Is the demand for Norfolk Southern Heritage trains large enough to absorb the amount of product that is currently available?

I'm sorely tempted, Scott!    Of course, I will also need to have the ES44AC and the matching Interstate caboose, at the very least.  I will have to consult with my dealer to explore the possibilities. 

I purchased 2 of these MTH Heritage units, and painted both of them into the standard Norfolk Southern "horsehead" scheme. Some of my favorite locos I own- here's one of them--

Hey Jeff, I have wanting to contact you but ATT sabotaged my email.  I have fixed the ability to receive but NOT send.  Since you kind of broached my question here, I know you can, but are you willing to fix the errors with the MTH painting of the NS-Savannah & Atlanta unit?  If so please email (in profile) with answer and good guess of cost.

Ron   

Actually, Jeff, upon seeing your fine work I had the same question that Ron posted to you... I'd be interested as well - either have you do the work or give instructions on how you did such a convincing job...

I don't have any non-powered units, but what is wrong with the Lionel (or MTH) units that they can't be 'lashed-up'? Is it because of the different control systems? Could someone please explain, I'm still kinda new to this and way behind everyone else here on this one. 

That's more like it! I think you are joining me and also under the spell now. Some of these train items have special powers.  

rtr12 - I'll try to give an answer...

Obviously the non-powered units have no problems at all.

In conventional mode, the speeds of the locomotives is most likely going to be different from the different vendors, and eventually one will end up pushing/pulling the other beyond usefulness.

In command mode, the two systems are incompatible - they listen to different signals.

A truly dedicated person could try to mix either of the command systems and/or conventional by constantly adjusting the different controls to try to manually adjust the speeds to match, but I think would go quickly insane... Wondering if that would be an opportunity for a third party product...

Thanks, I thought the different controls might be a problem and also the different manufacturer's stuff working together. I hadn't considered conventional operation. What really threw me was the wording in the post by PRRronbh. I thought the poster was referring to the non-powered units. That was what was really throwing me. So, now there should be no problem with non-powered units from any manufacturer working with another's powered engines, and I just mis-read the post.

rtr12, to clarify, the Lionel non-powered units are NOT numbered prototypical correct, they are fantasy numbers.  And MTH did NOT retool to produce fidelity to the current phase (then) of GE ES44s so many details are NOT prototypical.

And as RootBeerRail stated the two company's command systems are NOT compatible to each other.

Ron

Thanks, the way I read your first post was that the non-powered units were not compatible between manufacturers. That just didn't seem right.  I guess speed matching for the powered units is one advantage of DCC over our O-gauge control systems.