I've been very happy with the MTH parts depot. They ship quickly and I now have the parts to do some custom work as well as repairs on a couple of items. I also ordered a bicentennial ATSF SD45. I'll figure out how to rework the pilots at some point.
My appreciation comes from how MTH is now working with dealers to make custom runs that you won't see featured in big catalog books. Dealers talk to their customers, and find out what road names and products they want to get made. So many obscure road names are now seeing layouts for the first time because of this.
Another nice thing, everything they announce gets built, not like catalogs where they "throw spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks" and then what gets cancelled. Also, the timeliness of how fast something arrives at your doorstep from when MTH announces it is nice too, 6 to 9 months has been my experience.
As for printed catalogs, how many of us spent the last three days online (some almost intimately 
...not creepy at all!...) with the Lionel catalog only to have half of it arrive in our mailbox in a week or two just to thumb through it for a little while and put it aside. At that point you've been there, seen that, and probable already placed your preorder.
With regards to warranty, if you have a good dealer they'll see to it that your warranty with MTH (or any manufacture) is honored in full with little hassle on your part. Just ask them about it, if you don't like their response, find a new dealer (there are plenty of good ones that sponsor this forum).
I suspect that in the future, Atlas would be interested in buying up more MTH as they are now vested into supporting their own products that share many of the same parts and electronics used in past, present, and future MTH offerings. There is this "WHAT IF" gang of folks out there that like casting doom & gloom to profess that MTH is one or two employee retirements or some other event away from closing forever and couldn't be happier about it.
"profess that MTH is one or two employee retirements or some other event away from closing forever"
Reality is tough to accept, I guess. No one works forever. The key players are all 60ish (excepting Mike Reagan) which ain't the first bloom of youth. Could Atlas be a knight in shining armor? Sure. We'll see, if we live long enough 
. Meanwhile, carpe diem as always.
@rplst8 posted:Try getting an R4LC, DCDS, DCDE, RS4, RS5, RS5.5, or RS6 board from Lionel. There one day, gone the next.
Yes, and at least MTH has an excuse for the parts shortage, they genuinely can't get the parts to build them. OTOH, there was no such issue with the Lionel parts, they just dumped all the parts on the shelf into a big barrel and took them ???? That's the kicker, we really don't know what happened to the parts, they just vanished all at once!
It was sad news when I read that MTH was closing down, and it's great that they can carry on in some capacity. The diversity of their product lines was mind-boggling, and for me, the Railking line of structures was the cat's meow; those buildings enabled me and likely many others with less than stellar modeling skills to build towns and cities on a budget. Does anyone know what became of their wide variety of subway trains? I always wanted to get an old-time subway set, circa 1930s, but never did.
Going off on a tangent, and at the risk of beating a dead horse on the subject, I am not a fan of apps via Smart phones to control model trains, and my hope is that MTH can somehow figure out a way to re-engineer or make the DCS remotes an integral part of their lineup once again. For the time being, I have an extra DCS remote, so I am good to go.
I am pleased MTH stayed on in some capacity.When I heard Mike Wolf was retiring I like everyone was sad to hear this news but I am glad that they stayed on with the announcements they do everyday.
@Paul Kallus posted:It was sad news when I read that MTH was closing down, and it's great that they can carry on in some capacity. The diversity of their product lines was mind-boggling, and for me, the Railking line of structures was the cat's meow; those buildings enabled me and likely many others with less than stellar modeling skills to build towns and cities on a budget. Does anyone know what became of their wide variety of subway trains? I always wanted to get an old-time subway set, circa 1930s, but never did.
Going off on a tangent, and at the risk of beating a dead horse on the subject, I am not a fan of apps via Smart phones to control model trains, and my hope is that MTH can somehow figure out a way to re-engineer or make the DCS remotes an integral part of their lineup once again. For the time being, I have an extra DCS remote, so I am good to go.
Paul, I agree with you 100% on your second paragraph……I’m a physical remote guy too!!….apps, shmapps, gimme a thumb wheel!….
Pat
@Bill DeBrooke posted:I also was not happy when the word came that the world as we knew it was over. However, if Mike never comes off the golf course again, he has done more and faster than anyone that came before him in this hobby. I suggest we cut him some slack and enjoy what we have.
In my opinion, Mike Wolf was a visionary in the world of model trains. I put him on par with Joshua Lionel Cowen.
I would not have been back in O gauge model railroading for the past 25 years without the products made by Mike's company. I think it's unfortunate that, after building up a business and becoming a successful competitor of Lionel, he had no alternative but to downsize his company so he could retire. He made my O gauge hobby possible and enjoyable.
If Mike preferred to retire - so be it - he deserves it. I just would like to see the New MTH producing the interesting new model trains that they did during the PS1 years - and beyond.
MELGAR
@harmonyards posted:Paul, I agree with you 100% on your second paragraph……I’m a physical remote guy too!!….apps, shmapps, gimme a thumb wheel!….
Pat
I think it can happen. It might be a combination device that has a screen for the more complicated configuration stuff, and then buttons, sliders, and knobs for the "running the trains type thing. It would just have to use the WiFi protocol.
Knowing how well designed the DCS protocol was, I'd be dollars to donuts, all the API calls are already there to support a device like that.
@MELGAR posted:In my opinion, Mike Wolf was a visionary in the world of model trains. I put him on par with Joshua Lionel Cowen. I would not have been back in O gauge model railroading for the past 25 years without the products made by Mike's company.
Well said, Melgar. I had the same experience.
As far as catalogs and product offerings, the one advantage of MTH's frequent announcements is that it does allow you to consider new products one page at a time, in depth and focused. Whereas a catalog full of stuff might make you overlook some things the same way the Sears' Wishbook was overwhelming to us as kids. We loved it but we could only choose 1 or a few things out of a huge variety of choices. I've looked back at past MTH catalogs and it's fun to discover all of the cool trains I overlooked. Part of that experience, of course, is those products that are appealing today may not have been as appealing back then. But the other part is I may have just overlooked them because I was zeroing in on something else that caught my attention.
@Landsteiner posted:"profess that MTH is one or two employee retirements or some other event away from closing forever"
Reality is tough to accept, I guess. No one works forever. The key players are all 60ish (excepting Mike Reagan) which ain't the first bloom of youth. Could Atlas be a knight in shining armor? Sure. We'll see, if we live long enough
The reality is that you nor I have no clue about the succession plans at MTH regarding its employees and investors. That's information only held by those who are currently invested and work there. But sadly yet again Neil you feed the despair engine with baseless speculation of how a good company you share little love for will fail.
I'm tired of the speculative negativity about how or what can happen to MTH to close it's doors, it doesn't produce anything of value as it's all conjecture. The last two years of almost everything in the world around us is full of enough of that. Maybe if we all celebrate the achievements of manufactures and try to be more supportive and constructive with our criticism threads like this won't need to exist.
@rplst8 posted:I think it can happen. It might be a combination device that has a screen for the more complicated configuration stuff, and then buttons, sliders, and knobs for the "running the trains type thing. It would just have to use the WiFi protocol.
Knowing how well designed the DCS protocol was, I'd be dollars to donuts, all the API calls are already there to support a device like that.
Agreed, I've posted elsewhere on the forum about my efforts in building a controller for the DCS app. I sure hope it's near the top of the list of things to add to the app.
"Maybe if we all celebrate the achievements of manufactures and try to be more supportive and constructive with our criticism threads like this won't need to exist."
I'll await your forthcoming celebration of Lionel's achievements with anticipation . Meanwhile, I've bought a bunch of MTH special runs in the last two years. Nice rolling stock. They don't need my love, they need my money.
Melgar and H1000 - I’m with you. I would not be back in this hobby if it wasn’t for MTH. And as I did get back to it while getting ready for retirement, it seemed like MTH anticipated the equipment and accessories that I needed to get going. I’d love to see them expand into some new areas, but as noted, that takes an infusion of cash and I’m not sure where that would come from, particularly in a tight economy. I also wondered if they’d partner more closely with Atlas on projects as together, they’d be a pretty strong entity. All having been said, I agree that speculation on our part as the the future of these companies is misplaced. I’d rather spend my energy on enjoying what I have and dreaming about what else I can accomplish in the hobby. And yes, I’m still spending my retirement checks on things like the MTH special offerings!
Bob
@Stephen G posted:What’s has MTH become. No catalog, nothing but uncatalog rolling stock and diesels every once in a while. Don’t get me wrong, I still appreciate that they are still producing something. Just disappointed in the way they are doing it. Surely not the old MTH. That’s change for you. Lionel has hardly any competition.
With what's happened to MTH, I do wish I had gotten heavy into the hobby years earlier than I did. I also miss the catalogs, too, so I totally get where you're coming from.
With that being said, I love getting their daily emails. They're one of the highlights of my day because I'm always excited to see what's coming. I've enjoyed all of these custom runs, too. As a collector, I think it's great.
Also, there's a run of Hudsons coming, so they didn't sell off all of their steam tooling. I'm planning on buying one that Mr. Muffin's is doing for the Big Four.
Never had a problem getting what I need when I need them. Let me also state I don't do repairs for a living or as a business. I also purchase items to have my own inventory. Something you can't do with MTH at the moment
I placed a parts order last evening, I received an email this afternoon that it was shipped along with the tracking number. Not too shabby!
