About 2 weeks ago, I bought a new Accurail kit from the hobby shop. It went together great, and it’s a nice looking car. It did have a truck with defective molding though, which caused the axles to fall out. I e-mailed Accurail about it, and got a response early on the first business day after. 2 days later, I had not one, but FIVE new trucks waiting in the mailbox!
A lot of companies couldn’t care less about customer service. Accurail is just the opposite, and it’s always nice to know there’s at least one good company who’ll stand behind their products honestly and be so willing to make things right.[:D]
Accurail has always given me great service as well. When I have ordered the ‘re-#’ sets, or ‘parts’(they have a great selection of freight car parts), the service is very fast Now, if they would stop putting Trinity 5161 BNSF numbers on their ACF 4600CF hoppers…
I had two separate issues with Accurail products, one was packaged with the wrong size weights and on another occasion I was missing one truck for a box car. They were great to deal with and sent out the correct items, no questions asked. I have since add quite a bit of accurail rolling stock to my layout.
Accurail is one terrific company and I try and support them all that I can. I’m particularly happy with the fact that they STILL…SELL…KITS. [tup]
And I had the same exact issue as you did, Darth, and Eric(?) at Accurail mailed me 5 replacement trucks, as well. (I think they are packaged that way, too.) Eric said that they had a defective batch of trucks one time, tried to retrieve them all but some slipped through and were shipped out in kits. The important thing is that they rectified the problem.
Yep, Accurail is on my favorite manufacturer’s list. Their 6- & 8-panel wood-braced boxcars and 41’ gondolas are quite nice for the price. Hopefully one of these days they’ll make a stab at a tank car.
Accurail is the main reason I am still in HO scale (not my main scale though).Aside from the fact that they “STILL SELL_KITS” they also sell most of those kits with data only making it much easier to increase my HO fleet of home road cars.
I also love their service it is definately top notch.
Not only do they still sell kits, but undecorated and data only kits are available - plus their prices are still reasonable.
Another good one is Sylvan Scale. I bought one of their car kits and the rubber tires were missing. I sent an e-mail on a friday evening, had 2 replies within 24 hours, and the tires were in the mail the following Monday.
I have four of their 41’ gons for my layout myself. They are for maintance service as they are too old for my era but I also have a few boxcars of theirs as well. My dealings with them have also been very productive as well.
I also like to build my cars and Accurail is first in my inventory, followed by Bowser, others (P2K, Tichy, old Blue Box). I guess the P2K kits are also past production. Haven’t had to ask for service from Accurail yet but a missing weight from a Bowser hopper was promptly shipped when requested.
Proof positive that these things CAN still be made in the U.S.A, sold at a reasonable price & combined with outstanding customer service! Makes you kind of wonder why so many of the other brands think they had to outsource everything to China.
I love Accurail, and Bowser. Granted I have never had to deal with their customer service part, but their kits are excellent. Easy enough to put together in an evening or two, yet detailed enough to satisfy. Tichy trains is another one. I only bought two flat cars, they were a nightmare to put together. The car went together beautifully,but the amount of seperate details…I darn near went cross-eyed putting the stake pockets on the car.
Count me in too on praising Accurail. I have dealt with them by phone and correspondance. Each and every time was a sheer delight! I have no problem what so ever buying Accurail products. I have never had to make a complaint nor have I had a missing/broken/bad part. Their attention to detail concerning customer service is top notch, friendly, and professional at the same time.
Add that to the fact they are ‘Made in America’ by Americans and you have a home grown version of what HO modelers want in a company. I will be doing business with them for a very long time to come. I recommend other HO modelers do the same.
Add that to the fact they are ‘Made in America’ by Americans and you have a home grown version of what HO modelers want in a company.
The same goes for Bowser; their website is showing off their new injection molding machine. Something like that does not come cheap, I am glad they are making the investment http://www.bowser-trains.com/bowsernews.html
I bought three of those Tichy flatcars! My magnifyer light and tweezers have never been so busy. But, I really was happy with the results.
There is a vendor at our local Greenberg shows who has quite a large display. He has many, many Accurail kits, all nicely set out so that you can read the ends and see what’s in every box. It’s easy to pull out a box and look at the contents, too. So, I get a good product at a good price, they’re era-appropriate for me, and they are easy to find in the display. No wonder that almost all the rolling stock I’ve bought in the last few years has been Accurail.
Most of my cars are better quality like Proto 2000 or Tichy but I have at least 20 Accurail outside braced box cars that look almost as good as the expensive ones, just bought 9 more in fact!
I do have to say that I do love Accurail also, and I hope they will continue to make kits. They are easy to assemble and fun to look at. I hope they keep on going making kits.
Discovered Accurail not very long ago. Enjoy their kits, selection and price. I too bought two Tichey flats recently, these old, old eyes and hands are not quite up to the task expected for the stake pockets. I will position them on a strip of styrene and apply that to the sides, of car number two even tho non prototypical.( no one around here but I will know. )
Same situation here. I recently bought 2 Tichy Flat Car kits just to try them out & it was only $15. for the pair. When I got them home & opened them…YIKES! LOL! They are going to be a challenge for these old eyes too.
Love the Accurail kits though. I’ve built a number of them & enjoy building them. The only thing I change is putting Kadee #5 couplers on them. Don’t like the couplers that come with them. I also like their deal of sending for a sheet of additional road number decals so you can build several of the same car & have different road numbers on them. Great idea & I wish others would do the same.