Supposed to be Painted? MTH CA Zephyr Cars

To me, It looks like they forgot to paint the trucks completely.... sideframes and all. Seems like an oops to me. I think a call is in order. 

It looks wrong to me, but I like it, detail shows up really good. My own opinion I would keep it that way.

Clem 

Well, fortunately this is an easy fix- get a small bottle of Testors silver and paint those pieces- small enough of an issue to make it easy to match exactly. 

My Santa Fe plated passenger cars from the recent Super Chief E-8 seemed to have the air brakes painted silver. I also have the matching SF sleeper/diner coming tomorrow and I'm guessing they look like that too.

 EDIT: I will check the passenger cars tomorrow and update the thread on whether or not they are unpainted or not.

It was just a suggestion- you should feel free to do what you think is the best option in resolution of this. Nothing more than that was intended.

MTH painting error. Everything, air brake details included, AND the springs, should be silver. Here's a shot of the prototype.

If it is a factory error and you don’t fix it may be worth a lot of money one day 

trainbob posted:

If it is a factory error and you don’t fix it may be worth a lot of money one day 

Extremely doubtful. MTH errors have never been worth much. For most, it's a liability. Same with most of the modern stuff. Besides, today there are so many factory errors that not only are they worth nothing, people are sick of them!  

It's typical, even on more expensive 3-rail locomotives and cars which have aluminum-painted trucks, that the springs are not painted.  The model truck parts are apparently painted before assembly, and guess what small parts are the last to be added?  

Paint 'em.

dkdkrd posted:

 

It doesn't show up well on the CA Zephyr photos, but the unpainted parts on our Chessie trucks include ALL parts of the truck...journals, frame, spring supports, as well as the brake gear. 

For what its worth - the actual cars for The Chessie had gray trucks, not silver.

Ken

Just picked up my Zephyr cars and the trucks are the same as yours.

Just paint them, I would.

Dave

Has anyone contacted MTH; heard back from MTH with a proposed fix?

Thank you all for the posts and for the confirmation that it was an error. I will reach out to the dealer about it and see what they say. Other than the trucks, the cars are really nice. The paint finish looks good. I will say, the paint on the figures inside is not as crisp as on some MTH cars I have from 5 years ago. I wonder if they changed the process/company who paints the passenger figures. I am not complaining, I am like most people in the hobby and like to observe and keep an eye out for details. 

Thanks,

Eric 

Just opened my Santa Fe Sleeper / Diner cars and the air brakes are unpainted. Not a deal breaker for me as I will probably just paint them, and the cars themselves are stunning.

I called the dealer where I bought them and I was told they are an authorized seller, not an authorized repair center, so I need to contact MTH directly.  I use three different dealers when buying MTH and Lionel. I think I just went down to two. I know you can't paint them for me, so at least contact MTH for me and see if this is known to them and if they can do anything about it. The reason there is a middle man in sales is so the customer is taken care of. Okay, I am done ranting. I will be calling MTH sometime today or tomorrow and see where we go from here. 

I called the dealer where I bought them and I was told they are an authorized seller, not an authorized repair center, so I need to contact MTH directly.  I use three different dealers when buying MTH and Lionel. I think I just went down to two. I know you can't paint them for me, so at least contact MTH for me and see if this is known to them and if they can do anything about it. The reason there is a middle man in sales is so the customer is taken care of. Okay, I am done ranting. I will be calling MTH sometime today or tomorrow and see where we go from here.

I agree with you, if I got that answer I would be down to two as well !

vthokies2007-2011 posted:

I called the dealer where I bought them and I was told they are an authorized seller, not an authorized repair center, so I need to contact MTH directly.  I use three different dealers when buying MTH and Lionel. I think I just went down to two. I know you can't paint them for me, so at least contact MTH for me and see if this is known to them and if they can do anything about it. The reason there is a middle man in sales is so the customer is taken care of. Okay, I am done ranting. I will be calling MTH sometime today or tomorrow and see where we go from here. 

The Denver Rio Grande cars are the same way,  thought it was my imagination when I opened the box. Plus two of them have bad trucks, the strap under the journal is only attached on one end...  

Has anyone gotten any of the two car sets or the single cars yet ?   If you have, are they the same way ?

ITS TOY TRAINS FOR ME posted:

Has anyone gotten any of the two car sets or the single cars yet ?   If you have, are they the same way ?

 

I bought the 4-Car set along with the Full Length Dome and Single Dome car. Every car has the same issue with the trucks. 

Thanks.. I haven't gotten my single dome car yet.  

Here is what I got back from MTH. The gentleman I worked with was very nice and quick to respond:

"I just spoke with the Production VP. He told me the following about these parts:

The brake cylinders were molded out of a different material due to excessive breakage previously. The Chinese said we could paint them but they’d risk being broken if they were made out of standard ABS. The “new” parts are a nylon material and nearly impossible to paint. The springs I was told have been black for several runs of this. The truck sides are cast and therefore painted. Although the Project Manager did check to see if the Chinese could spray them a closer silver color for spare parts. They said they think they’d be able to.

So the only thing that MTH can do to help out here is to possibly provide some closer matched silver truck sides at some point in the near future. The brake cylinder and springs are not going to change, unfortunately."

vthokies2007-2011 posted:

Here is what I got back from MTH. The gentleman I worked with was very nice and quick to respond:

"I just spoke with the Production VP. He told me the following about these parts:

The brake cylinders were molded out of a different material due to excessive breakage previously. The Chinese said we could paint them but they’d risk being broken if they were made out of standard ABS. The “new” parts are a nylon material and nearly impossible to paint. The springs I was told have been black for several runs of this. The truck sides are cast and therefore painted. Although the Project Manager did check to see if the Chinese could spray them a closer silver color for spare parts. They said they think they’d be able to.

So the only thing that MTH can do to help out here is to possibly provide some closer matched silver truck sides at some point in the near future. The brake cylinder and springs are not going to change, unfortunately."

Thanks for the information,  after looking at them several times I think I'm going to leave mine the way they are.  

vthokies2007-2011 posted:

Here is what I got back from MTH. The gentleman I worked with was very nice and quick to respond:

"I just spoke with the Production VP. He told me the following about these parts:

The brake cylinders were molded out of a different material due to excessive breakage previously. The Chinese said we could paint them but they’d risk being broken if they were made out of standard ABS. The “new” parts are a nylon material and nearly impossible to paint. The springs I was told have been black for several runs of this. The truck sides are cast and therefore painted. Although the Project Manager did check to see if the Chinese could spray them a closer silver color for spare parts. They said they think they’d be able to.

So the only thing that MTH can do to help out here is to possibly provide some closer matched silver truck sides at some point in the near future. The brake cylinder and springs are not going to change, unfortunately."

Never heard anyone complain their brake cylinders were failing, anyone have that issue? I sure wouldn't want the trucks to be sprayed an incorrect color to match the cylinders, that'd be even worse!

ITS TOY TRAINS FOR ME posted:

Thanks for the information,  after looking at them several times I think I'm going to leave mine the way they are.  

That is a wise decision, gonna leave ours as is. If the manufacturer can't get paint to stick why try?

BobbyD posted

ITS TOY TRAINS FOR ME posted:

Thanks for the information,  after looking at them several times I think I'm going to leave mine the way they are.  

That is a wise decision, gonna leave ours as is. If the manufacturer can't get paint to stick why try?

Just out of curiosity I was wondering what kind of paint they tried.  If I was going to try and paint them I think the silver auto touch up paint might do the trick. 

In attempting to fix a light issue on a friends Santa Fe car I think we discovered why they break.

When these cars were designed MTH equipped them with small, non scale trucks. Later when they equipped them with the larger scale trucks it made the 2 screw holes at each end impossible to access the screw head without pushing against these truck side parts. At this time I'd guess the breakage was factory caused. In fact prior to opening the Obs we discovered he has broken pieces of the new gray design part on a few trucks in the set.

ITS TOY TRAINS FOR ME posted:

BobbyD posted

ITS TOY TRAINS FOR ME posted:

Thanks for the information,  after looking at them several times I think I'm going to leave mine the way they are.  

That is a wise decision, gonna leave ours as is. If the manufacturer can't get paint to stick why try?

Just out of curiosity I was wondering what kind of paint they tried.  If I was going to try and paint them I think the silver auto touch up paint might do the trick. 

Well, who knows what kind of paint the Chinese were trying to use? Auto touch up might be fine. In any case, if the paint isn't sticking, some primer can be used first. It's highly doubtful the Chinese manufacturer spent the time and other resources to do a proper two-step painting process.

Interesting to compare MTH and Lionel passenger trucks. The bottom shot is from one of my Lionel cars. All silver, including silver springs. I'd certainly paint the unpainted MTH parts for a better look.