Recommendation on InterMountain Engines

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

So I was visiting my pusher today (LHS is my pusher, he feeds my addiction) and he let me know that Inter was coming out with some SD40-2’s. As some of you may remember I am switching from UP to Pan Am and lo and behold one of the Roads Inter will be doing is Pan Am. I have never bought an InterMountain before. My current engine line up is Kato, Athearn RTR and Genesis, Atlas Gold and Atlas Trainman Plus. As engines decorated for Pan Am are rare and went ahead and pre ordered.

So any thoughts on InterMoutain? Have they released SD40-2’'s before?

http://www.intermountain-railway.com/ho/html/49325.htm

Thanks, Derek

2

First off, I do not own any I-M locomotives but my LHS where I work part-time, sells them. Coincidence or whatever, we have had several units from the same shipment in early fall fail. Of course the customers are responsible for returning the units and I presume I-M made food on the warranty and made the customer happy.

I became reticent to recommend them.

3

Did he mean the release is imminent? The next round was scheduled to be due late spring/early summer.

I’ve got a CN Expo unit (non-sound) from the last release, and it seems to be OK. They still have a lot of CN units at MBKlein at a nice price. They’ve had one or two releases of SD40-2s before that one, and I’ve read about some problems with those, but they’ve had a lot of time to fix any problems.

4

I have one (1) IM F3 A-unit and it runs very smoothly. I would put it slightly below Bowser and Atlas as far as running ability.

Tom

5

I have about 12, mostly Gevo’s and a few F units in DC. They all run great ( the lights don’t burn out ) and pull lots of cars. Their SD40-2’s are a big deal for them and I expect them to deliver the best on that release.

6

Im a big fan of Intermountain locos. I have 4 of the ES44DC/ACs with 3 more on order. I also have a SD40-2 from them on order. I have been impressed with their detail, love that they have LEDs & Tsunami sound, and especially IM’s customer service. I would put them on par with Atlas, Athearn Genesis, and Kato as far as running qualities and comparison go.

7

UPinCT:

I have four I-M F units all purchased on eBay. I am not sure how old they are but they all run very smoothly (I’m using DCC). Detailing, paint and all that stuff is good (I am not a rivet counter). They did use LEDs for the headlights which are very deep yellow when they are not on. Changing those was easy.

I have had two problems with one engine. The first problem was that one of the gear towers was binding so the locomotive’s speed was inconsistant at low speeds. I could not find anything wrong with the parts, so I contacted I-M to order a replacement truck. Despite the fact that I bought them on eBay they sent me a new truck assembly at no charge, no questions asked.

That solved the hesitation but then I discovered that the motor had a squeak at low speeds which was loud enough to quickly drive me nuts. I went back to I-M and they sent me a new motor assembly at no charge and again, no questions asked.

I thought that was pretty good customer service but they topped it off a little while later when I asked if I could purchase two winterization hatches in CP maroon because two of the engines came without them. 10 days later I received the two hatches at no charge!

I can only speculate what the quality of their future releases will be but I can fully attest to their attitude towards customer service. You can argue that the truck and the motor were warranty issues so what they did was only reasonable, but not charging for the hatches when they were in no way responsible for them being missing is going beyond simple customer service.

I think it is fair to say that my experiences suggest that they will be a good company to deal with.

I will buy more of their engines for sure.

Dave

8

I recently bought my first IM engine, an ES44-DC. Since I had never owned one before, I asked a lot of questions at my LHS and based on what I heard decided to take the plunge. I bought BNSF unit and am very pleased with the detail, the tsunami sound quality and smooth running. I would rate it right there with my Kato and Atlas units for operation.

Marty C.

9

I have 5 Intermountain locos. They are all ES44ACs with sound. They run beautifully, and sound great. Never had any kind of problem at all. The detailing on them are excellent as well.

Good choice.

10

don’t own any yet but I plan on getting the BN FP7, if every thing that I’ve read thus far is pretty true I’d have to say I can’t wait for the NP 2 tone F3’s to get here.

11

Thanks Everyone for your comments. I did pre order yesterday being desperate for Pan Am decorated engines. I was wondering about their quality from this stand point. It seems like everything I buy lately needs a little tweaking, tuning up, and TLC right out of the box. I had a thread going in Electronics about what turned out to be a bad reed switch in a Atlas GP40-2. At the LHS yesterday I picked up two Exact Rail NS Gondolas, and what do you know two minutes on the layout and they are derailing. Take them off and weight them and underweight. So I added weight and they run fine and stopped derailing.

So we’ll have to see if the SD40-2’s run smooth out of the box or will I need to fix them to get them to run the way I want. I’ll report back when they arrive later this summer.

Thanks again guys, Derek

12

IMO, they’d use a lot of tooling and drive parts from their SD40-2W… So find a review for that.

I might be interested, if the shell detailing is accurate.

13

I have a few Intermountain EMD F units. These are the newer FP9’s with sound. I would rate these above the Genesis and a close equal to the new Rapido FP9’s, the Rapidos are lavish with the amount of detail on their locomotives.

I had a couple of problems with the Intermountain units and they sent replacement items super fast. They certainly stand behind their products.

I would not hesitate to buy any of their locomotives steam or diesel if i was interested in a particular model and they had it. I would not hesitate to recommend Intermountain

14

The truth: Anything made in China can have poor assembly fit and finish. Parts may be missing, may fall off, may have excessive visible glue, or may have poor paint, wrong color paint, poor paint masking, or occasional garbage–lint, human hairs, whatever in the paint. One unit of a given production run at the same time may be simply outstanding, and the next of the exact same paint scheme and model run may not.

I have searched for years for “perfection” in even just the appearance of HO scale trains, and it is rarely if ever achieved. I have bought, sold and traded away countless models that for one reason or another just did not meet my expectations.

I’ve owned the Intermountain F Units and the GEVO’s. Like anything else, some are fantastic and some have minor problems. On F units, the rear of the unit body may sometimes be low on the frame and thus it may look like it is running uphill slightly.

The GEVO’s are fantastic, but plastic handrails can be breakable. The good news is they can be glued and painted if necessary, because they are not delrin. (Try Dr. Mike’s glue…) If you get a good one, and handle it carefully all the time–then you have a great model!

The Intermountain parts support is first rate–they’ve sent me replacement handrail sets for free, and did it quickly, too.

I’ve noticed the recent Athearn Genesis stuff, since they moved to the new factory not controlled by others, is better assembled than what they had before, and is really outstanding, and among the best motive power for assembly fit and finish right now.

Intermountain recently changed the top management, and there will likely be an emphasis on improved product quality. If I needed a Canadian engine that only they made, I’d have no qualms at all about buying it.

John