I have a friend of mine that wants to get into G Scale ask me about the quality of a Buddy L train set today. I have never heared of them before so I told him I would ask around. So I have come to you guys on this one!

Good or Bad Brand?
Baker

So would you say that a Bachmann set is equal to or better then the Buddy L Set?

Thanks
Baker

Truth: (just my 1/2 cents) Buddy L not a wise choice in G Scale.

William

Buy Bachmann.  The locomotives are waaaaaay better than Buddy L.  If you want to go outdoors, then you must replace the Bach track with a better quality track such as brass, aluminum, steel, stainless steel, or nickel silver.

My recommendations:

1.  Forget Buddy L

2.  Consider Aristo-Craft before you invest in a Bachmann set.  You'll get Aristo's track with their sets, which is vastly superior to Bachmann's track and which can be used outdoors or indoors, and subsequently expanded with a wide variety of switches, curves, and so forth.  Personally, I find the Aristo set trains to be more durable than the Bachmann stuff (at the lower end), but that's just my opinion.

James,

Stay away from Buddy L. The cars are ok and that it. You might want to check into your local SAM's club and see if they have any of the Chritmas sets left. Very good price on a Bachmann starter set. You would need to buy Atristo, USA or LGB track for outdoors.

You should also try and think ahead a bit. I built my layout with 6 feet diameter curves and now wish I had gone to 8. At the time I was only interested in running the smaller engines, but my interst changed and found out I was now limited by my curves.

Good luck and have fun. Get something down as soon as you can. That is the hardest part.

Regards,

Mark

Ok, I am sorry for being a little flip about the Aristo track.  The guys in my model train club all told me about how much they disliked Aristo track because the railjoiners will rust.  Now true, this may only happen in certion areas.  I live in the Pacific Northwest and no one, that I know of, uses Aristo track, heck even the hobby store doesn't have them in their personal stock.  I was told that LGB was a better option than Aristo.

Again, I am sorry for being flip about the quality of the Aristo track.

No problem, Snoqpass, just being flip myself

I live in Virginia Beach with sun, salt and rain, very similar to the PNW only warmer.  I've yet to see any problems with Aristo track.  BUT with that being said, every area has it's own unique conditions and what works in one area may or may not work somewhere else.  It's always best to see what the local railroaders are doing before making a big purchase.

I was also wondering about the comment on the Aristo rail joiners rusting away. I do not see any rust on the joiners or the rails. I'm in Northern Ohio, so not subject to the salt associated with living on the coast, so guess I'll have many years of reliable opperations.

Having fun in Ohio.

Mark

I think the rusting rail joiners may be an issue only on older Aristo/REA track. I had a loop set up on our patio for a few months, of mixed track, and the only rail joiners that rusted were on some old track I got from ebay.