Lionels Quality...How Good Is It?

[krapug1]

The irony here is that one of the reviewers mentioned only buying a Lionel set from one of the former owners. Ironic since the Pennsylvania Flyer as Lionels entry level "Starter", or "Ready To Run" set would have been the top of the line starter set by the Lionel of only 15 or so years ago.

The Penn. Flyer offers a good value, and has some Lionel traditions like an air whistle. Freight sets tend to be more popular with the kids as well. 2 "add-on" pacs are offered and the freight add on contains some operating cars, and accessories.

The Polar Express has a better engine, and is a more premium set in general.

But getting back to your question, Lionel's quality today, is about as good as it has ever been.

Ken

PS After reading the reviews on Amazon, I have to question if 2 of the Penn Flyer reviews were "salted" by employees, or fans of some other brands.

[Kooljock1]

Lionel makes all kinds of trains in levels of quality. The quality is most often reflected in price. While Lionel often takes a hit in side-by-side comparisons with MTH, the comparisons are usually between a Lionel set with a MSRP of $200 vs a MTH set with a MSRP of $345.

Apples & banannas

The Pennsylvania Flyer is the lowest priced regular production set Lionel makes. It comes with a die-cast 4-4-2 Atlantic steamer with F/N/R, smoke, headlight, air whistle tender, boxcar, flatcar, non-illuminated caboose. It also comes with a 40 X 60 inch loop of FasTrack, an 80 watt transformer with accessory posts, a bridge and ten telephone poles.

The loco is just about bullet-proof. The new CW-80 transformers are great too.

To get all this in at a lower price point, Lionel made the trucks on the cars plastic, and no light in the caboose. This has been regular practice since the 1950s on lower priced items and was the standard between the 1960s and 1990s. Some folks demand die-cast everything, others don't mind as long as they run well.

As far as I'm concerned, if your price-sensitive it's a great value.

The Polar Express contains the same track and transformer, but the 2-8-4 Berk it comes with is much larger, contains a die-cast frame as well as shell, the motor is mounted within using a worm gear to tramit to the axel, and the cars are all equipped with interior illumination. There's your price difference.

Jon

[Anonymous]

I was looking at various Lionel products on Amazon and found these two sets of reviews quite interesting.

 http://www.amazon.com/review/product/B0006GYMTI/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5Fencoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

http://www.amazon.com/review/product/B0000E2X4Z/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2_cm_cr_acr_txt?%5Fencoding=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

From those who own and have used the two products, is the quality of the Polar Express train set that much better than the Penn Flyer? I was planning on giving several Penn Flyer sets for gifts but now I am having second thoughts. Should I buy Polar Express sets instead?

To cut to the chase, does Lionel put out junk?

TMT