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lehighline:      "I don't know how many of you have noticed, but the latest set of cars were made in Vietnam, not China. I'm not certain when the switch occurred, but my guess is that is when and why the new tooling was created and when the problems started."

     Yes, and these cars made in Vietnam are the same ones with the paint chipping problem!

NOT LionelLLC:      "There's nothing wrong with the Milk Reefer trucks.  The trucks are perfectly fine.  It's the couplers, and just the couplers, which don't consistently work as well as they could."

    The original trucks were truly sprung trucks. The trucks here have springs that are just decorative. They don't function. It looks like most of us here THOUGHT that these would truly be a second run of the milk cars from a few years ago. In many ways they are a pale imitation of those original cars.

     John

Last edited by John Knapp
@Mannyrock posted:

Landsteiner,

"Stuff goes wrong despite people's best efforts. "

True, but best efforts in the products world includes actually opening the box of one of your newly manufactured products and testing it out before you start shipping it out.    :-)

Manny, I’m not trying to pick nits, but best practices would be to design in quality and build in quality. It’s very, very difficult to test in quality.

I just got an email from Lionel "Talk to us" offering to replace the trucks on my reefers again since the first replacements didn't work. While I appreciated their follow up, I don't believe they realize this is an issue with a defective coupler design - just replacing trucks is never going to correct a defective design.

Last night I was watching on YouTube about the GS engines. That is the poster was indicating issues with Lionel and these engines, speaking about design process. He briefly touched on the milk cars saying just look up on YouTube and you'll have a whole bunch of things come up.

In his talking about the design process, he said what a great portion of our community know very well. That was that there are some great engines from the TMCC into early legacy as far as great work horses that have no issues. I don't remember how many times I have seen one of our own suggesting to the original poster to look for these types of engines, or even some other like old KLine ones.

The poster also suggested what we have pretty much echoed here, go find older rolling stock. Today I put in my pre-order. It was just a few engines, that's it. No rolling stock at all. I told my local train store Tony, that there was no New Haven Cabooses, so I'd have to get an old one wherever he has them whether old Lionel or MTH. Since Tony has a great selection, I'm sure I'll be okay in that regard. I'll have to ask him as well if he has any Madison New Haven passenger cars as well, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I just received a new Chessie System I-12 caboose with Bettendorf trucks, and I am very disappointed in the new truck design. The uncoupler tab needs to be forced into position and then you have to pull the knuckle open! It’s also having a hard time coupling to any other pieces of rolling stock. Also, the trucks are no longer sprung. Not that it makes a big difference operationally, but I always thought that it was a nice detail to see. I hope Lionel goes back to the old design and provides replacements for customers that have purchased this inferior design of trucks!



Mat

There's nothing wrong with the Milk Reefer trucks.  The trucks are perfectly fine.  It's the couplers, and just the couplers, which don't consistently work as well as they could.

Please just give Lionel time to announce their plan.  I think most people will be pleased at how simple their plan will be.

Stu

I’m going to respectfully disagree here and let this video speak for itself. This is a Ross 072/054 curve switch. I have run hundreds of pieces of rolling stock through this switch with no derailments. I’m not sure exactly what’s causing this but it appears to be a combination of the fixed couplers and narrower wheels. I’ve sent this video to Lionel also.

Attachments

Videos (1)
trim.9AC21EFA-0AAA-4166-A335-D3C5ACE77F47

Wow - that video is compelling - in the wrong direction. Until now, I've had confidence in the Lionel rolling stock. Now I'm beginning to rethink this. The question has been asked: "where else do you go?" So I'm looking for an answer. Do the Atlas cars work well with the existing (pre Vietnam)Lionel rolling stock and with electrocouplers?

I’m going to respectfully disagree here and let this video speak for itself. This is a Ross 072/054 curve switch. I have run hundreds of pieces of rolling stock through this switch with no derailments. I’m not sure exactly what’s causing this but it appears to be a combination of the fixed couplers and narrower wheels. I’ve sent this video to Lionel also.

Your video is very reminiscent of my Friendship PS-1s going through an 072 S-curve. They pull each other off the track with 100% repeatability. It’s not just a coupler issue.

I’m going to respectfully disagree here and let this video speak for itself. This is a Ross 072/054 curve switch. I have run hundreds of pieces of rolling stock through this switch with no derailments. I’m not sure exactly what’s causing this but it appears to be a combination of the fixed couplers and narrower wheels. I’ve sent this video to Lionel also.

Wow! I don't know whats more amazing.

The number of derailments, or the fact the train just kept going and going without a breaker popping.

@RickO posted:

Wow! I don't know whats more amazing.

The number of derailments, or the fact the train just kept going and going without a breaker popping.

I should have mentioned this is a crossover from my outside loop to my inside. So power is on in the crossover and the outside loop but not the inside where the cars are derailing.

I tried to shoot a video with cars going the other way, which is even worse. But they short after 1 car with the crossover power on.

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