Todd, yes a generator car would place a lot of drag on the train, and recoup a small fraction of power from the motion of the train. Regenerative charging (like on some hybrid cars) where the locomotive would generate power when slowing down, or on a downgrade, would be too difficult to implement in our size, and the weight (force) of the train going down hill wouldn’t generate much power anyway.
The idea of track power to charge on-board batteries sounds like the worst of both worlds to me. You have the track cleaning issue from track power. You have the equipment costs and weight of batteries. And somehow you have to get these to play nice together, so the battery charges while the train is in motion, drawing power either from the battery or the track.
I have toyed with the idea of making a battery powered, track cleaning car. I have enough stuff stashed away here that I could probably cobble something (truly ugly) together to do the job. That would proably be as close as I get to battery powered trains on my set up.
Both battery and track power have their pros and cons. Batteries have come a long way in power to weight ratio. But for many of us, the cost of fitting all of our equipment is prohibitive. Even if I went with 2 trail cars, I would still have to rewire many of my locomotives. Its just not worth it to me.
For someone starting out, it is an option to consider. If each locomotive were equipped, or modified, right after it was purchased, then it wouldn’t be as big of a chore to have all the locomotives set up for RC and/or battery power.
I operate HO trains in 2 different clubs. They both use DCC. Having independant control over my train, that is on the same track with 2, 3, or more other trains, is great. It gives us all such control that we could never have with just track power. But on my home set up, where only 1 or 2 trains are run at a time, controling the track power works just fine. And the money I dont spend on RC and batteries I can “invest” into other equipment.
