(10-29-2014, 03:54 PM)Super Wrote: I agree that the Emily looks gross. That is the big drawback of trying to fit every train on the same, bulky, chassis. What I don't understand is that with a direct drive, motor to axle, why is there a need for 2x AAA 3 volts? It seems to me in my amateur electrical mind that a more powerful motor direct drive like one of the Tamiya's would be more than enough power to run up those hills and only take one AA 1.5 volt battery which would leave more room for detailed engines. In fact without the bulkiness of the 2 AAA batteries and no need for the big motor housing the gears I think they might have even more likeness to the real Thomas line than with the older models. And they could even engineer the chassis to fit all characters. Of course this is only my opinion with no real idea as to what it takes to make these trains and how much the various ideas would cost.
Hi Super, quite simply Mattel wanted to cut manufacturing costs but standardizing all the chassis across the range, this means less work for designers and less work at the factory due to one set of chassis tooling required to make all the chassis. You are right about the upgrading the motor part and it was shown in Trackmaster's own youtube video behind the rails, you can see in one scene some preliminary sketches of the designs with notes in the corner as bullet points indicating "One chassis for all locomotives to reduce production costs" "increased speed with NO COST IMPACT" (this in itself is very telling that they themselves did not want to shoulder the cost for upgraded motors and would rather impose the cost on the consumer by having to buy extra batteries to double the voltage.