Any body ever have a train that was a dud!!

Sometimes one man's dud is another man's bargain deal!

I picked up a non-operational DDA40X for a sweet deal, took it apart and found the wire broken to the rear motor ~ easy solder repair. Added an extra speaker while in there.

Picked up a non-operational 4-8-8-2 Williams Cab Forward, took apart the tender to see what was wrong and discovered that somebody had modified it with QS-3 and the top board was loose ~ I pressed the board back into the sockets and it now works fine.

Too many to list. SunsetModels, Atlas, MTH & Lionel - the manufacturer doesn’t matter. I’ve got $1,000’s of boat anchors.

A Williams shiny blue D&H steamer that I bought a few years ago from a LHS.  Although it looks fine (not crazy about its shininess, but very nice blue and silver D&H livery), its smoke is anemic and its pulling power is weak.

The weak pulling power surprised me because it has plenty of weight and  I have 2 other Williams locomotives that are great pullers. Maybe I need to change the traction tires.

I tend to prefer a flat, as opposed to shiny, finish, and have other Williams engines with the  preferred flat finish. 

MTH and modern Lionel steamers tend to be much better smokers than Williams and K- Line steamers. Arnold 

Good evening, for me it was MTH Railking Pennsy I1.

This engine has pulling power but no traction. MTH defiantly missed the mark on this one.

I compared this engine to my MTH Railking Pennsy M1A which was released before the I1 model. 

The M1 pulling a consist of 15 or 20 coal two bay coal hoppers would never miss a beat pulling a grade at any speed.

The I1 would spin out before the engine had the same train half way into the hill. Tried new traction tires and had the same result. It has to be the balance of the weight on the drivers is off.

The I1 ( prototype and model) has no trailing truck which could be contributing to the traction problem.

Not sure if MTH made any changes to correct this problem on the Imperial line of I1's or not.

The I1 was the only MTH product I ever purchased that I was not impressed with.