KATO's SD45 response

Yes, I'm glad I had cancelled my order in time. But it was not because I had already seen a picture then, it was because I had realized I already had this version in HO, made by Atlas. And that one is a beauty. I certainly agree that Kato should have done better.

 

My Man!!! :thumbs_up::thumbs_up:

 

I saw the 1976 at the local shop and I think it is great looking. I did not buy it but I did walk away with the BN 5327 and I love it.
Kevin

 

I'm torn of course. The option is whether to get a Kato with a lesser shell and paint, or get an Atlas/Intermountain that waddles down the track and makes squeaking noises. Hmmmm. Well, paint is easy to get, but a good running engine is forever... :tb-biggrin:

 

Kato Jumps The Shark

While I certainly subscribe to the "settle down" mantra, I cannot agree that "don't buy it" is an option most of the time. It's not like there are competing products out there. If you want an SD45 you pretty much want a Kato. Yes there's Bachmann but you're really talkiing about a whole different class of product.

So IMHO, Kato should be held to the fire on this. Their paint quality has been in constant decline over the past ten years. It's to the point now that I feel like they have the 16-color crayon box they've handed over to their paint shop and said....make it close. And the poor masks and bleeding issues are more common than not.

Why do they spend all their time on pretty good tooling and then cheap out the decoration? Well, part of it is nobody complains about it. Seems everywhere you look there are people saying "live with it" or "quit complaining" or "it's just a model" or whatever other excuse they can come up with for Kato.

Currently, no manufacturer in their right mind is going to intentionally go head-to-head with Kato on tooling and mech. I'm sure FVM would have preferred that Kato stay out of the pool when they did the GEVO's. So with that, Kato is pretty much owning certain segments and another option ISN'T an option. If they aren't inclined to improve then we are losing out with substandard models, which is a shame. So I definitely think we should let them know we are dissatisfied with their product. They probably won't react right away, but when sales slip and they have a pile of complaint e-mails about paint accuracy and quality....well they're at least gonna think twice about it and maybe put out more effort. That's what were shooting for here, methinks.

Yes, eventually Kato's reputation for poor decoration WILL be well known, and other manufacturers will be able to jump in with competing products. At that point, yes the market will work itself out.

 

Hallelujah!
:thumbs_up: :thumbs_up: :thumbs_up: :thumbs_up:




As for the BN 1776 Bicentennial locomotive, its colors are pretty much spot-on if you look at prototype photos. The prototype is colorful and loud and so is the model. I don't see what the problem is. Yes, the plow on the front is colored, molded plastic, but a little weathering will take care of that.

 

Given that a popular internet trainstore is now selling Kato Gevo’s at $59 to get rid of excess inventory, while their FVM stock (of the same Road Names) continues to be priced at $89 is a pretty good indicator that the market is working these issues out. That not a sustainable price point for Kato, that is a damage is done, move on and order less from Kato in the future price point.

 

Well, that is good news. (for us) Glad the FVM's are holding serve. I guess the holes in Kato's unconventional/non-existant business model are finally starting to experience water.

I'm a fan of Kato's, I really am. I am thankful that they have released key locomotives without which I would not easily have been able to model the trains I can now. (especially the SD70MAC's and SD40-2's) But when you get to the point of telling your customer "yeah, we really don't care what you think" and basically refusing the most basic of customer service requests...something is amiss. The BN C30-7 is one of my top 5 favorite locomotives and I have yet to preorder one....that says a lot about a company that used to be tops in quality all-around.

 

I hope this is a joke because it's the dumbest post I have seen in a long time, and about as far as one could get from the truth!

Two brand new SD80macs, high pitch whine at 35 SMPH and 15 SMPH on Digitrax setting #1. I'll take an ATLAS over a Kato any day!

 

An interesting observation, but I have had engines from both manufacturers that have had problems. Thankfully most of them were quality and not engineering/design problems and I have been able to repair them. However, both manufacturers have made recent changes to mechanisms that leave me scratching my head and wondering why they would change proven designs.

By the way, I will be more than happy to spare you some grief and take those troublesome Atlas and Intermountain engines off your hands. I even have paint to trade for them....JK!

 

Hey, let's tone it down a notch. How about respectful disagreement rather than saying someone has written the "dumbest post" ever?

 

Good to hear. I am waiting to see if my not-so-local-pusher gets one in that I can drive over and look at.

 

I thought my name was "Hey Stupid" until the first day of kindergarten.

BUT- Please let us not forget that we are here for an exchange of ideas and viewpoints without vituperation, venom or viciousness.

Sorry- It just seems like a "V" kind of day.

 

You forgot "vitriolic" or maybe you wanted to leave something for me.

 

FWIW: I hear Kato>Atlas every day. Seems to me, the three Atlas Master geeps I bought recently are:

-Flawless, speed-matched slow-creepers
-Silent runners
-Smooth tacking (no wobble)
-Hold the most precise, laser-sharp, colorfast paint and print I have ever seen on a locomotive (black and yellow NP)
-Similar cost to Kato's at list price, CHEAPER at online retailers.
-Similar comments to the above from Atlas Master owners

Seems to me that the AMERICAN company is paying attention to what the market wants (ever heard of the Atlas forums? LOL). While I know there's stock here in Japanese quality, seems to me that the attention to detail I desire is shared by Atlas, and not Kato. I spend time looking over the new Kato's at the LHS, and I see it too.

Do they really think they can get away with bleed-through/ washed colors in pad-printing/ blatantly mismatched colors between plastic and paint, without upsetting their market of high-end buyers?

 

I respectfully Disagree. I have a box of 35 Atlas Master locomotives that are the worst running locomotives I have. They make all sorts of noise and jerk back and forth on the track. I do not own a single Atlas locomotive that is as quiet and smooth running as my Kato locomotives. And for the sake of full truthfull disclosure, I have a similar box of 19 Kato locomotives that are not very quiet or very smooth either. In both cases I am debating on what to do with the locomoitves.

The broad generalizations made about either manufacturer are only a view of the posters sample size. If you only have 10 locomotives, you do not nsee the same results as someone with 100 locomotives.

As someone with over 1500 locomotives in my inventory, I see a lot more things than most. So I think that posts like these need to be taken in the context of how many locotives is your sample. So I will start this by giving my numbers and obsevations based on these numbers.

So, with over 600 Kato and over 500 Atlas locomoitves, the Kato locomotive consistently runs better and smoother than the Atlas locomoitves. I am not saying Atlas locomotives are that inferior, but if I need brute force pulling ability, I use Kato everytime. Atlas makes some nice looking locomotives, but I have yet to see an Atlas SD60 pull anything close to a Kato SD70, or a Kato SD45. This is the case for all of the 38 SD60 variants I own. Scale motors mean nothing to me because I convert everything to DCC and program all my locomoitves for scale speed operation.

And with all the hubub about the scale speed motors, I do not see them pulling any better than the non-scale speed motors, in fact from what I have seen, the scale speed motors are lacking in torque and only pull about 70% of what the non-scale speed locomoitves do.

With an additional 270 IM locomotives, and the rest is mostly brass, I see issues with the Tunnel Motors using the Atlas chassis, but see great things in the F units. They are almost on par with the Kato F units in operation, but I will say they look a lot better than the Kato units.

These are my obeservations based on the numbers of locomoitve I have worked with.

 

WHAT's GOING ON HERE!