I have never owned Williams, but have alot of Lionel - Is the quality of the Williams up to par with the postwar trains of the 1950's I am looking at a Williams 2321 vs the Lionel 2321?
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Williams quality generally surpasses Lionel postwar, mainly because of the maintenance-free can motors and the non-sticking electronic reverse unit. Williams runs smoother/quieter/slower and requires less maintenance than postwar Lionel.
Of course, all the die hard "Lionel is the be all and end all" folks will be up in arms about this, but it's my opinion and I'm sticking to it.
I have had several williams locos...they are generally good runners also good price...some problems with zinc rot,the truck frames on my FM had rot....I recommend Williams....of course,Lionel is Lionel...I recommend the MPC or later LTI FM's PW if you can get one for the right price...
My only complaint with the Williams FM was parts availability. I searched high and low including York for replacement truck side frames. The two main sources of old Williams parts are gone. The lionel part looks close but the screw holes don't match up. My information from Bachmann was the parts wouldn't be available until they made another run of FMs. So I sold it for parts. That has made me very cautious about buying engines that don't have an abundance of probable parts sources. Which narrows down the field considerably.
