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Turn around on BLI engine engine repair and where do I get small tools?
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<p>Well, I recieved my Reading T1 one December fresh from the factory, I could not get home fast enough.</p><p>2 sad feet down the workbench track it went back into the box and I was in tears or close to it thinking the thing does not perform at all and may be written off or replaced with a new T1.</p><p>5 weeks later I had the unit back in perfect order with a handwritten repair order showing things that I missed and fixed.</p><p>My BLI F unit lost a speaker (We did not know it at the time, we thought we muted the unit and hammered the Digitrax trying to program the sounds to live again) that took 8 agonizing weeks. But BLI was being hammered with stuff in that period and stayed in touch.</p><p>I do have the M1a and that engine has yet to toss anything. The rest of my BLI steam fleet are doing ok but they are picky at times. They sleep in boxes until it's time to run, the day or two before, I go over them with a lube, hex screw driver checking all the nuts on the rods and run with the sound off to see if there is any problems and look for waddle.</p><p>I also had a Spectrum 4-6-0 tender that got destroyed but replaced within a week from Bachmann over the phone and 60 dollars on the credit card.</p><p>My MRC 4-4-0 appears to have one of the drive rod's bolts working loose. It is right now on the bench ready for tomorrow's inspection with the Jeweler's Hex Bolt tools.</p><p>I have heard horror stories of 400 dollar engines taking the dive of death after breaking a rod off and raring up to smash itself on the floor 5 feet below. Maybe I go over all the rods before they run on a railroad.</p><p>The only engine I own that does not get any attention from me is the Like like's Proto Y3 2-8-8-2. That thing runs sooooo smooth that if anything happens it will become very apparent very quickly, and at 20 smph should be able to stop in time. (At 50th production unit out of whatever total run that was it better be smooth)</p><p>The day the the Y3 breaks and dies, Off to PCM for the Y6b thank ye!</p><p>Have some faith in BLI. Im sure they will make your engines right as rain before too much time elaspes. Reckon that if they require a few dollars to complete a repair due to age of the unit I dont mind. I ship it to them USPS Priority, insured and tracked all the way there, bother them all month and watch it make it's way back to the house ready to go like new.</p><p>If they stopped taking so good care of sick, broken and sad engines I would think it might be time that we found some one else to sell us HO scale steam engines. But that is my opinion.</p><p>One other thing, I do suspect that some if not all of the engines come out of the factory lightly lubed if at all. The M1a was my second BLI engine and that one gets alot of attention lubewise because it runs the most. I dont want to depress you but wanted to encourage you with the testimony that the M1a that I have has not failed me yet.</p><p>The amount of lube used on this one engine indicates to me that it does not hold lube very well. Either that or im not using the right ones (Labelle plastic compatible) I hate to think of all the oily wheels im going to see in my rolling stock.</p><p>There is a T1 4-4-4-4 coming soon to my home. When it gets here, that thing is going to be inspected and if there is a problem, right back to BLI for repair it goes. if I think it's a keeper it's a good day and one less problem for BLI.</p><p>Im awful demanding when I expect a product to work reasonably well and so far BLI's repair department has been outstanding. I am happy with them. Not like my cell provider... they totally screwed up January for this year. But we fixed that pronto with some red-faced yelling on the tech support phone.</p><p>If I ever call BLI and hear "Hello my name is Abdul, I know your problem and will help you fix it" in that bad accent especially before I have a chance to explain the problem; from somewhere beyond Bombay India is the last day I will deal with them.</p>
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