I bought a few pieces of tubular track to replace the MTH standard gauge Realtrax which is a bit loud and 5 pieces out of 8 72"standard gauge curves were all bad and shorting out. Of course I found this out after I screwed the track down and put power to it! I tested every piece and 5 of them were bad. I'll be returning them on Monday to Charles Ro. Anyone have the link to USA track? This is one of the pieces with the thin insulators.
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I feel your pain. I have had BAD TRACK TRAUMA AND STRESS for weeks over the Std. Gauge MTH/Lionel tubular track I've gotten. FINALLY, the last of all of it is now out of my house and going back to whence it came. Patiently waiting for my USATrack to arrive. These folks were a pleasure to deal with, with my track made and ready to ship toot-sweet! Here is their email to get in touch with them.
early STD track used wider tabs on ties, Ives track on right
Thanks Carey. I'm not bashing but there is no excuse for that kind of quality or lack of.
Many here said they re-work or "fix" the track. NO WAY- not this gal. Not my fiance', either. I had gotten the track from four different sellers, believe me, it was a BIG job to send it all back! I'm still waiting for the credits of hundreds of dollars I shelled out for defective track.
Carey,
If I bought it local, I would take it back ,but to pay shipping, I will fix it,
Charles Ro is only about 20min from my house. I'll drop it off on my way to work.
Of the last set of 10- straight pieces I got, 6 of them tripped first time out. DONE.
All the MTH track I had I got rid of, it's just made poorly. I just waited and picked up some nice vintage track
and cleaned it up.
I've been buying my rail used from a local shop, and judging from the top picture, I have some of the bad track.
I don't think I can return it. What do I need to do to fix it. Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
Millcity got a bunch for his Christmas layout. He fixed it then it wen bad again before I could see it run. Its so simply how could you screw that up
Steve "Papa" Eastman posted:
Thanks Steve.
MTH had a run of standard gauge track that had bad insulators. The new standard gauge track that they are shipping doesn't have this issue. You can tell the new track by the plastic insulators.
The problem is that more than likely the dealers mixed the bad batch with the good. This stuff is going to be in circulation for years.
Scott Smith
At least they tried to put insulators on....my new O gauge Lionel tube track had no insulators
Clarence Siman posted:I've been buying my rail used from a local shop, and judging from the top picture, I have some of the bad track.
I don't think I can return it. What do I need to do to fix it. Any help is appreciated. Thanks.
I had some bad insulators on some used track I bought. You may also want to add insulators to an outside rail for track activation, so it is helpful to know how to do this.
You need to pry up the tabs holding the center rail, and put something between the track and the tie. Then, you push the tabs back down. Make sure you get the tabs tight again (this is the tricky part without the right tool). You can use a number of insulators. Electrical tape can work, but you may need to cut the piece longer since it is thin and may not keep the rail off the tie over the width of the tie. I think I cut a small piece of an index card. Also, the insulator must wrap the side of the rail where the tabs hold the rail to the tie.
Last point, USA Track makes special sections with insulated outside rails. They may also sell rail insulators in bulk.
George
Chris Lonero posted:I bought a few pieces of tubular track to replace the MTH standard gauge Realtrax which is a bit loud and 5 pieces out of 8 72"standard gauge curves were all bad and shorting out. Of course I found this out after I screwed the track down and put power to it! I tested every piece and 5 of them were bad. I'll be returning them on Monday to Charles Ro. Anyone have the link to USA track? This is one of the pieces with the thin insulators.
I can't see from the picture what failed on this one. The insulator on the center rail appears to be sized and positioned correctly, but it only takes one bad insulator to cause the whole track to fail.
This has been going on for a while and I'm sorry to hear that the bad MTH Standard Gauge track is still out there. I started a post on this topic in late 2014, just before Christmas, but the post got political and the entire thread was deleted by the moderators.
My experience was that 60-75% of the MTH Standard Gauge track I purchased had bad insulators and was unusable as received. I fixed them the first year because, candidly, putting in new insulators was easier than packing them up and returning them. It was also too late to receive replacements in time for Christmas.
I was sad to discover this year that pieces of track that had previously worked and that I hadn't needed to fix also failed. The problem, of course, is that the material used for the insulators is too cheap and crimping the tabs around them at the factory cuts right through them. I replaced the insulators as I had before.
My advice to anyone purchasing MTH Standard Gauge track is to ask the dealer to test them all before sending them to you ... or test them yourself before you leave the store. The failure rate on these items is ridiculously high.
Steven J. Serenska
Thank You
Interesting stuff. The manufacturing presses must be adjusted close to the original spec, but the insulating material is too weak to withstand the crimping action.
I re-furbished some original track, and the material seems to be high-fiber cardboard, almost felt-like. It's probably tougher than the new material when crimped.
Just as a side-note, I had my old track soaking upside-down in a shallow pan of Evapo-Rust, rinsed, and allowed to air-dry at room temperature for a couple of weeks. Afterwards, checking for shorts revealed no problems at all.
Chris, It would seem that there was a misunderstanding. I realize what your opening statement said. All I said and I hope that others will not that some started to bash MTH. Out of my respect for you I chose to delete my entire post. Please, delete your response above. I assure you that I will not respond to any thread started by you.
This is exactly why I was thinking about going to gargraves and getting rid of all the tubular track on the permanent layout I don't not want to take the time and spend all the money on the tubular track to replace it later
Prewar Pappy posted:Chris, It would seem that there was a misunderstanding. I realize what your opening statement said. All I said and I hope that others will not that some started to bash MTH. Out of my respect for you I chose to delete my entire post. Please, delete your response above. I assure you that I will not respond to any thread started by you.
Pappy; you and I are friends. I did not take any offense to your statement you can post anything you wish to my posts. It's all good! 
I talked to the guys at GarGraves a little over a year ago and they told me their SG track / switches wouldn't accommodate tinplate SG. I don't understand that--isn't all SG tinplate??
From my experience, it's hard to go wrong with USA Track and Ross Custom Switches for SG track. With these 2 companies, operating SG trains has never been better IMO.
This is a known problem that has been going on for a while now. It is truly amazing how, other than the gauge of the rails, the most important part of three rail track is missed by quality control. I would not even bother with MTH track at this point. Get your track from USA Track.
Already got in touch with Kirk from USA track on Sunday. He had the curves built and packed later that day and they are on the way to my house! Maybe today. I brought that other junk back to my dealer yesterday. I'll take some pics and a short review when it arrives.
My USATrack order was scheduled for delivery yesterday, but didn't show. Hopefully today it will be here.
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