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7 Responses to Which Locos Have The Best Pulling Power?
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Well, any 12 wheeled loco. The heavy loco’s pull more. An A-B set will pull a lot. The Bachmann A-B set’s are real pullers. Any AA, ABA ABBA will pull a lot too. The brand names I’ve tried and tested are Walthers, Bachmann (Don’t let the name fool you!) Bachmann can pull & run on bad track, where the $500.00 loco’s fear to tread. KATO, MTH, MTH seems to build a good heavy, strong pulling loco. Most loco’s pull better if you use metal wheeled rolling stock. Most loco’s will fool you, and pull long loads by themselves. Most brands can do the job. 😉
Wanting to add some names again, first you have to have a Bachmann AB pair, an Alco FA2 & FB2 locomotive is in order, great pullers and good price. A Wather’s Proto engine of any kind you like will pull a lot. (12 drive wheels if possible) And a Alco PA engine from MTH can be bought fairly cheep. The MTH engines are kind of crude looking to me but they have lot’s of DCC features & are very heavy. Careful, they are lot’s of fun!! KATO is a nice engine maker, what ever you like is good enough! Broadway Limited is a high end company with OK stuff. Fancy & expensive. Look for discounted stuff from them. Rivarossi, an Italian company with nice stuff. It’s hard to tie down certain models. Just remember, twelve drive wheels are better than eight for pulling. The Heavier the better. Enjoy what you buy!! Think about what roads you like. L&N, Pennsylvania, ERIE, D&H, Monon.. lot’s to choose from. Some prettier than others. What catches your eye?
I have several Bachmann locomotives, diesel and steam. They are OK but the Walthers Proto locomotives are better and have more detail. As far as I am concerned, Broadway Limited and MTH are top of the line and for what you get, not that much more expensive. I have an MTH 2-8-8-4 that will haul 100 ore cars without a burp at a steady scale speed of 50 mph. My Broadway Limited Y6B 2-8-8-2 has hauled 70 freight cars at speed. I have a Bachmann 4-8-4 SP Daylight. It looks good but can’t pull 8 passenger cars. I buy all of my stuff on sale. Look at walthers.com, trainworld.com, factorydirecttrains.com and hobbylinc.com
Your so right about MTH, I bought two AA pairs One a D&H the other a Penn, five stripe. They are more fun than ANY loco I’ve ever had! So many features and fast!! 😉
Gary, You can have all the wheels you want but if a set of wheels is not powered then it has no power to pull much. Example Old Tyco or Bachman engines that had only one truck powered (2 axles )had very little pulling power. Same with trucks with 3 axles in them if only 2 are pulling you have lost traction power Weight has some to do with it It keeps the wheels from slipping. But too much weight on a light weight motor in the engine is not a good combination either.Your looking for an engine that has all axles pulling and a decent motor to power them. An example of a under powered engine would be the early Bachman Centenial engine.(Long had 8 axles, a cheap motor but only 2 axles were powered. and the engine was light weight. Their newer version uses 2 motors in it and each pulled 4 truck axles for a total of 8 powered axles and a heavier engine weight but there again the motors are stronger and there are 2 of them. When I go to convert that one to DCC I will need 2 chips each to power it’s own motor but it will be a good engine for it. Newman Atkinson
I like most blue box engines they have all powered wheels and geared they also have good motors if I want pulling ability out of them I add more weight in the engines and the motors can handle it they have good gripping power on the axles as well some of the rtr locos depends on brand are fairly good pullers I also do not care for the DCC new stuff
Hey guys — really appreciate your thoughts. I noticed none of you mentioned Athearn which, by the way, is what I currently have (RTRs, not Genesis). I hadn’t considered that a 12-wheeler would pull better than an 8 (makes sense); but I have to use 8-wheel locos due to some 15″ radius curves on my layout (bought a 12-wheeler a few years ago and it couldn’t handle the 15″ curves). Any particular thoughts on Athearns? Thanks!