Model Railroading > Athearn SP 4-8-2 Arrives

After originally ordering the Athearn SP 4-8-2 with skyline casing in 2010, I finally received it earlier this week. I bought it at Caboose Hobbies, which packed Athearn's already well protected box in even more packing material. The engine is the DC version and arrived in pristine condition, is a real beauty and runs wonderfully. When placed in service it will power both freights and passenger on my RR. Unfortunately it did find 4 places to derail on new trackwork where I already knew there were some slight irregularities at switches. I will have to perform some track work no matter what. But a friend who is a real expert in this hobby advised the following:

“One thing I found on my new Athearn SP 4300 is that the spring holding down the lead truck is too strong. When I received the engine it was limited to two brass heavy weights climbing my two percent grade. I replaced the spring with one that is smaller, and it now pulls four cars up that grade. I suspect that your derailment problems might be related to that spring. I would recommend that you remove the front lead truck and run the locomotive as a 0-8-2. If she runs fine, find a weaker spring and replace the lead truck and see how she runs.

The sun shades should either lettering gray or antique white, the water box on the tender should be either lettering gray or BN Green, the boiler checks should be red, and the number on the tender is too small and in the wrong place. Probably the biggest error is that the forward facing class lights are green when they should be white to match the X number in the train number boards.”
 

I am thinking about getting the MT4 with the skyline.  I'm in no hurry so is there any advantage to waiting until the next batch arrives or will they be just like the ones already available?  Does anyone know if they are making any improvments over the first run?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 09/02/15 12:46 by wingomann.

Is there another run of this engine coming? It would be challenging to make improvements to this locomotive.

 

The MT-4 I recently received has no problems at all, which is great news! It looks amazing and runs fine on the layout, what more do you want?
Like the old adage says, "if it aint broke don't fix it." This time that actually applies. I did have to wait quite a while to get mine, but in the end,
it was worth it to get one that looks great and runs well. Go ahead and buy one, its probably one of the best model steamers available right now.