An interesting thing about Bachmann SV decoders is their “notching” ability- they only start moving when the throttle is in a certain position (speed step 4/128 for ‘Murican railroaders). I work at a railroad museum and this is certainly true on our engines. The lights only work if F0 is pressed in forwards. If your DCC system can do so, you can program things like the horn type, acceleration, light brightness and more with CV values. And one more thing, if you ever get the chance, review a loco with TCS WOWSound. You definitely won’t regret it!

(obligatory checking in making sure you’re okay and the 666g loco hasnt brought something awful upon you)

The EMD E7 didn't have dynamic breaking. This option was introduced with the E8.

Quick note for you on the axles, the plastic gears actually never touch the square slots. Those metal pickups within the sideframes actually double as the bearings. This allows for a very stable and free-running mechanism, and this system has been used in some of the highest end diesel models since the early 80's. It's proven to be one of the most reliable designs out there, so don't worry about the square slots, because you'll never see any wear on those parts. :)

Not sure if anyone has explained the paint scheme yet. The e7 you’ve got is in the beautiful Southern Tennesseean passenger train scheme. The engines painted in this special paint were usually kept with the Tennesseean consist. Southern also had e7s with the “normal” southern green scheme that removes the second white stripe and white splash at the top. Also just realized you didn’t turn on the headlights, that’s function 0! Hope this helps!

The E and F class diesels, which can get confused for each other, are my favorite types of diesel locomotives here in the states! There may be only one known E7 on static display, but F7s are almost everywhere; they just have so much class and style to them, mainly due to the powerful and streamlined look

Bachmann: "Want to see our catalog?" Sam: "Urge to kill rising!"

Sam, these models with the outside pickup don't ride on the axles in the slots, they ride on the ends of the metal axles in the pickups. Kato (of Japan) invented this drive back in the early 1980's, and is used on many of their diesels, along with ones from Atlas, Athearn Genesis, MTH (Mike's Train House), Rapido, Intermountain, and Bachmann.

Another fantastic review ! Sam you do seriously addictive content ! I’ve gone back though your older catalog of videos and started watching them all again ! Can’t wait to see more !

The plastic axles are a well thought out solution to cracked axle gears. The axles and gears now expand and contract at the same rate. Cracked plastic gears are mainly caused by the plastic gears contracting faster than the metal axle when the temperature drops. Metal wheels on plastic axles could theoretically have a similar problem when the locomotive is placed in a hotter environment, but at warmer temperatures the plastic will compress more easily with minimal risk of failure.

Yay, more American diesels! I absolutely love the Southern paint scheme, that’s one of my favorites.

Just so you know Sam F0 activates the lights, then the flashing ditch light and the headlight should work as intended. Great video, I love seeing you look at American locos, you should try and get your hands on a Big Boy sometime, keep up the fantastic work!

666? You’ll have to work this into your Halloween special hahah! Those Southern coaches actually look great with it!

Lovely video Sam as usual.😎

Great vid sam as always hope all is well!

Lovely video Mr Warwell! I've always wanted one like it!

The big slot on the pilot (front) of the unit is a definite mark against it. E7’s were built between 1945 and 1950. They were the best selling E unit, being on quite a few American Railroads. I saw them running fairly well on the New York Central, Pennsylvania and Penn Central. They were gone before anyone noticed, with a Pennsylvania unit being the lone survivor.

Great review and video. It's interesting seeing a UK train enthusiast reviewing American locomotives.

The only difference between the A and B units is the A has a cab and the B doesn’t. The B unit is like a booster and most would follow the paint design of the A unit

Love the video Sam. Great work as always. Also, you have a great friend, those Santa Fe passenger cars are hard to come by

3:20 actually, Bachmann has yet to produce an E7B as only the Atlantic Coast Line, Pennsylvania, New York Central, and Union Pacific would be the only ones that have a matching Bachmann A unit and still be prototypical, but it would also be interesting to see 'what-if' matching B units 7:54 you may be right, as quite a few E8s and E9s were used into the 1990s and have since been scattered to many sidings all over the country. But many American diesel locomotives were traded back into the manufacturer for newer models 15:24 so there clearly is space for some sort of cab detailing, but Bachmann just put a blank piece of plastic in there. The similar Bachmann F7s don't even have that piece 22:50 so you do still have American passenger cars. that ATSF blue livery was never applied to any real ATSF passenger cars, but they were made to match a locomotive that carried that livery in real life. I do hope you can get them coupling again someday, and I suggest putting the silver baggage cars directly behind the locomotive.

Nice loco ,, i love the diesels too sam and this sounds gr8 and looks gr8. Thanks again for the gr8 video. Cheers from John in Australia

the livery on this is gorgeous, not normally into american locos but this one and the electric you ran with it are so cool looking :3

The reason the GG1 Electric didn't make much sound is that it didn't in the full size locomotives. The GG1s were known for being quiet locomotives. The E unit on the other hand, did not have such silence.

There may only be one preserved E7, but I do know of a preserved E8 which wears the USA Southern livery (No.6914). I happen to live within reasonable driving distance of the museum where it is, and as someone who’s seen it a couple times, the livery really is as fabulous as the model makes it look! Don’t mean to brag, but I’ve seen that one preserved E7 as well!

Glad you’re doing more DCC locos recently Sam, even if the last one was accidental! I think a lot of people new to model railways will be jumping on the increasing range of “budget” dcc kit, so you giving your views on them is invaluable. Keep up the great work, as always 👍

Those streamliners are beautiful

My Favourite American diesel locomotive of All time also Thoroughly enjoyed watching your videos. Cheers.Lewis

I saw the thumbnail and immediately knew this was going to be fun, Bachmann's Southern Tennessean E7a, nice choice of line.

The early American diesels look great I am a big fan. Some years back I was lucky enough to visit the California State Railroad Museum at Sacramento (stunning) and the line from Winslow to Grand Canyon Station. Both had the early diesels still in service! Sam if you get the chance GO! Great video Mate.

Sam - Great video, as always... The EMD E-units were the cousins to the ubiquitous passenger F-units, and the easy way to tell them apart is that Es have three-axle trucks while the Fs have two-axle trucks. Since here in the US we like things to be confusing, both types were made in A and B unit versions, with the Bs being cabless boosters. A-B pairs were cheaper than a pair of As to buy, but weren't as flexible for operations because a B unit always required an A unit to operate. So a lot of railroads chose to operate a pair of As back to back instead of an A-B pair when a second locomotive was needed. Also, I know that there is at least one E unit not only preserved, but operational, because I have ridden behind it at the Southern California Railway Museum. It's a Union Pacific E8-A, number 942 built in 1953. It's the generation that followed the E7 and has round porthole windows instead of square. A bit of research shows that there's only one surviving non-operational E7A though. Here's my video from the Museum that has a lot of footage of their E8: kzfaq.info/get/bejne/g9-cmauXt8-mZ4k.html

Nice choice of paint scheme. Thinkin about getting one cause my grandpa used to ride behind these from the 50s to the 70s

I am so happy to see you review a Southern E unit! Glad you were happy with it; bachmann diesels can be a really good value once they go on sale or once they are used. I personally feel the MSRP on them is way more than is reasonable, considering what they are and the other American brands they compete with (Walthers/Proto2000, BLI, Intermountain all come to mind). I love seeing your American Southern equipment mixed in with British Southern.

this looks like it should have an unpowered twin on the rear of the train, like my first triang train set!

So happy to see an American F-unit on the show!! I was super hesitant looking at this online but after the review I really hope to pick one of these up!! I’ve been looking for a good engine that comes in a B&O livery and I’m so happy the search is over!!

Nice engine! Does you friend have the engines to those coaches? Those are both quite uncommon Rivarossi coach sets that go to the Blue Goose and the Valley Flyer respectively. Would love to see them on the channel at some point!

nice review sam, always nice to see some more american stuff. the pipes on the back of the locomotive are MU cables. they were used so that the engineer could control other lashed up A or B units from the leading unit.

Great video sam

I model US railroads and have several Bachmann locos all of which I purchased at bargain prices. They all perform well after a bit of tweaking with the DCC controller and run like clockwork. They are basic models but again you can purchase the extra bits to refine the model and enhance its appearance. They are also heavy beasts compared to UK models and perform well. Great review Sam, honest and straightforward. Well done.

Oh god I just realized you put a horn hook on a brand new loco lmao

The sound of the E7's 567 prime movers bring back fond memories of growing up watching Southern Pacific EMD units pulling trains near my home. Nothing sounds like an EMD!

Hiya Sam I’ve been recently rewatched the “7 ages of steam” I was wondering if you could do the same with diesels or electrics or maybe redo the 7 ages of steam as it was quite a while ago

Nice to see you diving into some more US diesels. Other bargain DCC sound stuff they have are mainly Walthers Mainline diesels, although some Athearn RTR and Atlas stuff may be found at nice prices. 1:02 Bachmann’s MSRPs are outrageous and you’ll never usually pay that much from them except maybe for their ACS-64 and SC-44. $299 is something you’d pay for a top tier US model such as Scaletrains Rivet Counter, Athearn Genesis, Rapido, etc.

Nice to see an stateside diesel locomotive. For the price range that they cost, I recommend looking at something from Athearn (both Genesis [high end] and ready to roll [some with sound], Atlas, Broadway-Limited, Bowser, Intermountian, ScaleTrains, or Walthers Proto. I'll admit that they normally are not marked down as much as Bachmann, but you do pay for what you get and there is considerably more detail on them when compared to the E7 you reviewed, especially looking at the MSRP prices. Many hobby shops have these brands on sale and in a case like Broadway-Limited, they have refurbished trains that are normally 40% off list and still come with a full warranty. One final note, if you activate the headlight first (function 0) you then should get the mars (flashing) light.

hi sam, this loco reminds me of my Triang f7 which is still working, they are good looking locos

Headlight is function 0. The diesel engine sound is spot on. I am old enough to remember these locomotives, The sound brings back memories. Michael

Just got my track back after 5 years today,been using it all day i missed it so much

Hey Sam! It is common to use f0 function to activate the head light, that's a standard thing for most of dcc decoders. Usually extra light functions are available only with the f0 on. Hopefully that would be helpful. Cheers from Poland.

Hi Sam. Thanks for the great review, I own quite a few Bachmann locos (US) all sound, some factory fitted, others not and on the whole they are great value for money. Young and old railroaders can't afford the rising prices of the more detailed (expensive) locos so it's good to see these more budget based models being offered. Here in Australia sound decoders are selling between $150-$200 so when you can pick up a loco with sound for around the same price it helps build our loco roster. (see my Bachmann 4-6-0 review on KZfaq) Please keep up the reviews of these more affordable offerings. Regards Gary.

If I can recommend your next diesels, I’d like to say two of the Norfolk Souther heritage units number 1067 the Reading “Bee Line Service” and 8099 Southern. The 8099 shares the same paint scheme as the engine in this video. I recommend the 1067 as it’s my favorite scheme since I have one from Athearn (Bachmann makes one too) and I’m also from the Reading area. Both engines are available from Bachmann and Athearn. Great video Sam, sorry for the essay.

This was an absolutely great review, Sam! I hope that E7 hasn’t summoned satin yet

Lovely review! The E units are my favorite diesel locomotives. You should look at Athearn Genesis models, they are not cheap but boy they sound and run lovely.

Looks like a very nice model! Well deserved ratings

Yeah... I'm having similar problems with couplers on my trains and rolling stock. Of course, I'm coming back into the hobby after several decades, so I have a bunch of new Kato and Atlas engines with kadee style couplers mixed with rolling stock and Yogoslavia-made engine of indeterminate age with those old square couplers. A future job for me will be to update everything to compatible couplers so I can pull everything again.

The EMD Es and Fs had some amazing liveries. My personal favourite is Southern Pacific's FP7 Feather River Route livery, the orange and silver go remarkably well together. Funnily enough this livery for the Southern Railway is one I haven't seen before. Still, it's pretty good looking, can't go wrong with green.

great video as always and yay my lucky number appeared. Tho interesting fact for you there was an LMS 4F that carried the number 666 I believe she was scrapped tho you also have the US big 6's which have become something of a stable when talking about locos with the number 666. anyways can't wait to see what's next from Erika

Bachmann is a good value. Especially their sound equipped models. I only have 2 of them at the moment but one of them is the giant DDA-40X and it's a great model! I have to say I do prefer the additional features, etc. of the Esu Loksound decoders but you certainly pay for those extra features. And in recent years Bachmann has built some really reliable units in both HO and N scale.

Awesome video today Sam beautiful modle and does it work on a hornby dcc select

Hi Sam like the new diesel. Are you going to get one of the new sonic models gcr A5 announced today? Got mine pre-ordered!!

Your next Halloween special should feature this loco haha

Ooooooo... the Southern always had a nice passenger livery. Can’t wait to get a Crescent Limited E8

Nice video Sam.

They have a loco just like this in Chattanooga, TN. It’s been fully repaired. Beautiful!

I don’t usually go crazy for American locomotives but seeing that makes me want to see it pull a train full of matching coaches as far as the eye can see!

I'm glad to see you enjoyed this modern model of a classic American diesel Although there's only one E7 left, there are many more EMD locos with the "bulldog nose" cab design preserved in static and working order in North America and Australia. We're really spoiled for choice in North America for diesel models. Some makes that might hit your sweet spot of price & detail are Atlas (any), Athearn's Ready-To-Run line, Scaletrain's Operator line, and Walthers' Mainline, er, line. That said, any recently produced model is more likely to be good or great than bad. Also, Hatton's is putting out adverts in US model railroad magazines looking for collections to buy. They might have some never run US models on sale.

Southern railroad is from the Southeast US. This a passenger engine locomotive green locomotive is for passenger trains. Southern railroad also painted them in black ad white for freight service. The railroad is over two years old and Charleston,SC is the oldest part of Southern Railroad try 1827.

You should get the Walters proto 20th Century limited or the Broadway limited t1 or the Broadway limited Hudson

Heya Sam!! I watching this on dodgy wifi from the Atlantic Ocean off the Bay of Biscay hahah!

Another interesting addition Sam. Pulling power prototypical of 'the Devil' I suppose!

having spent a couple of years in California an undertaken a 2 day rail journey, from San Diego to Eugene Oregon i have a weakness for us diesels. this looks fantastic. but are the horns above thecab,facing backwards?

Sweet job sam

Southern my favorite Line. I'm like a kid when I get started on the history of the RR.

Did I spot one of your 3D printed connectors on the converter wagon? Love this loco. My first HO model was an Amtrak EMD that looked a lot like this one. I had the B unit too, though it was motorless. Brings back memories

Wow what a loco,. I know nothing about American locos but this is a perfect one to start with.

I have three of these locos, They perform well, as you showed. My lights worked fine, Check your controller.

They even painted the builder’s plate in it which is such attention to detail! You should do more Southern Railway (US) reviews. The namesake and color scheme comes from the Southern Railway (UK). Think you’d enjoy some of the locomotives in Southern’s range. Look Ahead-Look South!

GM's EMD had the "F" series for freight and the "E" series for passenger service. Other American models worth a look into is GM's EMD GP7, the first big hit in diesel locomotives and was used for both freight and passenger service. There is also Alco's RS2 and RS3 locomotives, their answer to the GP7. There is the Fairbanks-Morse Trainmaster which was the first high horsepower diesel locomotive. The Trainmaster used opposed piston engines and produced a deep throbbing noise that would vibrate any object near the rail line that wasn't mounted down. The Alco (American Locomotive Company) diesel engines made a variety of odd noises that made the prime drivers sounded they were ready to self destruct at any moment. I think it is Rapido that makes a sound version that captures that ready to explode at any moment noise. The Atlas RS3 is a good choice if you do not need sound.

Hi Sam. Did you get the main headlight working?

Hi Sam, I am a long time fan and I've had the most burning question applying ho and oo scale trains as i am starting a layout myself. My question is, am I able to swap the hook and loop couplings with the knuckle couplings on the oo locos and vise versa with the ho locos? If you don't know this could be a nice video idea for the future. Also, love the EMD's they are such a stunning class of american engineering.

It is the best model I've ever had in my collection. I unfortunately sell it. But thanks for reminding me about it. It was the oldest locomotive in my collection

I actually have an Erie Lackawanna EMD E8 class diesel which looks very similar to this southern E7 And yes, both our examples are A units (A units have cabs)

I love to see you do American locomotives, and also mainland Europe!

Bachmann do tend to be of a lower quality of detail and performers, I recommend Walther's PROTO2000, & MAINLINE product lines, Atheran Blue line, Atheran Genesis line, BLI, and BLI's Budget line (Blue something) are usually of a better quality. EMD made E-units for passenger work, and F-units for freight work, but sometimes F- units were used on passenger trains for that extra low gear traction. E-units came with A-1-A trucks/ bogies, while F-units came with B0 trucks/ bogies.

I have seen that beauty in person. It is in the cool Atlantic Coast Line paint scheme. It is visible at the North Carolina Transportation Museum in the Round house.

scaletrains rivet counter series has an extreme amount of detail while not being too expensive.

Love the loco, superb looking model, trying to find something for N gauge, such a wonderful price, I must say that they have it all in America, some great models and superb prices. Shame its not the same in uk. Oh well, back to searching for some bargains. Great review Sam.

Could you do these consists on the next running session? Diesel and a class 08 pulling a yellow Submarine class 373 power car on a flatbed And a class 91 with 4 BR Blue MK2 coaches and a class 92 at the back

love the livery on this

You'd better send that wicked thing to me! ^_^ Best of luck with it!

Wow such a cool model. I'm really impressed. I like the looks of the early American diesels like the EMD or Santa Fe. Now about the mechanism. I believe at 14:09 when you removed one wheel set of the boogie it appears to have bearings in the axle boxes. Maybe I'm mistaking but it would explain the good performance. Also your jokes just made my day :D Also a question. Is Bachmann and Bachmann USA the same company? Great review, Sam 👍

Sad that there is only one E7 preserved. But there are plenty of E8’s left, some in operation. This is a great model!

Could you do some models from mainland Europe? The 2-rail H0 locos are compatible with UK ones.

What about the headlights? Can you get them working now?

Dear Sam hope you are well we all need your help ive got a question for you if anyone knows you will Do you know if you can buy a radio control 00 gauge locomotive that has sound and smoke as thinking about doing another garden railway I hope you can tell us all the answer thanks Sam 😊

Hi, Sam! I used to "dabble" in American N and I have friends who are very much into that particular aspect of modelling. Generally speaking, the "A" units need to be coupled in pairs, as the Americans have never ventured very far into the idea of having a cab at both ends of the loco. A "B" unit is powered but had no cab at all. If three locos were needed, the formation would have been A+B+A. If four were needed there might be one A and ABA or a pair of A+A, or even A+B+B+A. Great review!

Very nice! I have the Atlantic Coast Line DC version. Just like yours it is a great runner. If you can find this locomotive for a bargain I would highly recommend it!

For the headlight, try Function 0 (F0)

great review as always Sam-just bought a Bachmann sd40 w/dcc sound value.. only $85...have yet to receive it. Watched reviews of it online, so it looks promising.. btw, would you be interested in a 326 page catalogue?.. haha

Did the lights work when the model was in motion?

"Is it complete then ?" "100%" "Including the catalogue offer ? Looking forward to sending off for that" "Er ........ "