I purchased a Model Power N Scale Mikado off eBay. Unfortunately its driving wheel pickup wers were bent, mangled and tangled up in the wheels. I contacted Model Power, who told me the parts are $5. The seller gave me two options, return the locomotive or reimbursement for the spare parts. My question is how difficult a job is replacing the wipers? This will strongly influence my decision to return or repair the locomotive.
Thank you.
I know this post is a few days old but I am just working on the same N scale engine due to mangled wipers. This seems to be a problem with this model. I have two and both have mangled the wipers. The repair I am doing right now is IMO a 9 out of 10 in difficulty. The biggest problem I had was having to reattach the red and black wires after they detached from the wiper plate, very fragile connection. The wipers are attached to strips that in themselves are fragile as well.
I shipped off one model to the company for repair. It came back in excellent shape. One run around the layout and the wipers where mangled again.
The second one is still on the workbench, almost ready to reassemble after extensive repair to the wiper plates, the wipers and the red and black wires. )Probably should have ordered the parts and replaced with new)
Tom J