just got a bunch of used intermountain freight cars, the jewel case inner insert that cradles the freight car puts pressure on the inner wheels and spreads the trucks inner axle spacing over time. The absolute cheapest part of the entire product, the thin molded cradle that goes in the jewel case, damages the product it holds over time. Ruining the gauging of the inner wheels on both trucks. It is totally obvious to a trained industrial designer that this is the dynamic material change that will happen over a given time scale with the thermoplastic materials used to make the trucks, combined with the pressure the packaging imparts asymmetrically to one end of each truck. The wheel is pushed, the axle tip and the pocket it rests in are angled slopes to the direction of the force the insert applies to the wheel, the truck spreads apart slowly and remembers the new position as it is a slow constant pressure over time. The truck is now wider at one end. Question is why the heck do any manufacturers do this? It is utterly bizarre from the consumer's standpoint, but it actually may be intentional damaging of product through design and engineering to impart subtle damage over time and force consumers to spend money on replacement parts. Yes that is a thing that is widely done in many industries, and utterly evil for the pressure it puts on society culture and environment. So fair warning remove any rolling stock from any inner inserts that push on the wheels at all, as it will spread the trucks mounting points over time and allow the cheapest part of the packaging to damage the most crucial part to the products functioning as more than a static model. I would hope the shop owners could do something about it since it damages the product as it is sitting on the shelf or in the warehouse, before the consumer has purchased it and signed up for the undisclosed maintenance plan.
I doubt they want the headaches this would cause. Iy may be a thing about different batches of plastic shrinking at different rates. Packaging costs money too.
