Need reports, i have about 6 on the way and i have heard nothing but good reports on FVM's first entree into locomotives. Dave
Hey Dave, (cool name) What service are you pressing these units into? Coal? Intermodal? Manifest? Are you gonna compare to Kato units? How many units per train, how many cars per unit? Just curious. I want some FXE units and I guess Kato won't do it? dave t
There was a posting from a hobby shop in Des Plaines Illinois today on the Yahoo N scale group saying they are awesome, the poster said they were superior to Kato/Atlas, so there's an eval in the positive department
Feather River Train shop posted photos over on the Railwire: A few pictures of the Fox Valley Gevos...
Holy crap that BNSF loco looks impressive. I'll have to check out my local hobby shop to see if they have any of these in stock. I'm tempted to get this version of the BNSF heritage scheme but I like the swoosh more. Must....resist....urge....until....payday....
To quote one of the replies on Railwire, "Wow; wish they'd made something in my era !" RSD15's, Alco switchers? Might look into them anyway when reports start coming in about how they run.
Mostly intermodal and some coal unit trains. Bnsf and UP are some of my favorite roads and they do allot of this type of railroading. Can't wait for the FVM units to arrive. Dave (yea! it is a cool name)
I'm keen to hear how the mechanism compares to Atlas/ Kato, as there are no FVM stockists (brick and mortar stores) here in the UK, so I can't 'try before I buy. I will be getting the CN versions when they are released, but I'm sorely tempted by the BNSF ....... Cheers, Kev
That'd be Des Plaines Hobbies. From some of the early reviews, it sounds like they run equivalent to Katos, and the detail is beyond that. I'd expect nothing less from Matt. For those of you that purchased these, it should be a wonderful Christmas gift!
And for more info.... I saw, and watched the pre-production models on Saturday. Even for pre-production painted units, these were sharp. Clear, sharp printing, different colors on the different warnings, and all placed properly for their respective roadnames. Even the anti-skid paint on the long hoods was well done. Matt had one unit with all the grabs pre-installed. Very sharp! The one unit he ran, I would say was closer to the quality of an Atlas. A little noisy, but nothing to noticable. These will be excellent additions to anyone that models modern locos.
Here are a couple of photos. I'm shooting more today at some point and will try and post more later: This one is a preproduction with grabs installed:
I picked up the last one from my LHS this evening and I'm very impressed with it. I ran it on my layout quick just to see how it is and already I think it's better than my Kato SD70MAC. I don't have the decoder but just tested it quick by itself and it's very responsive (better than my Kato) and seems to be pretty quiet and I think it will be quieter than my Kato once I can get the decoder for this baby. It looks very sharp, very nice details applied, makes my Kato look out of place because of it. My layout is pretty small right now and I now know it doesn't like my tight curves (the Kato doesn't mind them at all) but that will be changing within the next month or two. My LHS also said they have the DC version ordered of BNSF so hopefully I can score that one when it comes out too. They also told me they tested these when they got them in and liked them a lot. Looks like FVM has a winner here for their first loco!
This past Tuesday, one of our members brought down two of the BNSF units. He had them on order and picked them up just hours before. Ran great and looked nice. Boy, there was EVERY DETAIL printed on the things. I never realized that there were so many warning decals and caution plaqures on these things. Among our club members who examined them, there was mention of them being "noisy". To me, they don't sound any louder than most of the Atlas stuff that I run. And I run a "Completely Atlas" roster these days. Word is, that Matt (FVM) test-runs every unit before they go out. Nice Matt!!!:thumbs_up: Jerry G.
I picked up one today at Trainmaster Models in the Atlanta area. They had 2 left. Not sure how many they got.
