Repowering & Upgrading Athearn RTR Locomotives


jbovinette

jbovinette

Florida Railroads
I have a coupe questions regarding repowering Athearn RTR Locomotives. I have (11) GP39's and GP40's and I am converting them to DCC. How are the motors on these RTR to be converted to DCC? Is it worth repowering them? What motors would you recommend? I want to get the most realistic motion out of them. If I can get that motion with the stock motors I wont replace them. How are the motors in these RTR's? Also would it be beneficial to add brass gears at all to these instead of plastic? Pro's? Cons?

Thanks,
John Bovinette
www.johnbovinette.com
 
I see no good reason to put brass gears in them. As far as DCC, hard wire the loco like any other athearn engine. Motor leads to each side of the motor, and for power pick up, one to the frame and one to the trucks. I can't see any reason to replace the motor unless you have burned one out.
 
I would not re-gear Athearn RTR nor change out the motors. (Don't say that on the Atlas forums, they'll put a bounty on your head!).

The RTR Athearns have decent motors with keyed hex drive shafts. That makes the drive smooth and quiet. The gears need de-burring if they make noise, but adding metal gears is unnecessary.

To convert to DCC, the motor must be isolated from the frame.
 
I hardwired (solderd) in 2 basic Digitraxx decoders(DH123D) into 2 Athearn RTR GP38-2's with little to no issues. Id say the hardest part is tucking the wires / decoder under the shell! It was very simple to do however and multiple how to videos can be found on youtube and theres probley a handfull if nto more how-to's on this site aswell as friendly people to help you through it. If you dont want to hassle with soldering, Digitraxx makes a "clip on" decoder that is just as easy to install. Doing 11 at one time!! I can only dream of owning that many locos lol :D

http://www.digitrax.com/prd_mobdec_dh123d.php < Hardwired
http://www.digitrax.com/prd_mobdec_dh123at.php < Plug 'n Play

Im by no means saying that you must use digitraxx decoders(im sure you know this) as there are multiple other manufacturers out there who make decoders. Just telling you what i've personally used. They run super smooth and very quietly without any "upgrades" done to them.

-Chris
 
The Digitrax No-solder harness (DHAT) will work with all 9-pin JST socket decoders, and as far as I know, every major decoder manufacturer makes one.

But if you know how to solder and can do it, it's a lot easier and less expensive to solder than to buy the harness.
 
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