

Would something like the battery replacement product used a a third part product for MTH engines be used on Lionel engines to get the loco over the "hump".

 

We have the N&W Class A that is a big offender with the sound dropping out. Added the battery and there was but little improvement...

To the best of my knowledge, those "battery replacement" devices do not work on Lionel products since their is no internal charging circuit. Thus those battery replacement devices only work on MTH PS-1 and PS-2 equipped products.

There is a product for Lionel, it requires you add the charging module and provide track power to charge the battery.  I believe the actual BCR is still the same.  I've been meaning to whack one out to see what issues I run across, but I don't foresee any problems.  Since I make my own BCR clones, I'd just combine the charging circuit with the BCR clone.

 

 

Pound one out?

 

Hi LIONEL VISION BIG BOY ENTHUSIAST, I ordered mine and am putting $200 back each month to be PREPARED..I will run mine and Hopefully It will be a Real Crowd Pleaser.My Legacy Version BIG BOY is a super runner, sounds Great, never, (knock on wood), had any issues yet. I Wonder how many Readers of this Topic will Put one of these BIG BOYS in to their Roundhouse? Thanks for the Topic.