Bought some new locos....

[cupoftea]

Following a series of 'disasters' with 0-6-0 steam locos not running well I decided to switch to bo-bo and co-co diesels.

I firstly got a farish class 24 and am very pleased with it - the slow running is smooth, the detailing excellent and it runs quietly (which pleases my wife). On the strength of the class 24's performance i bought a secondhand farish/bachmann class 24 (I like the look of the 24 and wanted 2 on the layout) and also a class 47. The locos are again excellent.

At last I have locos I am happy with.

[Chris]

I've yet to see a better runner than the later Bachmann Farish 37. By the sounds of it your 47 and 24 use similar engineering. There is certainly no doubt the newer models are streets ahead of the older designs. 0-6-0s are notoriously tricky to run smoothly unless your track is perfectly laid and has wide curves.

[cupoftea]

The problems I had with the 0-6-0's were quality issues. The first one I bought would not run at all, I got that replaced and the new one ran for 1 hour total and then packed up and the third one ran really badly and needed to be pushed to start, wobbled from side to side badly on straight sections and just looked wrong. That was exchanged and the next one ran badly and packed up after a short time it also wobbled from side to side badly on straight sections. These problems nearly put me off n-gauge and I did consider not building a layout at all.

The diesels are quite simply in a different league in terms of running qualities. They actually seem behave like the way I perceive real trains behave - smooth and no wobbles. This has restored my confidence in n-gauge.

[cupoftea]

Hi Broadtrain

At the moment I am not considering converting to DCC. My layout will basically be a double oval with one loco on each oval. Just a personal thing but I don't want sound so I am quite happy with analogue control as my DC setup will give me simultaneous independent control of each loco.

I can understand the advantages of DCC on a more complex layout but on a simple layout like the one I am building I am happy with DC.

[Chris]

hee hee trust me, The dcc ready locos run superbly, especially when converted to dcc

Apart from the 66.