I wanted to hear what these engines sound like, notably the NYC and/or Southern models, as I may want to acquire their sound boards. Plus, the fact that videos of them are pretty much nonexistent.
Replies sorted oldest to newest
Not stock sound, but maybe this helps you. I'd also suggest you look at Carl Tuveson's website.
Thomas, if you want high quality video's of the Mikado running go to tuveson.com, click on the item in the left hand column called TMCC for S. There are videos of extended runs of the PRR and NYC Mikado engines. You can listen to the majority of the Railsounds 5 features. I own the PRR, NYC and C&O versions. Of those 3 the NYC has the best set of sounds, in my opinion. All of my engines have been modified for 4 chuffs/revolution, fan driven smoke unit and cruise control as shown in Carl's video.
This is just a FWIW comment; Jonnyspeed mentions in his video that he thought his Mikado was a pretty poor runner. I also bought the NYC version when it first came out. I oiled the usual siderod points prior to its first run. I then put it on the track for an initial break-in run of ten minutes. At the end of that run, I found, to my horror that the boiler front area was extremely warm to the point where I though I've maybe smoked the motor. (The motor is up front in the engine).
I let the motor cool down and then proceeded to start disassembly of the running gear which I found was completely dry. I removed the lower plate that holds the driver bearings and found the gear was stiff to turn as an assembly. After oiling everything in sight, I re-assembled it and found the running drag greatly reduced. I did another break-in run and the motor stayed much cooler.
To this day, it is one of my smoothest runners - on a par with my C&A and Blue Comet Pacifics.
Really good suggestions to assure the unmodified engines run as well as possible. For info, there are two versions of the Mikado, the first version was the NYC and B&O roadnames. the remainder of the roadnames are the second version. The chassis and motor mounting was revised.
Mikado; I posted a video of my NYC Mikado on YouTube at this address: "youtu.be/UqAp0CVXMUo"
Sorry; trying to figure out video upload process. It is on YouTube and was "published" as "public"...
D&H 65 posted:This is just a FWIW comment; Jonnyspeed mentions in his video that he thought his Mikado was a pretty poor runner. I also bought the NYC version when it first came out. I oiled the usual siderod points prior to its first run. I then put it on the track for an initial break-in run of ten minutes. At the end of that run, I found, to my horror that the boiler front area was extremely warm to the point where I though I've maybe smoked the motor. (The motor is up front in the engine).
I let the motor cool down and then proceeded to start disassembly of the running gear which I found was completely dry. I removed the lower plate that holds the driver bearings and found the gear was stiff to turn as an assembly. After oiling everything in sight, I re-assembled it and found the running drag greatly reduced. I did another break-in run and the motor stayed much cooler.
To this day, it is one of my smoothest runners - on a par with my C&A and Blue Comet Pacifics.
I used to have the NYC version as well. When I was breaking it in after a light oil it got so hot that it literally seized up. I thought I fried the motor, but after it cooled down it ran again. I've never owned a model that ran as poorly as that engine. The C&O ran better but under TMCC the performance was horrible at the low sped steps. It runs much better under plain DC or DCC as shown in the video. Carl's tips are a must IMHO if you want to run them under TMCC. It's a beautiful little engine and just a darn shame that Lionel can't figure out how to put Legacy in them (along with the 4-6-2) and bring them to market.
Mark: Yes, that is my video. Thanks so much for getting it over here for me. Any tips on how you did it?
FWIW: In the video, I have 15 cars hitched to it which is why the start-up was slow. You also didn't see it run into my Y-3 which was parked down the track. That's what resulted in the "sudden stoppage" LOL. Trying too many things at once with camera & CabII in hand....
This engine is a smooth runner, but as others have said, Legacy control or possibly a ERR Cruise M would sure help start-up.
Mark: Thanks for the excellent tutorial. I'm familiar with copy & paste, but didn't get the address highlighted or didn't find it on the YouTube site. I'll try better next time...
Thanks for the videos guys. These engines sound awesome, and definitely makes me feel like purchasing one.