N O R T H E A S T M O D E L P R O D U C T S experience?

[CCSII]

Has anyone tried one of their NG kits who might wish to comment on your experience or the quality and support?

[cacole]

If you're referring to Northeast Narrow Gauge in Wiscasset, Maine, I have built several of their 1:20.3 kits and have been very pleased with them.

The only one I didn't like is the 13 Ton Class B Dunkirk.  The kit itself is not bad, but the drive system is horrible.  I have shied away from any more of their locomotive kits in the belief that they may all use the same system as the Dunkirk.

[kstrong]

I'd have to agree, though it's been nearly 15 years since I built one of their kits. They go together well, and are ripe for superdetailing. My experience with their drive system is unfortunately similar. The gears hold up well enough (they're from Northwest Short Line) but there needs to be a better way of getting the power from the motor to the gearbox. I believe on the Porter kit I built, it was a small length of rubber tubing.

Later,

K

[cacole]

Even worse, the Dunkirk uses brass rod drive shafts from the gearbox to the trucks, and 90-degree twisted O-rings between the drive shafts and truck axles.  It makes a horrible, high pitched whining sound but barely moves, and the O-rings break or burn from the friction within days, depending on how much you run it.

I just gave up after the first week and put it onto a shelf as a display curiosity.

[vsmith]

These kits started back when their wasnt much choice in drivetrains so coming up with their own drive mechanisms was kinda a given, however with as much time has gone by and the new choices in drives available I'm surprised they havent upgraded the drives on thier kits.

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Cacole, that Dunkirk sounds like a prime candidate for a pair of Aristo Centercab bricks like I used for my geared lokies.

[CCSII]

Are the rollingstock kits wood, cardboard, plastic.

There are no pictures at the web site and there is no description as well. I wouldn't be interested with that little info but there are a few specific types that intrigue me and I am not in a position to blow the bucks just to find out the stuff is low grade. That they go together well increases my interest.

[cacole]

The rolling stock kits I have built are mostly wood with metal castings, metal straps, or metal rods for the detail parts such as brake rigging, grabirons, etc.  Some, such as their tank car, kit #248, included a piece of PCV pipe for the tank with a cardboard wrapper.

Note that most of their kits do not include the trucks.  The trucks they sell are metal.  One additional thing I always do is drill out the journals and insert ball bearing races that I order from Great Big Trains (http://www.gbtrain.com) or purchase from an Ace Hardware store in Tucson, Arizona.  I put these races in all of my rolling stock, whether scratch built or store bought, and they double the length of trains I can run.