I'm a long time member of the Illinois Railway Museum and I sometimes collect models of items at the Museum. With Athearn's announcement of a forthcoming Santa Fe FP45 #92 which is currently at IRM, I'm interested in picking one up. Since I don't model the Santa Fe and don't plan on running it regularly, I'm trying to decide between the DC model and the one with DCC and Soundtraxx Tsunami sound decoder. I'd like to hear what people who have the FP45 with Soundtraxx decoder think of the unit. Thanks! Andy "Tetsu Uma"
I had an extensive demo of one of these units at the LHS and if I did not have a bunch of expensive items already reserved, I would have bought it on the spot even though it did not fit into my prototype or era. It ran smooth and sounded great; I was very impressed. I have very little experience with sound in N-scale so take note of that as you read my review. I do have pretty high expectations, however, especially when it comes to locomotives. Jamie
I don't have one but I've seen 'em up close. I think it's the best sound in a diesel that's been sold RTR to this date. If you are going to run this model on a DCC layout and money isn't a big concern, the sound equipped model is worth the extra in my opinion.
I have one of the FP45 models with the Tsunami DCC and sound. This is a nicely running loco. Some have complained about the quality of their paint schemes, and maybe some schemes are worse than others. My orange and black Milwaukee Road loco looks great. These locos are big. I am not sure I fully appreciated that until putting it next to some of my other locomotives. It has a nice weight to it and I haven't had any problem with its pulling capabilities, but then again I haven't tested them to failure and I have so far run it only on my club track, which is dead level. The motor control is nice - much better than a lot of my other "factory-installed decoder" models. This was a big jump from the MRC decoder in the Challenger models, I think, in terms of motor control. The sounds are good. Not having ever seen FP45 locos in person, I can't speak to whether they sound EXACTLY like this model, but they are very believable sounds for EMDs of this era. The sound quality is crisp and it doesn't have that Hallmark greeting card tinni-ness that some N scale locos have. Programming requires more of a boost than is normal on my Digitrax Zephyr. If I remember correctly, I used the 1k Ohm resistor trick to change the loco ID, and then I put it on a programming track using a Sprog II and DecoderPro to do the rest of it. I didn't really change all that much. The stock settings were pretty close to what I wanted. I think the detail level is good for N scale diesel. It's certainly not the most detailed, but then again how much detail does a real FP45 really have. On DC, the sounds still work well. You need to get at least 5 or 6 V to the thing before it will even budge, but this is not unusual for sound decoder equipped locos. There were some threads about this loco back in June or July if you are looking for more opinions. Enjoy! Adam
I have 3 of them and not only do they sound and look great they are some of the best running engines out there. Mine are the warbonnet in both the passenger and freight schemes. As far as programming goes i have had no problems programming them in ops mode or the programming track, no need for a resistor here. I also have 4 of the DC units that i upgraded to DCC and my opinions are same weather in DC or DCC. Dave
My complaint is that there are no function outputs for lighting effects (that I am aware of). Sound is great at first, but the constant drone of the prime mover becomes annoying after a while. I turn mine off and just use the horn and bell. They are great models, but for the price of three DC locomotives (speaking of a DCC model), where are the lighting effects?
I have 2 w/ddc and sound. They are heavy, great pullers with good speed control. Shell detail is ok/good but one of the units had to go back as the "Fe" in Santa Fe was missing and the unit would short out after 30 minutes of use. Hopefully Athearn will replace - soon... I'd purchase again. Brian
I've got five sound equipped units so far, money well spent and will be getting a pair of superfleets. My only gripe about the Tsunami diesel decoder is that you can't start up and shut down the engine with a function key like you can with the MRC and BLI decoders, or at least I haven't found a way yet.
I now have 3 of them, and will probably get at least one Superfleet-painted one when they come out. As for lighting effects, it comes with Rule 17 lighting front and rear, and I have configured the headlights in mine to oscillate when I blow the horn. I don't think ATSF had any special lighting, but the extra effects are kind of cool.
A friend at our club has one. The unit did not run very well: it stalled on turnouts.... OK, apparently this model needs some running time. Sound is nice, but I was more impressed with the BLI E-unit, which has a very nice low noise.
Here's my 2 cents worth. Just trying to be helpful here. I have heard these Athearn FP45/F45s, and they're pretty good. If money wasn't an issue, I'd love to have them. (*Edit: see post by me below. You guys got me started thinking about this too much... dangerous! ) Originally, I had (with difficulty) passed on purchasing them, for the following reasons. It's picky on my part, feel free to disregard. Given how these Athearn N scale sound locos have flown off the shelf... clearly they seem to be a commercial success for Athearn. So, what were my (prior) reasons? Reason #1) One thing to be aware about these Athearn FP45/F45 Tsunami-equipped sound models - is that N scale factory sound (from just about any manufacturer) still lags HO factory sound in realism. The speakers and small size of N still is not able to reproduce the pleasing deeper rumble and more subtle layered sound of all the mechanical equipment on a big diesel, that is possible from multiple HO manufacturers today. Reason #2) There is also the rather non-congruent effect that the Athearn N scale Tsunami F45s/FP45s with the factory stock settings (i.e. no momentum), doesn't do the correct sound of the prime mover (engine) spooling up, prior to the loco moving. Rather, the loco moves and the sound spools up at the same time and same rate.... but that's not the way that real diesel locomotives actually sound when they're working. When I was looking at this in the shop, the shop didn't know if there was a way to set either momentum in the decoder or some Tsunami decoder setting to enable this in the Athearn N FP45s/F45s. I realize that for most, this isn't an issue, and more power to you if you don't care about this. Just my personal preference, I like this spooling-up sound aspect of the diesel engine. I'm spoiled by the Loksound decoders, which have this feature as standard; or by HO sound locos that I've run, that have been programmed to have this. ------------------- Yes, I was continually tempted by the sound of the Tsunami in the Athearn F45/FP45's - they're really good for N scale. I just hadn't convinced myself to buy yet at the current price points. But especially because of this thread, I kept thinking about it.......... (see my post below)
I would like to thank everyone for their input. I have the BLI E8s and it is good to know what people think of the Athearn unit.
Update: Kept thinking about the Tsunami and the 'startup lag' issue above, as well as listening to YouTubes that I could find of this loco. I went to my local "DCC Lunch" today and consulted with the local knowledgeable guys on Tsunami. Bottom line advice from them: - Set momentum up fairly high on any Tsunami-equipped diesel - The prime mover should rev up in advance of the loco moving I broke down, bought a pair. Initial testing confirms what my guys said... setting the momentum up pretty high allows the prime mover to spool up in advance of the loco moving. There is a more realistic variation of sounds in the Athearn's stock factory sound file, and I hear the multiple mechanical sounds (air popping, whining fans, etc) on a diesel - goodness. The sound recording and sound quality on these Tsunami-equipped Athearn FP45s is better than the factory Loksound equipped PCM E7s that I have. I don't know if the PCM E7 sound recording could be improved or not via a custom Loksound file. I also don't know if there is any difference in the speaker quality or not between these two. I don't have any of the Paragon2 BLI locos to compare these with. Need to break in the Athearn locos, make sure the wheels are clean, etc. More testing to be done with the CV settings to see if I can follow these tips from Litchfield Station to get the loco to crawl: Litchfield Station FAQ for SoundTraxx Tsunami So far, nicely satisfied at this early stage with the Athearn Tsunami-equipped FP45s. More testing to come.
And that is just what hit me when listening to the new BLI loco: a deep rumble! I hadn't heard that rumble before on other sound units. And yes, the Athearn needs breaking in. And clean the wheels please, because they are greasy with oil.
