My maiden voyage in a DM3

[bolero3232]

Ran it with no consist, of course. Blew it up just getting out of the harbor on m first attempt. Second attempt made the entire loop around to Harbor.
What fun! The shift pattern is quite odd if you're not familiar with this sort of thing, and I wonder if it's patterned from real vehicles of that type. If you understand that you don't need to use every gear it's much simpler.

[schutt]

i am having a bit trouble with the maintainance costs. took it just a little out of harbor and it already had racked up big chunk of mechanical costs.

[bolero3232]

Two things:
First, I've noticed service costs seem to have gone up a lot in Simulator, just from running the De2.
Second, you do have higher paying jobs available, and easier to do with the higher hp.

I haven't taken a hauling job with this loco yet, just shunting so far.

[Menacing Scarab]

So my first time with it was hauling a 285 ton 5 car scrap train from Harbor to Steel Mill, And wouldn't you know it decided to rain too. So yeah trying to remember the gears and learn to operate it at one time did not lend itself to coming away without a ton of damage. 9 grand in damage and another 3k in fuel costs. And thanks to the rain I wheelslipped a few times climbing out of Harbor and had to actually use sand. In overhauled I never touched sand and just controlled things with the throttle, but I had little choice here if I wanted to make it up the hill at a blistering 10 km/h

[HarmanMotor]

Just write this down on a bit of paper and keep it handy near your PC:

1-1
1-2
2-1
2-2
3-1
3-2
2-3
3-3

That said, in my short experience with it so far, you can skip quite a few of those combinations and get going faster if you're just plodding along light-engine mode or with a light load. A very fun engine indeed! Can't wait to drive it again...speaking of which... *starts Derail Valley*

[Azige]

Originally posted by HarmanMotor:

Just write this down on a bit of paper and keep it handy near your PC:

1-1
1-2
2-1
2-2
3-1
3-2
2-3
3-3

That said, in my short experience with it so far, you can skip quite a few of those combinations and get going faster if you're just plodding along light-engine mode or with a light load. A very fun engine indeed! Can't wait to drive it again...speaking of which... *starts Derail Valley*

In my experience, I use only 1-3 2-3 3-3 with light loads. It's even possible to start from 3-3 with a single loco shunting around. It's fun to climb hills by switching gears and coast down with dynamic brake.

[bolero3232]

Yeah you rarely need the other gears.
In the little driving I've done with it, I've so far mainly used 2-2 and 3-3. I've only done shunting jobs to this point, going to make my first haul job with it today.

[bsmfs]

I exploded this thing in less than a minute, swapped over to the 4 straight away, still trying to earn enough to pay for it

[Menacing Scarab]

Well my run today taking the DM3 from SM back to HB has gone horribly wrong. I messed up and picked the wrong gear downshifting on a downhill section to get some better engine braking....and I apparently blew the engine up. Went the rest of the way to the Harbor on foot in the dark to come grab a DE2 to go rescue my poor job. Thankfully my copay is still only at $100, so the blown loco engine is the insurance company's problem now