I know a lot of O gauge folks are older than the baby boom generation, but a lot of us are baby boomers. ...
My biggest concern is not the hobby dying, but all the train techs who are getting older and eventually passing on. There is one Lionel tech here in Southwest Michigan, he's in his 60's and not in the best health. He also told me Lionel doesn't have tech classes anymore because of lack of enrollment. I don't know about MTH or any other company. I'm trying to learn how to do a lot of my own repairs, but these 'circuit board' trains are past my ability...
What are your thoughts on the matter?
I place myself decidedly on the younger side of average around the hobby at 33.
As a younger guy, especially in my 20's, being into O gauge was tough. Younger folks are generally treated with disdain by the older folks in hobby shops, clubs and shows, and this is not very good for getting folk in their 20's to want to work on model trains, as few as there already are. (this ties in below, considering the HUGE number of folks in the 15-25 year old demographic that are really into hobby electronics these days) I've walked into the hobby shop with $2000 ready to spend when I was 21, got treated like a 6 year old when I asked some questions, and me and my 2 grand walked back out again. Ended up using it to stroke the motor in my mustang instead.
Simply saying lack of enrollment is a bit misleading, I think. I would guess it has more to do with the fact that so many of the techs are older guys. 20 years ago it was pretty simple to repair an engine... there was really not a lot to them. In truth, there is not a lot to them in modern engines either, but it seems a lot of these 'techs' out there do not want anything to do with the electronics. Only 1 of 3 local shops will even look at modern engines, and then only for simple problems. When you look at the forum, I can think of 2 guys that are known for repairing these engines. There are obviously more than 2, but they are the go-to guys. Pretty small ratio here of folks that know what to do with the electronics. I expect the enrollment issue is more due to folks just not wanting to learn how to fix the new engines than anything.
As a second thing, it is my understanding that you must be sponsored by a lionel dealer/hobby shop in order to take the class if/when it is offered. Not a lot of young folks working in the train department in hobby shops lately. I would bet there would be quite a bit more interest in these classes if they could be taken by folks not connected to a hobby shop. I'd take one if the timing was right and as a member of the general public I was allowed.
As to the general feeling of throwing away locomotives with modern electronics, the general processes for repairing them is the same as for postwar locomotives, and in many cases a lot simpler; There is not much that you need to pry apart or solder. Got a bad e-unit in a post war engine? Aside from taking the shell off, guess you have to unsolder about 4 wires, take out 2 screws and pull the thing out. Pop in a new one and reverse the process. On a new engine, got a bad DCDR? open the shell, pop out a few little plugs, maybe a couple screws, and pull the board out. Drop the new one in and reverse the process. The actual process is pretty much the same. I find our trains to be very similar to cars in this regard. Sure the ones from the 60's were easy to work on... BUT you have to work on them to keep them running properly. The modern ones need a couple of specialized tools to diagnose problems when you have them, but they need a whole lot less routine maintenance.
When it comes to repairing modern engines at a component level, I've yet to see a board in these engines that your average tv-vcr repairman from 1985 could not repair. These things are really not very complex. In the end, as with most modern devices, replacing entire boards is just easier and more cost effective, then component level repairs. The tech in TMCC was obsolete when it came out in 1995, and the newest thing out there, LCS is based on 2.4GHz wifi that has been the standard for almost 20 years now. and aside from the wifi interface has nothing that couldn't be done in the 70's as far as tech. Cost and number of parts has gone down, but the tech is older than I am. When it comes to finding someone that can fix the electronics, there may not be many hobby shop techs that know what they are doing, but there are tons of young people (and older folk as well) that are very interested in electronics and will have no trouble repairing the simple circuits used in things like Legacy engines, never mind finding someone just to plug a new board into a socket.
I'll end with this, if anyone wants to toss any modern locomotive into a landfill if/when it stops working, please let me know. I will pay the shipping to my house and even give you a couple bucks for your time, instead of having you throw it away.
JGL
I received my first train set for Christmas 1947. I might should add that my first set was Std Gauge. Which I still own to this day.
