Is anyone else as bothered as I that his rear wheels are set wider than the rest of the train? I can’t unsee.

 

Hello out there, I recently found 2 of these Thomas, and I will be cancelling my pre order with BBTS, if anyone wants to jump on it. I got tired of waiting on them. Just putting it out there.

 

Probably not as bothered as me.

 

Should have been overcome-able

 

If you replace the screw with one that's threaded the whole way I could see that being viable. But if you re-use the original screws you'd have to really pad out the bare shank otherwise it will still twist, still catch, and still potentially cause problems.

It's completely hidden, though, so I wouldn't be at all worried about the aesthetics.

*ed: On that same subject, if you were concerned with aesthetics... black heat shrink tubing. 2-3mm unshrunk diameter would be plenty. One, maybe two 5mm (7mm if you run right up to the head) lengths could be used to cover the bare part of the shank and pad it out enough to stop twisting. If you're feeling really game you could try a 10mm (12mm to the head) length over the whole thing but I don't think there's clearance around the threads for that without enlarging the hole in the metal armature.

Use the stuff without glue and it would be easily reversible if you got it wrong or it just doesn't work.

PS I'm planning to try the nail method myself. I've fabricated screws and bolts before and have the appropriate taps, so hopefully I can pull it off (will be useful for other projects to know if I can).

 

Alright, how we splitting the bill?

 

I’ve done bolts and nuts before but don’t own any taps now. Not sure I would fancy the chances of a slotted nail head working though... good luck all who try some of these methods us know they go.

anyone here who ordered through Baba and had a package arrive in the destination country? Mine hasn’t updated in over a week...

 

“Astrotrain! Transform and get us out of here!”

 

Got my Thomas. The right knee doesn't line up. Any one in New Zealand with a bung left knee want to swap ratchets?

 

Mine arrived today - I don't notice any difference with the alignment on the knees, and if their is I can't notice it.

On the other hand, the ankle tilts on mine are CRAZY TIGHT and I feel like they are going to snap - anyone know of a way to loosen those?

 

Just work em back and forth

 

As above, plus (and you may have already done it) but make sure the heels are unpegged and orientated correctly - out of the box they are pegged in in train mode, and you need to unpeg and rotate so the flat yellow side is facing down (not the train light). If still pegged in the ankle tilt is nearly unmoveable.

 

oh yeah, that was the first thing I did when I took him out.

 

Hopefully you guys get new tracking updates soon.
Baba shipped mine out on 10/13/2020 in China. I just now received a USPS tracking update via email that shows as of today, 10/19/2020, it has processed through ISC San Francisco and has a delivery ETA of 10/24/2020.

 

baba sorted it out and reshipped it so hopefully no problems this time, unlike my sovereign that was in the country for a week and went back to america more than a month ago and still hasnt gotten back to TFSource to send it back.

 

Still putting Thomas through the paces, but I'm enjoying him so far!

 

Well... at the risk of losing whatever credibility I have left, I feel it's important to mention that I stuffed up. The screws they use aren't M2s, which in hindsight I could have very, very easily confirmed without even leaving my seat. They have the 2mm major diameter and 1.6mm minor diameter of an M2, but the thread pitch is around 0.75mm - M2 is nominally 0.4mm coarse, 0.25mm fine (not that you ever really find fine threads smaller than M6). Either this is some kind of uncommon "super-coarse" thread or it's imperial, and I lack the knowledge to ID imperial threads (if it helps it's 5/64" major, 1/16" minor, and 1/32" pitch or 32tpi).

But I can say that the threaded nail idea is feasible if someone can ID the thread and has the appropriate die (which I don't).

Plus side, if there is one, I now have two 2mm nails, 14mm long with 2mm of M2 thread on them, but between the mismatched threads and kinda manky slot means they fit but won't screw in. Still need to work on cutting those heads (maybe less caffeine?) but I'm pleased I could cut a thread that small while still using grey-scale language. I guess the option is still there to just use them as pins by grinding off the threads I have made.

BTW, when you're re-assembling those armatures, get the screws all the way in but don't tighten them unless the panels are secured in the down position (ie The non-bot position). If you do them up too tight you can make it nigh impossible to actually peg it in down there due to compression, so you want to put it in place there and just snug up the screws. No gorilla fist stuff.

*ed: While I was in there this time I also noticed that there's no obvious chamfer on the metal part. If that's a square edge on hole that would cause it to catch more, so a quick hit with a countersink bit might also help the situation a lot. Not much - just enough to take the corner off.

 

I‘m sorry for asking but can anyone elaborate on what the issue with the screws in Thomas’ chest is or at least point me in the direction where I can find the problem explained?

 

A quick search of imperial thread charts led me to this ... and, uh, whatever that screw is, it's not imperial either. Closest size on the chart is #1, but none of those have a 32 tpi option.

If you're correct, and FansToys custom sourced this screw ... I think I'm out of words to describe that level of incompetence.

The issue is that they shouldn't be screws. There are two plates on the chest which are attached to a sliding armature at the bottom. Instead of using a smooth pin for the slider, they used a screw, which doesn't work as a slider or a pin. It sticks, strips the plastic, and routinely falls out even if you're careful with it.

-XCN-

 

I would doubt it was custom sourced, but it could be a leftover box/crate from something else which just happened to fit. And that something else doesn't even have to be related to FansToys at all. Sometimes you just use what you can get your hands on. Definitely not best practice but if it works and it's available than most times there's no reason not to (in this case the reason not to would be that it makes finding a suitable alternative extremely awkward).

It seems all the world like a #1-32 or there-abouts, but as you've spotted that kind of thread doesn't seem to exist... at least by the standards. I also did a bit of looking around and couldn't find anything which matches in metric, USS, imperial, or Wentworth - anything that narrow has a much finer thread pitch. It's almost like it's a thread meant for a wood screw, not a machine screw, but again I wouldn't expect to see a wood screw that narrow. See edit.

I'm going to re-visit the pin idea tomorrow when it's daylight again. It uses far more readily available tools so should hopefully be easier for others to replicate, but it will still require a few things that not everyone is going to have (electric drill, pin files, something to cut it to length like a hacksaw blade or rotary tool, and ideally some vernier/digital calipers but you might be able to wing it with a decent ruler).

To expand on what Xcandescent has said, it's one of those things you can work around if you're aware of it but it can also catch you off guard. Basically if you can slide the chest plates straight back and forth on the armatures then you have no problem save a minor rubbing, but you can very easily twist them which in turn causes the armatures to catch on the screw threads - exacerbated if it catches while you're turning the armature or chest plate, since then it can pinch and grip. Catch a few times, get frustrated and pull too hard... they're tiny, coarse threads, so you can easily tear the screw out of the plastic.


*ed: Boom - found it! Wood screws gave me an idea, and set me on a different path. They're M2x14 plastic thread forming screws. These have a thread pitch of 0.79mm, which is pretty close to the 0.75mm I measured (a few hundredths isn't unexpected inaccuracy with my abilities). Still not the right hardware for the job but not something unexpected for plastics (which is outside of my wheel well).