01-25-2011, 12:40 AM
Dear Fred, Here is the post I made
IMHO many of the model railroad industry buy outs are not about making good products, it is eliminating the competition so prices will increase. I'm at the stage in my life where I could buy a few more locomotives or cars, but after replacing gears on many old Athearn and "lifetime guaranteed" P2Ks I think I will just install decoders in them and be done with it. Walther's bought Lifelike, and now that people need replacement parts, whether for "warranty" replacement or not they should make them available. I read somewhere that they haven't got the Life Like replacement parts unpacked. Geeze guys, it's been 5 years or better. Of course if I have a locomotive that needs a $2 part that I can't get, I'll rush an order in to Walther's for a new locomotive (not). I hope they don't hold their breath.
I did not mean to imply (I don't think I did)I wanted anything for free from anyone, but if replacement parts are not going to be available for me to BUY to repair my locomotives then why should I buy anything new from them? I don't think it is unreasonable to want the parts, and I'm willing to buy them. The gears set me back less then a buck each and I got them from Athearn. Now if I still had my bills of sale and the original agreement with Life-like I might have a case, but during my short life I have outlived a lifetime membership to a historical society, a video store, and my lifetime warranty on my muffler expired 2 mufflers ago.
Some manufactures in this business realize that we often buy this rolling stock to last our lifetime, thus they offered the warranty.
In my years in car dealerships I saw many items replaced free when the car was out of warranty just to promote goodwill, and many times this was not asked for nor expected by the customer. sure I saw unreasonable customers, but that was an exception.
Walthers may have thought they were being taken advantage by the number of gears they gave away, but I can tell you that I have 14 4 axle life like units and I have not found a good gear on any of them, and these units were bought and stored until 4 months ago. I knew they might be bad, that is why I bought gears last year when first I heard about it, without bothering Walthers. I've never bought direct from them anyway, I get their things through the hobby shops.
Walthers bought Lifelike and along with that they should have realized that they bought an obligation to keep these folks happy too. The biggest percentage of us are running locomotives that are 30 years old or older, and one way or another I'll keep mine running too.
IMHO many of the model railroad industry buy outs are not about making good products, it is eliminating the competition so prices will increase. I'm at the stage in my life where I could buy a few more locomotives or cars, but after replacing gears on many old Athearn and "lifetime guaranteed" P2Ks I think I will just install decoders in them and be done with it. Walther's bought Lifelike, and now that people need replacement parts, whether for "warranty" replacement or not they should make them available. I read somewhere that they haven't got the Life Like replacement parts unpacked. Geeze guys, it's been 5 years or better. Of course if I have a locomotive that needs a $2 part that I can't get, I'll rush an order in to Walther's for a new locomotive (not). I hope they don't hold their breath.
I did not mean to imply (I don't think I did)I wanted anything for free from anyone, but if replacement parts are not going to be available for me to BUY to repair my locomotives then why should I buy anything new from them? I don't think it is unreasonable to want the parts, and I'm willing to buy them. The gears set me back less then a buck each and I got them from Athearn. Now if I still had my bills of sale and the original agreement with Life-like I might have a case, but during my short life I have outlived a lifetime membership to a historical society, a video store, and my lifetime warranty on my muffler expired 2 mufflers ago.
Some manufactures in this business realize that we often buy this rolling stock to last our lifetime, thus they offered the warranty.
In my years in car dealerships I saw many items replaced free when the car was out of warranty just to promote goodwill, and many times this was not asked for nor expected by the customer. sure I saw unreasonable customers, but that was an exception.
Walthers may have thought they were being taken advantage by the number of gears they gave away, but I can tell you that I have 14 4 axle life like units and I have not found a good gear on any of them, and these units were bought and stored until 4 months ago. I knew they might be bad, that is why I bought gears last year when first I heard about it, without bothering Walthers. I've never bought direct from them anyway, I get their things through the hobby shops.
Walthers bought Lifelike and along with that they should have realized that they bought an obligation to keep these folks happy too. The biggest percentage of us are running locomotives that are 30 years old or older, and one way or another I'll keep mine running too.