Bachmann is there any talk of releasing the N&W 4-8-4  J with DCC and sound?

Could the whole  decoder/sound board  be removed and replaced with one from the K4 /2-8-4 . I am running only DC at this time.

If these are interchangeable  sound decoders could they be a drop in replacement for Bachmann's nonsound decoder in the 2-10-2 for example?

All Bachmann steam on these trains.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDWVFD8nQ0k

How much run time do they have? some engine need a hour or two of running to break then in. If they are new may be let just the engines run 1/2 hour forward then backwards.  For the second question is there lube on the wheels and or track? Over lubing engine will cause slipping. Some engine come from the factory with too much lubrication.

A easy way to clean wheels is put a paper towel on the track and put a little rubbing alcohol on it with only one truck on the towel put power to the engine and hold it in place and let the wheels spin,then move the towel to a clean spot and repeat with the other truck.

They had problem with the white gears,older n scale. The newer stuff with black gears are good. You could switch shells with a newer release,just check the bottom for black axle gears.

Here is a Milwaukee Road C2 2-8-0 that has a Atlas 0-8-0 tender shell mounted on the Spectrum USRA short tender frame.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hj5XnySCL-8

I do not  replace the rapido couplers on my cars . I just replace the whole truck. on a Bachmann car I remove the truck and take a Micro-trains truck and enlarge the pivot hole so that it sivils nice and reatach the screw. You can get the new bachmann Ez mate trucks and just swap them out for the old ones. Then there is no need tho modify the mounting hole.

Or my secret for saving money on replacement trucks with knuckle couplers for my car that I have with rapidos.  I look for a lot of used  cars on Feebay that have the trucks I want,bid on them and if I get them I swap the truck and then sell  the cars that I do not need.

that is the problem with 2 coupler types. If you fleet of N scale is small, I think it would be advantages to switch over to knuckle couplers on all of them.When i switched from HO to N over 20 years ago I am glad that I started installing MT Knuckle couplers from the get go. Most if not all new N scale are coming out with knuckle couplers.

Did not notice the bump in the track  in the video before. That is  where the lay out has a seem between two sections ,I hid it under some grass mat and and the station.I have since fix/ improve this.

I stripped the paint off some older Bachmann Plus/spectrum F units and painted the units for Milwaukee road and added slight weathering (layout era late 50s) and am very happy with them.
The f7B (plus model) has white gears that are cracked so I converted it to a dummy. The third engine is the Bachmann GP7 ( yes I know Milw did not has GP7s but it is close enough to a GP9 for me)  Also runs great and the speed range (DCC on board )   is not too different from  the Fs even thought I run DC . The Bachmann  paint strips well with  91% isopropal alcohol.   

Just thought I would share.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0ScCixcBWk

I have added Bachmann spectrum tenders to many nonBachmann engines. You are right it is the best fast way to improve performance of steam with  nonpick up / poor electrical pick up tenders.


What is great is that  Bachmann sells the tenders separately.

Thanks to spookshow's site  I modified the spectrum tender to allow the draw bar to connect to the engine. Look under Bachmann 0-6-0 on his locomotive encyclopedia.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNi3fKpr7Q0

J with a meat reefer train  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joKsBd2D2GE

sorry forgot the photo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HNi3fKpr7Q0