I just started to get back into the hobby after many many years away. I’m still in the early planning/dreaming stage. I am interested in the MDC/Roundhouse HO 2-6-2 Loco Kit - Pennsy J-28 Prairie. Are the MDC loco’s good runners? By “kit” what due they mean. Are they reasonably detailed for what you pay. How are they compared to Bachmann Spectrum’s? I have a 3 truck Shay that I just got. No layout but I have a Shay.
Thanks
Hello Bob and welcome to the forum!
The Shay is a sweet locomotive, I recently purchased one and it purrs along with all that action going on in the gearing, it is a joy to watch.
I’m not at all sure that the MDC Roundhouse loco kits are still being made. MDC / Roundhouse was purchased by Horizon Hobbies and essentially merged into Athearn who were also purchased by Horizon. Some of the MDC freight car kits are showing up as Athearn kits now and from what I can tell the Roundhouse brand has been re-launched as ready to run old timers http://www.roundhousetrains.com/
Now of course you may still find some of the old Roundhouse kits out there. They really are a kit and require quite a bit of work and patience to get them to run well. Your Shay is in a different league as far as detail and running quality. If you are up for a challenge they are fun to do.
By “kit” they mean deburring metal, tapping holes with self tapping (we hope) screws, soldering leads, mounting motors on frames and possibly shimming them for optimal gear mesh, assembling valve gear, gluing plastic detail, and some painting.
The instructions for the MDC kits I have do not call for machining (other than flash removal), press fitting gears on axles or shafts, or precision drilling.
The MDC kit locomotives have a reputation here and elsewhere for using quality older motors and plastic gears which generally get replaced for optimum performance. Some of the gears fail and must be replaced, while some just run poorly. The motors have a rep for smooth operation, but a little noisier than premium because they are open frame design. Both can be replaced using kits from North West Short Line, but replacement requires press fitting gears on axles and shafts.
The detail is in the midrange, they aren’t bare, they aren’t as densly detailed as the Bachmans, but they do offer a variety of optional detail, included in the kit, notably different smokestacks and headlamp housings, so you can kitbash it up the way you want it to look.
My gut call is that this probably will not end up being your number one “go-to” locomotive, but if you are willing to spend the time dialing it in and tweaking the gear train to get it’s best performance, you might end up with a reliable second line loco.
You need to get the frame, motor, and gear train dialed in before completing the superstructure of the model, so some sort of oval test track and a power pac is a minimum requirement to fini***he kit.
Thanks for the responses. I think that I will pass on the MDC locomotive. I’m sure I could build it. But maybe having to changes gears and motor is not a selling point for me. I like the idea of optional stacks and lights.
Thanks again for the info.
Bob W
kit means put together yourself. MDC is a good brand.
I don’t know about their locos, but I own a number of their box and reefer cars, and can’t complain.
Tracklayer
The MDC/Roundhouse locos get mixed reviews. I’ve known people who really like their RS 3’s and their Critter has gotten good reviews. But others have said they are unreliable.
Bob, I wouldn’t give up on that kit quite yet. The locomotive kits are no longer being produced, but are very available on eBay. I have built 4 rod loco kits of theirs within the last 8-9 months. The ones with the can motors are extremely smooth and quiet-running. For the price, you can’t beat them. The earlier kits with the open-frame motors are a bit noisier, but with break-in, run equally smoothly, and are almost as quiet. Detail-wise, they are typical of most die-cast locos, and if you are not satisfied with the level of detail, you can always grind off the cast-on detail and add your own brass castings and piping.
Contrary to some of the opinions, I have found the MDC/Roundhouse rod locomotives to be very reliable, and have never had to replace any of the motors. The open-frame and can motors are all made by Sagami, and are very reliable. I have also never had to replace any gearing. I’m told that the ready-to-run Shays are also good runners, but I’m not at all satisfied with the kit model I built. They look great but run for c***.
Oh, the MDC locos I’ve built this year are: (1) ATSF Prairie 2-6-2, and (3) Harriman 2-8-0s. I’ve never built the Pennsy J28, but if it goes together as well as the Santa Fe 2-6-2, it’ll be nice.
Here’s a link to the ATSF loco I built - it’s lettered for the one that is sitting in the park in Lawrence, KS:
http://www.kcnet.com/~gmcrail/1073roster.jpg
I moved the number boards back to where they belong, and replaced the bell. Those are the only detail changes I made. Someday I’ll replace the steps, when I decide to get really frisky
The old MDC locomotive kits were really a mixed bag. Their Shay required nearly triple the original cost in remotoring and regearing in order to get it to run. I still run an 0-6-0 with slope-back tender from the mid-1960s and it will probably run forever.
Since Horizon Hobby bought out MDC and merged it into Athearn, the MDC product line is nearly all ready-to-run that is made in China. Athearn has said they are going to release some MDC products in kit form and will continue to make the Athearn blue-box kits as long as their is a market demand for kits, but I haven’t seen any of the new MDC kits anywhere yet.