Mine arrived yesterday but it was this morning before I opened it up to look.
I have photos below to show my points, but quickly summarizing, this is a very mixed review, and perhaps the least positive I get about something - but overall it has a simplar number of good and bad points as I see it . . .
The good:
- Its big and heavy.
- It's detailed enough and interesting enough in shape that, being big, if put back in the layout if still has presence, and it can looks good.
- The faded advertising signs - a big point in Menards advertising for this product - are very well done and a really great, nostalgic touch.
- The truck is cool, good looking with a nice load in its stakebed area.
- The box says it comes with two figures and a dog. Menards advertising says four figures and a dog. It came with four figures and a dog, all individually packaged in tiny plastic bags. The figures are so-so - about Lionel figure quality. But the dog is seriously cool, nicely rendered with its tongue hanging out.
- I did not try but it looks like four simple screws and the building will lift off the base - which has to go - Ugh (pics later)
The bad
- It is much less detailed and finished (there is very little cast-in surface detail of shingles and siding, etc., and ham-handed unrealitic "weathering" or splatter) than Woodland Scenics or well-completed Ameri-Town kits. In my opinion it will suffer badly - look out of place and not quite good enough - alongside them if close to the layout edge where one can see all the intricate detail in the surfaces of the WS and A-T kits, and that it is not there on the Menards building.
- It may be heavy but it is a bit fragile. Mine arrived with one pipe knocked off and another bent. Handling it, it weighs enough that I am careful to pick it up only by the full base.
- It is heavy (14 pounds) that it can't go where I intended it to: on a flattopped hillside I made out of cardboard covered with paper and plaster. I think it would crush it. I had expected it to weight about what a WS building like Morrison's doors weighs but it must be, literally at least ten times that.
- I could not get the lights to work on the building of the truck. I put batteries in he battery case (photo below) and connected the Menards 4.5 volt power supply to the jack on the back side of the building, but nothing happened. If there is a switch I cannot find it. If there were instructions in the box, ten minutes of careful seraching failed to find it. The trucks lights do work: after I took it off the base (see below) I connected it directly to 4.5 v and its headlights work.
- Assembly quality was not great. While the broken and loose pipes may have been done during shipment,
- the truck chassis was significantly bent (photo below) because whoever assembled it tightened the two screws holding the truck to the base to the point that they pulled the truck chassis down toward the base until it bowed downward by 1/4 inch.
- One of the signs on the building is painted on upside down! The one on the front, unfortunately.
- And the "weathering"- Ugh - Just someone taking a semi-dry brush and dabbing/dobbing it all over everything, etc., quickly, without any eye for detail or realism.
Anyway, it arrived in a big, heavy box . . . 16 pounds.
Inside was another big box . . .
Packed between molded Styrofoam, etc, was a big building. Impressively sized, and very heavy, and five little plastic bags with people and a dog. No instructions I could find.
The pipe closer the camera was broken off. I put it back on but it leans . . . the one on the other side is loose at one end.
I really like the faded painted advertising signs - by far is best features.
I put three batteries in this battery holder. There were no instructions to tell me why, but I figured it would not be there if there weren't supposed to be batteries in it . . . No lights or anything came on. . .
I connected the 4.5 volt power supply to the point point (small, round black circle in the right lower foundation below), still no lights (the building is supposed to have two lights and a red blinking warning light on top.) If there is a switch to turn the lights on I could not find it. I tried turning things like the chimney, etc., thinking maybe the switch is hidden, but nothing seemed to be a switch . . .
When you get close - within two or three feet, the details show up - or rather don't because they aren't there. It looks good in the photos above 'cause that viewwhat you'd see if it were away from the edge of the layout, but up close as below, the "weathering" looks poorly done in comparison to Woodland Scenics built ups or Ameri-towne kits I complete, etc. . .
The truck is really good, though, and the load in back nicely detailed. But note the paint and "weathering" on the driveway it is parked on. Concrete? Asphalt? Dirt? More like counter top. Elsewhere, the "grass" see photo above, looks like flocking, because it is: good from four to five feet away, bad from two feet.
The four figures are good enough: not Woodland Scenics or Preisser detail maybe, but good enough you have to get within a few inches to see . . And the dog . . . . is just the best dog I have, period. I tried to take a picture of that wonderful look on its face and its tongue hanging out, but my camera did not cooperate.
I took this photo to show the bent truck frame, and the screws that caused it. But I didn't even notice the reversed, upside down sign on the building until just now, as I was writing this. Hmmm ? I checked Menards' ad on its website just now, to see if maybe they did this deliberately, but no, their ad shows it right side up. Could it be the assembly workers don't speak or read English? Actually, its rather endearing, but . . .
The truck would not straighten out at first. Here was the best I did before a final go at really manhandling it. I bent it back eventually, by about 20 degrees, to the point I worried I would snap the chassis, and when I released it it was a bit straight than this photo . . .
As you can see here its pretty straight now. And when I connected it up to 4.5 volts, the headlights work find.
In summary: this building needs a lot of repainting/re-weathering and work to make it fit on my layou, and is so heavy I will have to reinforce the hilltop where it will go first. Repainting will be a challenge because I want to preserve the painted signs, including the upside down one in the photo above . . . and that will require time. But I will get it to.
Still, I doubt I will buy any more Menards buildings.
