New Lionel GP-30 DOA

Did your dealer offer to test it before shipping it? With today's complex trains I always have my dealer test run it and go over it completely before shipping it to me and he is more that glad to do it.Therefore,I have had zero returns back to MTH or Lionel on dozens of engine purchases.If your dealer won't do this I would find another dealer that will.

Ricky

Are you going to get a replacement or just mot get the engine?

Why not just ship it back to Lionel?

quote:

Originally posted by Dave Warburton:


I expect better when paying over $400 for a toy.

Send it back and tell them to keep it.$400 will get you one of the tmcc gp30's from 5 years ago, it'll still run conventionally, have better sound, and the steps will be correct.

Oh No!!!! I was led to believe, from many on this forum, that "Conventional" was the only way to go. TMCC, Legacy and all the fancy electronics were nothing but trouble looking for a place to happen. I guess nothing is a sure thing. Sure glad I held on to my TMCC and Legacy stuff.

Don't know about Legacy, but TMCC has been very reliable for me. Not perfect, but at least as reliable as my
"conventional" locos. PS2, almost as. PS1? Hard to kill and often under-appreciated by me.

Funny story: one loco that gave me trouble after only a little running a few years ago was a Lionel scale
NYC L3 Mohawk. Conventional - in a big way: Pull-mor and a buzzing, mechanical E-unit. You know what failed
on this "bullet proof" loco? The buzzing, mechanical E-unit. Buzz? - yes. Cycle? - no.

Not a microchip in sight. 1 hour run time. Funny story.

quote:

Oh No!!!! I was led to believe, from many on this forum, that "Conventional" was the only way to go. TMCC, Legacy and all the fancy electronics were nothing but trouble looking for a place to happen. I guess nothing is a sure thing. Sure glad I held on to my TMCC and Legacy stuff.

I guess that all depends on the definition of "conventional".
I find trains with conventional electromechanical e-units to be fairly reliable.

Well, out of about 60+ TMCC and Legacy Engines, I have had 2 that I can think of that gave me a problem and both I was able to find the problem and repair it. That is a problem rate of 3.3%. I don't think that is bad. One, after finding the problem, needed a receiver board (Which Lionel Provided FREE of charge) and the other was a pinched wire on my H-16-44 that I got last week.

Oh, I too do repairs and the common problems on your "fairly reliables" is burned and broken or melted fingers and worn pins on the end of the barrels. Even the barrels are over heated and distorted at times. I guess anything can have its problems at times.

Took the Geep back to my dealer where it was repaired while I waited. Can't do better than that. It was shorting out due to two wires touching each other under the hood -- the cab had been pushed on and mashed the wires together on the edge of the frame.

As for the steps at one end being out of alignment, that is unfixable, of course.

Anyway, thanks to The Train Shack in Burbank, "problem solved!"

quote:

As for the steps at one end being out of alignment, that is unfixable, of course.

Yeah, I figured they stamped the steel frame different/wrong and it moves the whole truck back. Oh well. Maybe next time.

I wouldn't settle for that,I'd get my money back. Lionel should recall everyone of those gp30s, theres no excuse for screwing up a locomotive that has been made several times before,correctly. That would have been like them leaving a set of wheels off of the trailing truck on the vl700e.

quote:

Anyway, thanks to The Train Shack in Burbank, "problem solved!"

Glad they fixed it.I was just in there a few weeks ago.Nice store,nice folks.

Ricky

I am hearing a little to much of this not working stuff on arrival, come on Lionel kick some China butt and get them to make it right or take the show on the road to another country, I know Some Vietnamese folks that are interested in making trains, they came by AGHR to take a look at the layout.
Just my very humble opinion but hay what the hay do I know.
John