Can anyone who has comment on the quality and heartiness of these animated scenic pieces? The videos look really cool, and they look amazing on layouts. I'm wondering how they hold up?
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Ive had mine for years and they hold up well. I dont run em non stop. I you hurry, Menards has a bunch of them right now, good prices
I have the "CrazyCars" had for 2 days worked GREAT
Brent
I’ve had a number of them for many years. The key is to manually turn them off with the switch after each use and then turn them on individually by the switch when the power is supplied. I had a couple of them stop working when the power was applied and the switch was left on from the last use.
I have six of them on my layout. The Crazy Cars and the ferris wheel might be my favorites. I bought all of them but the ferris wheel on Ebay used. I don't think I paid more than a total of $150 for five of them before I bought the ferris wheel new, because I couldn't find a good used one. Lemax makes good durable stuff that has lots of nice detail. All of them are closer to G scale (except the merry-go-round, which inexplicably is close to O scale). They look great on my O gauge layout. Just keep them in a somewhat separate part of the layout. Nobody that has viewed my layout has seemed to notice the difference in scale. I bought some Chinese-made figures to add to the carnival (viewing the rides, waiting on line, etc). It all works. I even added a small zoo. I'll post some photos, if anyone is interested.
George
I've had them for years. They are all turned on and off by a power strip. The only significant problem I've had is with the roller coaster. The cars are a bit fussy and they sometimes "hang up". I've had minor sporadic issues with a coupe of others, but just work with them a little bit and they come around. I also keep them in their separate area.
Gerry
GJP posted:I have six of them on my layout. The Crazy Cars and the ferris wheel might be my favorites. I bought all of them but the ferris wheel on Ebay used. I don't think I paid more than a total of $150 for five of them before I bought the ferris wheel new, because I couldn't find a good used one. Lemax makes good durable stuff that has lots of nice detail. All of them are closer to G scale (except the merry-go-round, which inexplicably is close to O scale). They look great on my O gauge layout. Just keep them in a somewhat separate part of the layout. Nobody that has viewed my layout has seemed to notice the difference in scale. I bought some Chinese-made figures to add to the carnival (viewing the rides, waiting on line, etc). It all works. I even added a small zoo. I'll post some photos, if anyone is interested.
George
I'm interested in photos!
Scale doesn't bother me, I'm a toy train enthusiast so I don't care about scale. I mix Plasticville with Marx, and Lionel buildings and none of it matches.
If you run them non-stop they won't hold up. We kill these Lemax pieces in the 2 months they run non-stop for Halloween. There is no repairing them.
Scott Smith
Thanks so much! I have four on order from Menards— great price and looks like a Big Bang for the bucks.
My first carnival ride from lemax died today. The swings stopped working. I had them for about a year-and-a-half and ran them quite often.
Panther97 posted:My first carnival ride from lemax died today. The swings stopped working. I had them for about a year-and-a-half and ran them quite often.
Does it still light up? Or dead in the water?
I suppose it's inevitable. When they die, I wonder if we can at least LED light them up as stationary models. I'm sure there's a way.
Paradise and Pacific has many of the Lemax carnival pieces on our layout, they are all wired to a Picaxe activated switch and get run 50 times a day, most are 2-3 years old, were used when installed and are still running. We have backups to swap out if/when they expire but they are great additions to a layout.
Some of the Lemax animated rides and pieces are repairable if you you have the patience to figure out how they come apart and you have a strong stomach for such things. I have successfully fixed several of them, including the animated City Zoo, which required me to cut a hole in the bottom of the piece to access the motor.
I have a large Lemax zoo collection and I run them on a timer on our club layout. It really is a cool draw for people.
Dennis
pdxtrains posted:Panther97 posted:My first carnival ride from lemax died today. The swings stopped working. I had them for about a year-and-a-half and ran them quite often.
Does it still light up? Or dead in the water?
I suppose it's inevitable. When they die, I wonder if we can at least LED light them up as stationary models. I'm sure there's a way.
It's not spinning and the lights do not work. It does make a squelch insread of the normal music.
I have the round up. It broke quick as it goes up but doesn't come back down. still looks great on a layout though! Anyone with any ideas to fix it, chime in please!
Panther97,
What does the bottom of the swings base look like? Black felt or the white plastic bottom with screws? You may just have a loose wire inside. If it is the white plastic base, it might not be too bad accessing the inside. If it is the black felt, be careful removing it and you should be able to reattach it.
Marty W,
Same deal - it all depends on what access you have to the inside.
Dennis
I had the bottom off and there were no those wires. The problem seems to be up top but I couldn't get the top off.
I have the carousel, which I think is a much better value than Lionel's. (Your opinion may vary!) I'm not particularly crazed about the the sound system, as this one plays only one tune. It gets rather monotonous very quickly. (My wife has the Christmas version, which has a much better selection of traditional Wurlitzer music, both Christmas and summer time. With that one, you can select either season. It plays 10-15 selections of each type.) With the one on the layout, I generally turn the sound down and play a CD from a local amusement park with a boom box underneath the layout. Even so, after 4-5 years, I did have a problem with the speaker. I was able to open the piece from the bottom, determine what was wrong, and order a new speaker off the 'net. BTW, do not expect any trouble shooting support or parts from Lemax. Both are none existent in my experience.
Here are a few shots of the carousel.
Chris
LVHR
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Most of my "carnival" stuff is by Mr.Christmas. Older Lemax items can be found at York, or on line at ehobbytools.com
Bevel's Hardware in Blackstone, Va uses them on their large Christmas Train display layout. For every item on the layout, there are several replacements in boxes in the back room. When they break, a new one is swapped out until it fails too.
A member of our Modular Layout uses them too. They work great right up until the point that they don't. Occasional use, they're probably "ok", but if you plan to run them hours on-end they will not hold up.
I used to regard them as junk, until I realized what they cost. Now I just shake my head when they stop working.
I've bought a number of Lemax Carnival items and run them not too frequently. So they all work fine so far. I'm planning to buy more. Thanks for the tip about turning on & off with the switch. The photos look great. For those who've had an item die, there are a number of YouTube videos on how repair these.
