I don't see your comparison. The works in a Model Railroad Locomotive are far simpler than the clock you are comparing. A motor, some gearing, side rods and that is it. With a MDC Roundhouse Steamer; or, Blue Box Athearn Diesel, the repair was inexpensive and easy to do and I don't need all the easily broken molded details, I added brass or plastic detail parts as I deemed necessary. If a $200.00 to $500.00 dollar locomotive has no longevity and will not last, I think I and everyone else should find a better hobby to throw money at!
Sorry I have run away with your thread Greg! However, Crandell has made some points that I wanted to discuss!
I understand your points, Mark. I see them expressed by people who say that too much of what is available to them is more than they ought to have to pay for. For example, a person in DC who doesn't want DCC-equipped locomotives, but he will have to make his own or do without, or purchase brass he can afford if he doesn't want to pay for the all-singing-DCC/sound offerings in the commercial market. But, that's a bit of a straw man...don't you think? The dealer and importer have to make and offer what appeals to the bulk of it's prospective market or there's no use in being in it in the first place. It's no different for those who must adapt/bash what they can find so that they have the rendering they desire. But, they have to start somewhere if they can't/won't build their own from scratch.
The operating conditions between the clock and the locomotive are hardly comparable. The loco runs across dusty and cruddy rails that must be cleaned, and those contaminants may or may not end up in the works internally. Apparently, for some cases it happens. For most, it should not. Yet, while the clock must run for tens of thousands of hours continuously, we pay a premium for that reliability, including in properly sealed mechanisms protected by airtight doors at the back of the cabinet. That costs. Instead, we think our $250 toys should be able to scrub across crude nickel-silver rails for the same hours and not show signs of wear on their thinly metal-covered tires. Or that, by your admission, their simple and easily accessible and maintainable mechanisms, all comparatively more exposed and working under greater strains (hauling 16 trailing grams up 3% grades) should last as long as the sealed mechanism costing many times more.
As I said, the repairs for the clock, four times since about 1998, averaged about $400 each time. The last, indicating a thorough de-gunking, lube and reassembly, was coming in at an estimated $800. Two different mechanisms, so that is explained away...agreed. But, the clock has to move two hands whose total weight might amount to 2 grams when the indicated time is a quarter to three...maximum torque on the pivots due to gravity. Our locomotives must do work many times that taxing.