Bachmann spectrum steam

You sound as though you're in favor of slipshod product quality.

 

Not at all and please don't try to put words in my mouth. All I did was point out that expensive items are not immune to flaws. If they were then Mercedes dealers would not have repair facilities. So the argument that if something is expensive it must be perfect is flawed.

And really what it comes down to is if you don't like something then don't buy it. I removed all of my UP rolling stock after they tried to charge model manufacturers for use of the UP paint scheme. So I refuse to advertise UP but I don't go on a rant about it every time there is a discussion about UP.

 

My reply had nothing to do with a product's purchase price, but was targeted at your comment about the day of the week on which it was manufactured.
Again, a quality process that includes adequate testing during the manufacturing process can weed out the "made on a Monday" type of failures.
Any reliable product - or one that works correctly right out of the box - may still require periodic preventive maintenance and, eventually, replacement of parts that wear out over time from normal use - and, therefore, the need for a repair department if the device is not user serviceable.

 

If you think about it...the fewer of something that is made, and the higher the price....does that mean the more problems you have?
Mercedes? Lamborghini? Jaguar?
Let me just say, this May I'll have had my particular Jaguar for 8 years. It is a 1964. Minor stuff, brakes, tyres....but knock wood nothing major. Maybe that's because it's 50+ years old?
I can tell you also, the Botch stuff I have, some has failed to the point of inoperability within 30 days.
Yet I can fire up my pre-war 225E Lionel, and other than maybe a drop or two of dead dinosaur, it's fine.
I am so glad this in in print.

 

Inkaneer, My biggest issue so far with Bachmann, is not that both of my K4's had issues within the first two weeks of owning them, it's they were not going to even try and fix the first one (after this ordeal I repaired the second one myself). They wanted to send me a Berkshire as a replacement for my K4. In my opinion, it would be like the Mercedes dealer telling me my Mercedes cannot be fixed, but we'll give you a Lincoln town car as a replacement. I told the people at Bachmann, if I had wanted a Berkshire, I would have purchased a Berkshire. The part that really upset me, Bachmann shows K4 tenders in stock, but for some unknown reason they were unable to replace my melted truck on my K4 tender. I had them send the locomotive back to me, I purchased another K4 tender, renewed the truck from the replacement tender, found the light board loose and one wire not fully inserted into one of the plugs, that plug into the PC board. My K4 is now running without issues. I'm not superman, but why was I able to fix something, that Bachmann told me could not be fixed and offered me a substitute? For me it's disappointing my first K4 had an issue with the tender truck (personally I think it's because the pin under the cab that the tender draw bar connects to is too long, but that's another thread) but the really disappointing aspect of the whole ordeal is, Bachmann's inability to repair my locomotive. If you notice in the warranty, they say repair or replace, they never mention refund your money and that is why I had them return my locomotive. This thread could go on forever, but like I said in a previous thread, Bachmann is asking for my input so they are not happy with the status quo, which to me is a good sign.

 

I have never heard of Bachmann ever repairing a single loco, to my knowledge they have always sent a new replacement. As far as Bachmann asking for your input, a ton of companies are doing this now. Buy anything online or call CS and next thing you get a email asking how you like your purchase or rate you experience with CS.

 

And that is the problem I talked to Rich W. at Bachmann trains about. If you can't fix it, tell me when you are going to get more so I can trade my broken one for a new one. Don't just tell me I can have locomotive "X", when I originally purchased locomotive "Y", because you no longer have any locomotive "Y's" sitting on the shelf and you cannot repair my locomotive.

I'm also beginning to believe you are correct. I now feel the picture below does not reflect a technician at Bachmann.



By viewing the above picture on Bachmann's website, I was lead to believe they tried to repair broken locomotives, but now the more people I talk to it just seems they replace broken locomotives with new ones off the shelf.

I think you misunderstood when I said they were looking for my input. I was not responding to a survey, it was a one on one conversation to the guy that over sees the service department. I'm not going into detail about our conversation, but he is looking into the entire process, including telling future customers if they do not have a replacement product sitting on the shelf, let them know when the product will be available. He assured me the people in the service department have that ability, but just remember the shipments could be long term, 6 months to a year or longer. Rich also told me they will receive new products before they receive parts, it's a strange process but I guess that is their business model.

 

If Bachmann is not fixing any of their returned N scale I would love to buy the broken berks and K4 and most of the other stuff for a few buks.

 

I have to think that Bachmann's REPAIR or replace "warranty" is deceptive if they won't bother to repair what an owner can repair by buying available new parts from Bachmann. Unfortunately, that reeks of short-sighted profiteering at the expense of the long-term health of our hobby. And it is being done by the LARGEST company in our hobby. That, on top of the continuing QC issues, makes me hope that some other company aggressively challenges them on the service front and either kills Bachmann as a company or forces them to step-up and really provide QC and warranty that suits a HOBBYIST. As it stands now, I know that I will need to replace decoders in Bachmann locos sooner or later, so I consider that part of the purchase price. However, their steam is nice MODELING, so I am still attracted to it. It is forcing me to learn a lot and become more independent of the manufacturers. Good thing I am not easily deterred. But, are there enough people like me to keep the hobby going under those conditions?

Steve

 

first of all I highly doubt any Mercedes dealer would offer a Lincoln as a replacement, maybe another Mercedes model or maybe a different color but no Lincoln. Secondly Bachmann's warranty does not state you will get an exact duplicate. They offered to replace the locomotive with another model. That was in accord with their warranty. I wonder what would have happened if, instead of sending them the entire locomotive, you had only sent them the tender. From what I read, the issue was confined to the tender, wasn't it?

 

The decision to "repair or replace" rests with Bachmann. Usually they replace like models if possible. If not they offer a different model as they did in this case. They did have extra tenders in stock so I am wondering if only the tender was sent back and not the entire engine whether they would have just replaced the tender.

Listen folks if this was utopia we would not be having this discussion. But utopia this isn't and that means sh*t happens. But what I am sensing here is long term bias harking back to the days when N scale was not a modelers scale and was treated as toys and manufactured as such too. These were the days of the cracked white gears and LifeLike and Model Power engines that had trouble hauling themselves around a circle of track let alone a train. But we turned a corner and while some companies like Kato and Atlas turned that corner before others, the others have made the course correction too. I recall watching in utter disbelief as a little 2-8-0 pulled 41 cars around a Ntrak layout with one of those cars being a lighted Bachmann 65 foot passenger car with all the rolling qualities of a tractor pull sled. I could not believe that 2-8-0 was a Bachmann. Neither could any one else. But it was. So now I have six 2-8-0's, a K4, a 2-6-0, 4-6-0, 2-10-2, 4-8-2 Heavy mountain, a 2-8-8-2 EM1, two S4's and four Peter Witt street cars. All Bachmann and all without issues. It isn't the same world that it used to be.

 

Well I know for a fact that they do repair some. That 4-8-4 Santa Fe night mare I owned, (which I gifted to my brother, his headache now, your welcome Badlandnp) was sent back and repaired. The usual white plastic problem happened with it. , but they still repaired it. Of course, it could be because this is more of a toy than a model.

I am still waiting for an answer to my question about Kato. The steam frame that they use. Do they control the patent on it??? The frame and design is so simple you would think everyone would copy it, especially in the orient where their seems to be no boundaries on copyrights. Con Cor seems to be the only one to have a similar setup (and they haven't produced new steam since when?). But they had partnered with Kato on this. Did they have a contract? Is that why we see no new steam from them? Why wouldn't someone try to copy the idea? Wouldn't that simplify things for everyone in the MFG world? Wouldn't that take a lot of our aggravations off the table?

And since Bachmann is the ONLY one putting out new steam, in several different models, and at a steady pace, perhaps everyone needs to pressure the others , until they follow suit. Until then, be mad about it. There is nothing we can do EXCEPT whine and b!@#h about it. Bachman is not going anywhere anytime soon.
Bachmans product is improving, somewhere someone decided they needed too. And it HAS helped the hobby. Yes, they are expensive, but I say look at other things out there. Kato FEF, $$$, IM cab forward $$$, Atlas shay, $$$, Fox Valley Hiawatha, reasonable, but $$$. this hobby is expensive, and getting worse in that $$ department. Its the advent of all the technology we are putting into these little locomotives. Its not going to get any cheaper.


I might take that Town car over a Mercedes, at least I wont have to cut off toes to pay the bills for repair work...

 

GRRRRR! And the stories roll on. It isn't pretty and most of the negative stories shared here matches my and others experiences. Wish it were different but that's what we are stuck with.

 

To each his own. It's a hobby and we all have different tastes and likes/dislikes. BUT, we all like trains!!!! So enough. My nickels worth.

 

What happened to your GS4's? There must be a curse on northern in certain people's hands. I had that Bachmann repaired twice, then gave it to my bro...

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

 

Rick:

In all the years that I've had Bachmann Spectrum steam locomotives and I have multiple units of each Bachmann steam release as you well know, I've always had good success with all their steam locomotives. You know my history.... I'll leave it at that. I have no complaints with any of the Bachmann steam locomotives going back to the Spectrum 2-8-0 and all subsequent steam locomotives released by Bachmann from that point in time till the present. I also had the ability to correct any minor problem that might have occurred in any one locomotive/locomotives in that long time frame..

Having fun with it.....

Shades

 

You never stated which Bachmann locomotives you had issues with. Are they the post 2001 Spectrum steam or the non Spectrum ones from before 2001? The model numbers would be helpful.

 

A curse, I don't think so. A poor man's way of making a hard pulling locomotive. Traction Tires. Bull Frog Snott will come to the rescue. Just takes time to get them fixed.

To the other issues:

All of them. To answer the question about which locomotives or motors. All of them. From the first ones I bought to present day locomotives and motors. ALL! I sent one back to B-mann twice and finally gave it to George. He sent it back to B-mann and it now sits on his layout as a tourist attraction.

I'm a member of a group of mountain model railroaders and out of all the B-mann locomotives they bought recently there is only one still running. The owner....He's afraid to run it because he knows it will tear itself apart running around his layout. I take that back there are two BVMR's who are afraid to run their working locomotives. I gave Greg my old GS4 Daylighter and warned him it will tear itself up running around your layout.

I've been burned... so many times by B-mann, that the one person that could of been there best friend was turned away and is now...you figure it out. I've tried to order parts and they can't send me them, I've tried to replace the locomotives and they were out of stock. Do you think that when the opportunity comes to tell my story I'm going to sit on my hands and keep my mouth shut H No. Not a "I'm sorry" or how can we help improve our products was ever offered up.

My dad went out and bought a number of N Scale, ABBA sets of B-mann F7's in the Santa Fe Warbonnet and the same with the SP Black Widows. He was so disappointed with them that I went out and replaced them with Kato's sets. Smiles all around.

I've yet to purchase a Northern from B-mann that lasted more then 30 hours. Give or take ten or so hours.

My sucker light has been on to many times and I finally decided to shut it off. NO MORE B-Mann STUFF! Not on my layout and not in my future.

I needed a HO Northern repaired for a young friend of mine. I finally found a repairman in Baltimore, Ohio who fixed it for me. No thanks to....you know who.

That's my choice, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Now go play with what makes you happy and know I will smile with you while everything is going great and I will empathize with you when it isn't.

As a wise old China Man once said, "Let the buyer beware." I'm sure there's more to that and I will be corrected. So If I rant and vent, holler and hoop AND you don't hear any supportive type of stuff from me. You now know, the rest of the story.

Does that help.

 

Yes it does. All of the engines you mentioned are pre 2001 Spectrum. The F 7's were made in three schemes prior to 2001, the regular the Plus and the Spectrum and all were notorious for cracked gears. They have since made a DCC version which I do not have but I hear it does not suffer from the gear issues. So as I suspected the issues you have with Bachmann are long standing dating back to the last millennium and not relevant to their newer offerings.