Bachmann has hit a home run here with the N scale version of the GE 44 Tonner. I just picked up the red un-numbered & un-lettered model. The only problem I have with it is trying to decide what road number I want to put on it which is a good thing         They run great in DCC or DC as the DCC board installed will operate in either manner. This loco is a great buy with the pre-installed dual mode DCC board inside. If you buy either of the undec models (red or yellow) you have the option to use two different styles of light housings for the headlights. You can use either flush mount or the one with the hood. The light housings come pre-molded in the same color as the loco. If you do not want the Bachmann dummy couple and prefer something else, the Accumate couple will drop right in using the coupler box provided by Bachmann. If you want to use MicroTrains your going to run into a problem. Their's very tight clearance between the coupler box and trucks on the 44 Tonner. It might be possible to design some sort of adapter piece to mount to the body and provide clearance for the mounting of the MT but it will take some work to achieve this. The mounting surface on the body is not flat but a round pin with a hole in the middle for the screw for the coupler box to attach to. If you want to go the easy route then use a Accumate. Just the coupler and not the box that comes with it. Drops right in. The loco does great running at slow speeds and doesn't turn into a speed demon at higher speeds. It's amazing how well this loco runs without having any flywheels inside. Pulling power for this lil' sucker is also amazing provided that it's on flat & level track were it performs it's best.  I've yet to test this to the point of slippimg but have done some switching with two 50' box cars & two 53' bulkhead flats both with wood cast loads on them.  Did extremely well pulling & pushing these cars forwards & backwards without the slight hint of slipping doing yard switching. I saw a youtube video done by river eagle pushing & pulling nine covered hoppers...8 two bays & 1 three bay. The Bachmann GE 44 Tonner worked well here too.  Keep in mind that the prototype of this little loco didn't move large blocks of cars because of it size so keep that in mind if you decide to purchase one for yourself.  A lot of people think these GE 44 Tonners did nothing more than industrial switching but their were some railroads that used these for mainline road switcher duties but were still limited on what they did because of their size.  Want a great liitle switcher for your railroad......check this 44 Tonner out!

Supposably April/May time period.
Release date has been pushed back a couple of times now.....Nov 08, Dec 08 and now April/May 09. Hopefully it hits around that time. Many people (encluding me) are a waitng these little boogers

Hi CG04,
    Check this site out when you get a chance....

     http://members.aol.com/dgosha/TrebleO.html

A good railroad friend (Doug Gosha) has this site that covers A1G (Atlas 1st Generation) as well as Treble O. He might have the info needed for replace bands for your engine.

Hi Earle,
      Actually you should be comparing a Kato SD-45 to the Bachmann SD-45 and seeing the differences in the tooling and comparing those to a prototype picture of an actual EMD SD-45.

Thank you Mr. Bachmann and everyone else who clarified this question about the decoders usage and being able to be used across a level playing field whether the user is DC or DCC.
                                         Railhead

Hi Mr. Bachmann,
   Your company has sure mades quite a stir with your future release of the 44T switcher on every forum I've be to so far. Though I do have a question about the DCC board being used in these. Will it be a dual mode board that will run on both DC & DCC or is this a straight DCC board? This is one question that many are wondering about (including me) as we will be able to use the 44T in either manner or are the DCC guys the only ones going to be able to use these?
                                             Railhead

Hi Johnd,
      I don't know of anyone ever changing out the spring mechanism in a N scale turnout. Some solenoids have a plastic wiper that moves the movable rails inside the switch machine. Before you go and do some kind of mod that might damage your turnout, check for other possibilities of were you might be losing electrical contact. Keep in mind that some turnouts get their power to different portions of the internal rails by the movable rail as it lays up against the fixed rail when fipping the turnout for run thru or diverging. When you clean your track do you ever clean the areas on your turnouts were the moving rails contacts the fixed rails? Take a cotton swab and dip in in rubbing alcohol and carefully clean those areas plus the areas where the wheels of you locos make contact with the rails itself. Sometimes over a period of time the rails oxidize and this creates a insulating effect preventing electrical contact to flow from one rail to the next especial on those style of turnouts that are manfactured in that manner. Now if the turnouts in question don't improve any by the cleaning proceedure,  you may want to take a careful peek inside one of your turnouts and check for electrical contacts that may feed the rails internally. I've never opened one of the newer Bachmann turnout were the track is fasten to a plastic roadbed but I have fixed a few Kato #4, #6 and double crossover turnouts with all those having electrical contacts internally that feed the rails. depending on how the electrical contacts (if any) are done inside the Bachmann turnout, it might be possible to modifiy it to get electricity to flow better inside it.  If your good at tinkering, take a look inside but take notice of were everything is placed inside so if a part should get dis-lodge you can get it back together. See if it can be modded or beefed up in some way to get better electrical contact. On older Atlas turnouts before the series they have now in their code 80 track, they use to go dead on the inner rails near the plastic frog. These could be easily fixed by removing a portion of the plastic ties on the bottom of the turnout at the out side rail and inside rail then soldier a jumper wire from one rail to the next on each side of the turnout. ( left side.....outside rail to inside rail.............Right side..... outside rail to inside rail). This method may not work with a metal frog especially if any of the fix rails make any kind of pyshical contact with it (some Peco turnouts are made this way) but may work if their is a gap or plastic insulator between the rails and the frog itself. I hope that I haven't gone overboard and gave you to much info but trying to get in a position for a better fix on your turnouts.
                                           Railhead

Well,
   I finally got around to ordering three sets of the Bachmann variety pack dummy couplers. Some of the N scale internet vendors say these are in three different sizes (short, medium & long) which is miss leading. their are short & long couplers in the pack but the one that is referred to as medium is a different coupler all together. The short & long couplers have the "T" shank which will replace any Rapido couplers sharing the same "T" shank end. The othe coupler that referred to as medium doesn't have the "T" shank end. The end of this coupler has a pin hole thru it so it can be mounted on a loco using the pilot connector with the centering pin that snaps into the loco shell at the front & back pilots. If you follow Bachmann's description on these couplers your getting the correct info on which they are and what they will fit onto. The Standard line will fit locos like the first run Bachmann C40-8W's with the Rapido coupler thats mounted to the truck. The Spectrum coupler will fit the newer version of the C40-8W's where the couplers attach to the shell with the pilot connector with the centering pin on them. And last, the Rolling stock coupler which will rectro fit rolling stock using a Rapido coupler with the "T" shank end. You cannot use these to replace either a Accumate or a MicroTrain couplers directly in their standard coupler boxes...........
Now when comparing the long and short Bachmann dummies with their same counterparts made by Red Caboose (Unimates), they are pretty close to the same sizes. Were the knuckle opening on a Unimate is tight, the Bachmann Dummies have a wider opening allowing them to couple together just by pushing what ever cars or engines you place these on together. You can also couple to Accumates & MicroTrains the same way. This is a feature you can't do with a Unimate. In coupling or uncoupling with a Unimate, you must lift the cars up and over to make this move. I found I could also uncouple the Bachmann dummies using a modified screw driver shaped like a Rix's pick to do uncoupling moves. When appling a Bachmann dummy onto a piece of equipment takes a little care. Unlike the Unimate which has the heal on it's bottom so you know right away which is the upside & downside of the coupler, the Bachmann dummy looks the same on either side. So if you decide at sometime to use these, make sure your putting them on the correct way or you'll be forced to remove it and re-apply the coupler a second time. ......
Now the down side.........
     Many have spectulated on other forums about the Bachmann dummy couplers not being the proper height . When compared to a Accumate or MicroTrain coupler, the head of the Bachmann dummy is almost a half size lower. Their is no way to bring these up to proper height without some heavy modification if that's at all possible. If you compare the Bachmann dummy to a Unimate coupler you'll see first hand were the problem lies. The shank on the Unimate connects to the bottom of the head of the coupler placing it at a proper height to couple with other Unimates or other brand of couplers. The shank on the Bachmann dummy is dead center placing the head to low. If they would of place the shank at the botton of the head it would of put it up into a better position for matching the height of other coupler brands........
I went and placed these Bachmann dummies on a part of a passenger train consist to try them out. On the Concor cars I placed the Long Bachmann dummy and the shank on these get the head out enough to couple to another car and allows a close coupling effect giving a more prototypical look. I placed the short couplers on the A-B-A consist of Roco F3's drawing those pieces together eliminating the wide gaps when using the Rapido couplers that were originally on them. So far during test running I haven't experienced any false uncouplings. I'm going to order a couple of more sets so I can finish the rest of my passenger set.. I don't plan on using anything in the passenger train with any other piece's of equipment just using the whole consist with in itself so the coupler height will not be a problem. I do hope that Bachmann designs another style of dummy coupler which fixes the height problem (HINT! HINT MR BACHMANN!!  ( 8     )  as I believe that all those who model in N scale can benefit from a better designed product.  The Bachmann dummy built to the proper height would make some coupler changes like a coupler pocket design that can't be rectro fitted with any MicroTrains coupler conversions a whole heck of a lot easier and many happy campers too boot!
                                           Railhead

Hi Glenn,
     And thank you very much for the added information.
I've used various knuckle couplers for years (Mt's, Accumate, Unimates, ConCor dummies, etc) but never used or seen for that matter, the new Bachmann dummies other than in picture form. The old ConCor ones were a step in the right direction with being semi automatic in coupling but failed with staying coupled together with themselves or any other coupler. They were made from a soft plastic and stretched when any torque was applied. The other down side was they were only offered in one size. You could use these on passenger equipment for close coupling of cars but that was pretty much it. Couldn't use them for anything in a operational sense. The Bachmann ones I've seen in a picture look to be made of ridged plastic like the way Unimates are.  I might just get a couple packs of the multi-size "B" coupler sets and give them a try. It will be the only way to find out how they preform and post my findings here.
                                        Railhead

I've been trying to gain some info on Bachmann's new dummy knuckle coupler but haven't quite found all the info that I would like. I've read thru some of the older threads and found that the Bachmann dummies will couple with Accumates, MT's, Unimates etc. But what I would like to know is, do you still have to lift the cars to couple or can you push them together to couple them? The opening on the head in a picture I found at N Scale Supply of the Bachmann dummy shows that it might be open wider (the head) then a Unimate. Is this opened enough for standard coupling? The older dummy couple made by ConCor would couple to other knuckle couplers and the Bachmann one look simular to that by the opening. And this has got me thinging that the Bachmann dummies might be partially operating in coupling but not uncoupling. My other question is the length of the Bachmann dummies in the variety pack. What are the sizes of the small, medium & large? Bachmann should have this listed with their dummies here on their site when searching for product detail but they don't. I would like to use thse dummies on some passenger equipment I own that has Rapidos specially if these might be partially operating were Unimates won't.  Any and all info anyone can supply would be apprieciated!
                                        Railhead

Digitrax is getting nortorious for making bad decoder boards.  What I would of done is to check and see if the decoder board is bad in the engine thats stops running is to swap it with one of the other engines that you know to be good. Run them like you have been and see if that board you suspect to be bad causes the engine you know to good to stall. Here you'll know for sure that the board is faulty. Now by chance this board should run well in the engine you've changed it into and the other engine you've originally had it in stalls, you might have a short in the motor that only happens when it's been ran for a while and heated up some from running. Every once in a great while I'll run across a bad motor. I usually have this happen more in a Atlas engine then I would in a Kato one. The newer Atlas slow speed motors seem to be more problematic then their older fast speed ones. I've had a couple of slow speed motors go bad were they barely turn over even if the speed on the throttle is near or at full speed. Sometimes cleaning the communicator and all electrical contacts on these helps, sometimes it doesn't have any effect at all. I got Kato engines going back to the Atlas/Kato era and first ran Kato engines when they first got into N scale that still run like new out of the box. 
                                              Railhead