I have a curse on one of my steam locomotives unlike any of the others I have, and it started the day I got it out of the box… It’s a Kato Mikado Western Pacific #310. First I broke the whistle off while installing the detail parts package on it, and had to paintstakingly glue it back in place. Now tonight I was getting ready to put a traction tire set in it and the coal tender fell off and hit the floor breaking both of the rear steps off. I’ve repaired it with super glue and some black touch up paint, but still. I pray nothing else happens to it…
Maybe you should shelf it for awhile and leave it be. I had the same problem with a loco once and ended up putting it on the shelf until “it” decided to let me work on it! That was 2 years later too.
I’ve had projects where the “gremlins” come a’calling and I’m all thumbs. I’ve learned to recognize when this is happening and put it away until they get tired of waiting for me to come back. When I do return, sometimes weeks later, the project goes together like a flash with little effort. If I try to fight them, I end up frustrating myself and breaking something. I don’t have any other explanation for it, and I really don’t believe in mischievous little creatures, but that’s what happens, and its not only with trains. It happens when I have projects in the yard or on my cars. I don’t fight it anymore.
Have you considered calling a priest for an exorcism? Who knows, it could be"haunted"!
Then there is the possibility that you are just soooooo excited to have this locomotive that you get all giggley and goofy when you play, er… I mean, RUN it on your layout! LOL
Maybe the loco isn’t the one that needs a break? Have you checked to see if your “to do” list isn’t creating anxiety for you?
Or maybe you’re a lot like me, fumble-fingered at times!
I think my Genesis SD75M might be cursed like your Mikado. The railings are real fragile, and paint just won’t stick to them very well. The light bulbs keep burning out. I accidentally dropped it 3 feet to a not-very-well-padded carpet, but it miraculously survived, without any damage. The shell randomly pops up a little once in a while when I’m running it. One of the sunshades snapped while I was putting it together.
Maybe this “Curse of the SD75M” will stop when I change the lights to something other than those stupid mini-bulbs.[:D]
i have a walthers trainlne engine gp9 that was cursed first a i drop it. then about a month later it takes the wrong track and breaks the front coupler when it plows into a box car!!!
Wow a Hoodoo engine!! Put it on the layout and run it it may blow up jump the track or kill some of your HO scale people!! Who knows this could be an article on how to model a cursed steam engine
