Four out of five new engines have had issues now. A conventional classics F3, a Legacy GP7, a Legacy steamer, and now a MTH GP38. I am about to pull my hair out. Some have had mechanical issues, some have been damaged in shipment, and sOme have electronic issues. All problems have been supported by local shops and the manufacturers, but I am starting to lose the faith. This has all been inside of 7 months to boot! No brand warfareplease...just venting.
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Got a mint sealed service station set from 2000 for $179. The engine's Signal Sounds did not work. Took 4 weeks to repair and $60. Got the engine back and gave it a good run only to find out the contact rollers fall into the dead spots when two switch tracks are placed together. So the engine is useless on my layout. Lionel has an updated power truck with an extra contact roller, but if I want to see if it fits I have to spend another $50. Meanwhile another freight car I bought is lost in the mail somewhere.
Ron,
We all have bad runs.
I am known as the "Scrapiron" for a reason.
Then, as in the Yin and Yang of life, we have good runs.
Everything evens out in the end.
STICK with it. Everything gets fixed.
Eliot
Ron,
We all have bad runs.
I am known as the "Scrapiron" for a reason.
Then, as in the Yin and Yang of life, we have good runs.
Everything evens out in the end.
STICK with it. Everything gets fixed.
Eliot
And if nothing evens out, it is not yet the end...
(paraphrase from"The Best Marigold Hotel" movie.)
Rusty
Yeah - I must have 45 locos - about 80% Lionel - and all five with problems were in the last year: one MTH, three Lionel, and a BEEP that died completely at only one hour of run time.
The most concerning thing for me regarding my recent issues is that three of them have been bent axles on diesels. Three of the engines mentioned (from Lionel & MTH) in the OP had bent axles that made the engines shake like Kate Upton.
I always lube everything as per the instruction manual before putting it on the track. This is one that I really don't understand.
The total dollar investment keeps growing with each and every electronic frill added. The added headache appears when one wants to convert "shelf-queens" to conventional operation. A "Baby" State Set was added to my collection this past Christmas. Even though it has no bells and whistles it still has electronics. I had to repair bent axles and repair rollers right out of the box.
I often wonder about the previous owners of all my other locomotives and rolling stock. Surely they too had bad experiences right out of the box. That was almost one hundred years ago on most pieces. Just a thought.
I often wonder about the previous owners of all my other locomotives and rolling stock. Surely they too had bad experiences right out of the box. That was almost one hundred years ago on most pieces. Just a thought.
Please consider yourself lucky that you only have issues and not real problems 
to be concerned about
Please consider yourself lucky that you only have issues and not real problems to be concerned about
How would you know? I keep it train related here.
I read where a lot of folks blame China for all the problems we have with our model trains, I've griped too. But would we be barking the same ole song if the product from China was top rate? Would we still be wishing the jobs were still back here in this country? I have a strange feeling we wouldn't, I think most would be perfectly content if the product coming from China was bullet-proof.
With that said, yankspride4 has almost as many new (broken or not) engines than I have total (I only have 7 total, 4 conventional, 3 PS2) and ALL work 
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