Looking At The Walthers Mainline SD70ACe

Six-axle EMDs are uncommon in California on the BNSF, even less so in the Los Angeles area. Still, I decided to give the Walthers Mainline SD70ACe a try. These are very reasonably priced, especially for the sound version, and I found one on line for 5% off the discount price on a Veterans Day sale. Here's a shot of the loco out of the box, with couplers installed:

The details are generally good, as is the paint, although the paint doesn't include warning labels. The biggest problem is the bare cab roof:

As delivered, these locos had GPS and antenna domes on the cab roof. Here is a 2014 photo of the prototype 9372 that also shows the warning labels missing from the model's paint:

More recently, PTC antenna arrays have appeared on prototype cab roofs. These vary by railroad and also by date they were installed, and some models have these, while others don't. Here is an MTH SD70ACe that I installed aftermarket PTC antennas on the cab roof:

I'm not sure, though, if the BNSF styles of PTC array are even available as aftermarket parts.

Here is a video I made to compare the lights and sound of the Walthers SD70ACe with my MTH loco, followed by a prototype BNSF SD70ACE:

The Soundtraxx basic sound with the Walthers model doesn't seem to give a choice of horn, but both the MTH and Walthers horns seem close to what you hear in the video. I wish the ditch lights were brighter in both models. I like the fact that function F5 turns the ditch lights on and off on the Walthers model.