Reliability of William's 2037&Tender

I am in possession of the 2037 set.  Running wise it runs reliably and consistently.  The smoke unit quit working the second Christmas that it ran. The whistle and bell still continues to work properly and it is what it is which is a simple sound system. Lighting is good and continues without issues now for four years.  Simple oiling and maintaince will keep this loco running for many years.

A note on the Suethe Smoke units is  make sure that you use the proper Smoke Fluid as any others will clog up the unit and make it not work at all.  To replace the smoke unit is relatively easy and the cost are the cheapest on the market for under 10 dollars each compared to the fan driven units that are produced by other manufacturers.  I have only used the Bachmann smoke fluid which is recomended by Bachmann.  However I have heard of others that have used J T Megasteam with good results.  If you wish to upgrade a smoke unit in this locomotive there are two options for you 1.http://www.mttponline.com/ This fellow has worked on modifying a Lionel fan driven smoke unit to fit and work in Bachmann Steamers.  Another option is I have test fitted a smoke unit from an MTH Imperial Big Boy.  with a minimal amount of work you can mount this unit in the Boiler shell.  this is in case you would want to upgrade the engine to the MTH Protosound command control and sound system.

The only problem I have found with the tender in this set is that there is a possibility of one of the little locks that are in the Tender Trucks can come loose and fall out.  I have had this happen and had to replace the entire Truck due to the fact that the little locks are not produced singly, the only way to repair this is to replace the entire truck assembly.

The headlight in the engine is bright and has worked with out issue for four years now. Now with that said I bring out the sets on occassion during the year and set them up and run them hard and long from October to January, during the Christmas season. During this time My display is run approximately 8 to 10 hours a day for at least 6 days a week. The display is constantly in motion and visited by the neighbors kids almost every day.

As to the E-Unit:  The E-unit in this is an electronic one and has never given me any trouble for the entire length of time I have owned this set.

This set is a delight to the girls and they take it to heart when they see a Pink train running I also add a Barbie Doll to the Gondola to please the Girls.

The set is well produced and is a reliable running set the only weak links are the ones mentioned above if you keep a few smoke units on hand or do one of the smoke unit upgrades, and treat the tender gently without dropping the unit on It's Trucks, Then I have no doubt that you will have many years of fun with this set. As I have had.  I am planning on picking up at least another 2 sets for my two nieces which will make me 5 Girls sets Total. I have One 1991 Lionel Girls set/Williams Girls Steam Set/ Williams Girls GG1 Girls Passenger Set/ and I will be picking up 2 more Steam sets.

Nick if you wish any other information or if i can help in any way shoot me a message and I will try to do my best.

Thanks for your response Bobbie. How would this set compare to the Lionel set as far as reliability, if you know?

It is my opinion based on the fact that I have the 1991 issue from lionel and the Williams one.  I prefer the Williams over the Lionel due to this fact. My Lionel does not pull more than its regular consist without slipping and the motor that is in it is hard to find.  The lionel is also noisy when compared to the Williams.  I have found that the williams is a better puller and more reliable.  Now with this said I love my Lionel Girls set and I love what lionel has done over the years. 

the williams set is also cheaper than the LIonel set a Conventional Classics set goes for 500.00 as listed on the Just Trains Website while the Williams set goes for 395.00

for the Steam set.

I purchased my Lionel Girls set back in 1999 new in sealed box for 1000.00 I purchased this for my late wife.  I have ran this set on my Christmas display like the others till 2006 when something caused the engine to start smoking from under the shell When i took it apart i found that the E-unit had melted capacators  on the board and it took me until 2011 to get the parts to fix it.  This was for two reasons one when i had the cash the parts were not available, 2 when the parts were available I did not have the cash for them.

As I said before I prefer the Williams to the Lionel because of what I have experienced with this set.  Now I do not know about the Conventional Classics set that was just released as I do not know what type of motors are in them.

Is there any difference in the appearance of this engine and tender as opposed to Lionel's? I have not been able to get a good picture of this set. Any idea of who would have a picture of this set?

here is a video of the Lionel set from 2001

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gl2GheK-jIY

Lionel 1991 Girls Steam Engine The one I have

I believe that this is the 2037 conventional Classics Girls set which was brought out in 2001 and just recently reisssued

http://www.ibuyoldtrains.com/i...20&%20Tender.JPG the image is too large to put into the post

Here is the Williams Girls steam Engine

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...&feature=related

Video of a Williams Girls set on layout and you can hear the Whistle and bell

also you may want to note that the earlier models like the 1991 reissue by lionel has no sound but it does smoke though rather poorly like all the earlier Lionel Trains. The 2001 issue from lionel shows a diffrent motor A pullmor motor rather than a Small DC can motor That is in the  1991 and  an Electronic whistle.  This data gathered from the Lionel Website. The 2010 reissue shows a Pullmore motor with Electronic whistle and bell.

Hope this helps

I looked at the Williams video. Do you have the same issues with it stopping for no reason as this one does. It also seems that when the whistle is blown, the engine stops.

I don't know if this is a very good example of how this engine performs. Have you looked at the video and what are your thoughts?

no the stuttering is caused by something on their layout

I have no issues at all when blowing the whistle

at all

mine does not stop

nick as i said earlier mine runs for approximately 10 to 12 hours constantly when the layout is up at holiday time The video apparently has Lionel TMcc connected to the track and they are having problems with it

if you run this thing convential you will have no problems with it at all

With the Williams, their "2037" is actually a much larger loco, based on the 726/2046 boiler, with a twelve wheel 2671W type tender, and the Lionel is very true to the 2026/2037 type original 2037 boiler with the 1130T/1130T-500 type tender.

With the 2-6-4 wheel arrangement, the Williams is very much like a 226E.