Hi Roger: Have you seen the Mike that Lionel did in S a few years back? It looked not bad but I don't recall it it was a light or heavy. I've wondered about asking Fred Rouse whether he's contemplating doing for it what's offering to do for the Y3. cheers
Alex Binkley To: [email protected] From: [email protected] Date: Sun, 3 Mar 2013 10:25:34 -0800 Subject: Re: {S-Scale List} UPDATE #1: Observations on the Lionel American Flyer SD70ACe with Scale Wheels Michael, Thank you very much for taking the time to share all of your observations. The latest Lionel entries look very promising for S. It’s almost enough for me to let go of my boyhood contempt for Lionel. Now if only they would produce a scale Heavy Mike, I might finally be able to forgive what they did to American Flyer! Roger Nulton From: pinetreerr Sent: Sunday, March 03, 2013 9:10 AM To: [email protected] Subject: {S-Scale List} UPDATE #1: Observations on the Lionel American Flyer SD70ACe with Scale Wheels This message is an update of a message I sent through earlier. The update is based on additional observations & operations with the American Flyer SD70ACe. As a result of additional deliveries from the good folks at Des Plaines Hobbies & Port Lines Hobbies, I've now got the benefit of three units to use & examine. Run time of the units continues to increase. My updates have been edited into my original message and the message is now divided into specific sections. Some of the updates are as a result of additional examination and testing I've done, while others are due to specifics inquiries from folks on this list, friends' comments, and direct emails I've received. I must say that overall I am very happy with the locomotive. It is a very nicely detailed loco and runs very well. As with any model, it's all about compromises and choices that the manufacturer makes. IMHO Lionel made a pretty good set of choices at a very reasonable price point. Since there have already been reviews of the Scale version of the SD70ACe posted by Rich Gajnak on the OGR forum and by Ed L. on the S Scale SIG, I will try not to replicate that material there. Here's some additional observations I have: Prototype Fidelity ------------------ Fidelity to the prototype is very good -- I checked several key attributes like length, cab width, and height. They were either spot on or very very close. Height and Cab width measure spot on, overall length is very close. Wheel diameter is also very close (prototype is 42", model is 40"). Wheels ------ Scale wheels -- passes NASG S-4 wheel standards. Using the NASG gauge, Back to back is spot on and Flange depth is spot on. Wheel Width measured at 0.126". No Traction tires (as expected). Contrast to S Helper Service locos at 0.110" and American Models in the 0.129" range. Couplers -------- Couplers in the S scale world are in some respects a matter of choice, with various modelers using some or all of the following: Kadee 802/808, S Helper Service 01295, Walther PROTO Max, and Kadee #5. On the first SD70ACe, I easily installed KD802s. Lionel provides a coupler mounting pad and screws to mount the KD802/808. On my model they were about 0.015" too high -- not a big deal. It is easily correctable with a piece of 0.015" styrene between the coupler and the scale coupler mounting pad. And the Lionel supplied screws for mounting the couplers to the scale coupler mounting pad have room for that 0.015" styrene. During operations with a the load load of a train, the drawbar pull actually pulls the pivoting pilot up to its highest position (almost like it has been permanently screwed in place, but still has the option to move). This is very nice, but at the same time also increases the delta in coupler height significantly. On my model it caused the KD802 to now be about 0.030" too high. As a result on the next two models, and eventually on the original model itself, I have replaced the KD802s with SHS 01295 couplers. The SHS 01295 couplers have the knuckle face about 0.045" lower. So I opted to use the SHS couplers on my models. They also have a slight delta (now being slightly too low), but overall it is more too my liking. If you are going to use KD802/808s on your loco, you probably want to install a shim between the coupler box and the mounting pad. Drawbar pull ------------ Drawbar pull of my model SD70ACe is ~0.185kg (compare to ~0.100kg drawbar pull of SHS SW9) as measured with the MicroMark Digital Pull Meter. It has been running a fair bit my Lenz DCC controlled layout pulling 30-36 cars, including up a 2.5% grade, all at a very slow speed before wheels started to slip. Multi-unit lashups definitely increase the pulling power although I have neither measured nor tested in this area, except for noticing I could easily pull 42 cars at one point. I'm sure they will pull far more, but I can't say how many. Smoke Unit ---------- It has a fan driven smoke unit. Mike all work fine, but I generally prefer no smoke on my home layout -- I just used the easily available switch to turn it off. Sound ----- With a variety of sounds built in, Lionel also provides an easily accessible volume potentiometer next to the Smoke/No Smoke switch, so if you prefer no sound at all, just use that potentiometer to turn it all the way down. Motor control ------------- With three units available I could also compare locomotive speed. Running on DCC in 128 speed step mode where Lionel implemented direct motor drive, I did notice some small differences in speed of the locos. Starting them all separated at 20" and running them for a given distance they did not all end up still separated by the original 20". But it was not enough that I noticed any issues when creating multi-unit lashups (see below). Layout control -------------- I did not test on Lionel Legacy, Lionel TMCC or AC, but the loco supports all of them in addition to DC and DCC. I must say it's really nice to not have to do any installs. And with all the different control options, running at home or on the club layout becomes very easy... DC Operations ------------- Speed on DC is very impressive. If I did the math right, it starts at 8.2V DC (4.7 SMPH) and at 12VDC it is at 49 SMPH. (Max speed for the real loco is 70MPH), and since this loco can run up to 18V, it likely will make that speed with no issues, but I did not test it. On pure DC Power there are nice lights and sound effects: FORWARD: Front Headlight on at ~2V Cab light on at ~3.8V Engine startup sound at ~5.5V Ditch lights on, Cab Light off, Forward movement starts at ~8.2V REVERSE: Rear light on at ~4.2V Cab light on at ~4.2V Engine start up on at ~5.2V Cab light off, Reverse engine movement starts at ~8.1V DCC Operations -------------- On DCC, programming was very easy. Comes programmed at the standard address 3. I changed it to the 4 digit road number on the programming track. It also has a special method documented in the manual to allow changing the address right on the mainline if needed -- no programming track required. Decoder Pro 3.3.2, with SPROG II USB on a Windows 7 PC had no problem reading all the CVs, although there is not yet a Decoder Pro decoder profile for this decoder yet. I also used it to modify some CVs. For DCC Operation, I did need to change two manufacturer unique CVs (CV59 and CV60) for some decoder filter settings to have it run on the Lenz system. Just reduce the values of these two CVs to a value of 1 in each one. The loco ships with some higher values in these CVs which are tuned/tested on NCE DCC and Digitrax systems, but the manual provides guidance on when changes to these may be required. One nice DCC feature I noticed is that the loco will, transparently to the user, process both 14 and 28 speed steps. It is not necessary to do the normal user required synchronization of the speed step mode between the decoder and the command station by programming a CV29 value in the decoder and setting the speed step setting on your DCC cab. The built-in decoder just handles it for you. It's a nice touch to reduce user complexity. The built in DCC decoder also comes preloaded with the 28 speed table, and uses the table in both 14 and 28 speed step mode. In 128 speed step mode, it does not use the speed table. I should also note that the built-in decoder has some nice use of functions beyond the basis of turn on the headlight, blow the horn, sound the bell. It has functions assigned to increase and decrease the volume, start up the engine, shutdown the engine, etc. Appears to be no automated crew talk in DCC unless you activate via a function. Use the functions if you like, ignore them if you prefer. You can see all the details in the owner's manual at: http://www.lionel.com/media/servicedocuments/6541748171SD70ACe.pdf With three units, I've also been able to test DCC operation of multi-unit lashups. Using my Lenz system for layout control, everything worked just as expected. Quite impressive to see the 3 unit SD70ACe lashup running! Further I should note Lionel has implemented a simple to use manufacturer unique CV (CV50) to set MU Lashup position (lead, middle, rear). Setting this adjust how sounds and lights are handled. Examples: the horn only sounds in the lead loco, all the lights except number board lights are off in the mid position loco, the rear loco only has the rear light on & only when the consist is operating in reverse, power down function on each loco only uses the appropriate sounds (lead loco gets engine shutdown and crew talk to dispatcher, middle and rear locos only get engine shutdown). All in all very nice, in a nice easy to use model. Summary ------- As I said at the beginning I really like this model. Very impressive product in my opinion. I think Lionel has a real winner here, and has really delivered a well appointed model that should well serve most S standard gauge modelers interested in modern motive power. I'm really looking forward to running these double or triple headed at the front of a long intermodal freight... Hope this might be of interest to others... Michael Greene
