Nix Mills

I love it. You really nailed it - and in both colour schemes too. Details, proportions, stickers are great. Fun fact, here is another livery... a batch of MZs made it to Australia where they haul cargo for Independent Rail in and around Sydney. They have even kept their numbers.

Like Very nice and very original. I especially like the colour scheme.

It's a near-perfect model of that old EMD diesel-electric engine, and you are even managing to keep it 6-studs wide in line with original sets. Perhaps Lego should make the Heber Valley Concerto Train Set a set of 2013 rather than ghost trains and the like. Nix

OMFG! How many years went into that?

It's great. It's really great.

I'd be curious to see how it performs compared to the regular train motor or to the XL motor.

I think you have done a very fine job building this locomotive in a way that is both loyal to its design and in line with other Lego designs. Well, your next challenge will be to motorise it with power functions. A while ago I was myself toying with the idea of building the GG1 with the old 12V motors from my childhood. My idea was to try and make overhead cables and use the pantograph to take the current down to the motors, so that it could run on the new tracks with the PF trains. Just a crazy idea - perhaps one day when I have the time. I'm looking forward to seeing your completed construction in action. Nix

I like the way you tackled the boogies on the tender. As for your carriages - perhaps those classic purple/gold Rheingold passenger and dining cars? How did you order red wheels, btw? Nix

Thanks for starting this interesting topic. I'm also an AFOL coming back after 20 years. I grew up with the 12v, and loved them, and now I'm building and driving PF trains with my 4-year-old boy. He loves them, and so do I. I agree with most of what is being said above. Also all the critics. I think in some ways the PF works better than the 12v and it gives more exciting building options. I also think the Emerald Night and Mærsk train are amazing models that push the boundaries of what we have seen hitherto. The yellow cargo train is a nice no-name replica of common European cargo trains, but I think the red passenger train and the latest cargo train (with the red shunter) are disappointing. What really excites me now, however, is the building options for designing and building your own PF trains and the *potential* it all has. Model trains in general are popular; with children, parents and grandparents (but probably mostly with the boys and men). And there is a great market worldwide for model trains. The 12v trains at the time where in many ways equal to actual model trains; they ran electricity through the tracks and you could operate switch tracks and signals from your control box - and then of course, you could *build* them, which you can't with actual model trains. The PF trains, however, don't match model trains as of today. You can't really operate switch tracks or signals anymore, your track options are limited (although they did make the flexible track) and you are missing many of the luxury functions now that model trains have, such as different lights and sounds from the engine, horn and other things. I think there is a huge unexploited market potential here. I think these are some of the things needed in order to call this another Golden Age for Lego trains.

Very nice! Where can we see some individual photos of them? Would like to see them more in detail. Nix

Great link and thanks for your points. How did the M-motor pull compared to the XL-motor? Beautiful steam engine there - and I'm a fan of your ICE3, the Stuttgart, and the funny little baptism ceremony. Nix

To all advanced train builders I'd like to start a discussion for knowledge sharing on how to power your MOC trains using Power Functions (PF). Typically, trains are powered by a complete motor boogie. If you run a longer and heavier train, you can replace one of the dummy boogies with another motor. With the Emerald Night engine, or locomotive, Lego introduced a set powered by an XL-motor with a simple cog gearing. The performance of this engine is slightly different – not as fast, but sturdy. In MOC trains, like the big and heavy NY Central, Shuppiluliumas uses two XL-motors to pull the train. He has also experimented with building boogies that gear up the motor. In these two links, you can see some interesting designs. Anthony Sava has, a while ago, posted some ideas for how to build your own boogies to be propelled by motors – and how to improve the traction. (see links below) This post is meant to share ideas for powering MOC trains. Give us some input to the following questions – or to something else: What is your experience with the performance of the 9V train motor (88002) compared to the XL-motor (8882) or even the M-motor (8883)? What is your experience with gearing the motors for either speed or load? What is your experience with finding the balance between speed, traction and weight? Regards Nix Links: NYC Gearing Traction

The single train wheel has been removed and won't be displayed when loading older models. That's quite a shame.

Thank you for a good and thorough review. I don't like this train. I think it's a step backwards in the train series. The engine looks messy, the colours of the engine, rolling stock and assessories look like something from a Duplo train set. It makes it look like a home-made set and it suffers in comparison to all the other recents sets with power functions. The functions for loading carts and doing repair work on tracks, however, look like something the smaller kids will really enjoy. NM