I bought this case, despite the negative reviews, for three reasons. First, I wanted to teach my boys to take care of their trains a bit better. Until we got this case, they would just toss them in one big plastic bin with the rest of their train accessories. It was kind of a mess. Second, the size of the case was perfect to fit under a small cabinet we have that holds all our larger TWR pieces. Lastly, it was on sale at Toys R Us for 32$.So despite the criticisms, "Travelton Sheds" as we have dubbed it, is now part of our collection. My boys (2 and 5) enjoy playing with it mostly in the closed position, attaching ascending tracks to the side, and helping their engines find the lost city of "Great Travelton." My only beef with this case so far, and I knew this prior to purchasing, was that it didn't come with a track adaptor. When my boys build off the side of the case as I mentioned, they cannot connect the two ascending tracks back together in a loop. This doesn't bother my kids as much as me. Actually, my older boy, amazed me by working around the case, connecting an eastern loop to right side of case and western loop to the left. Every once in a while little brother would knock down the ascending track connecting to one side of the box, and then we would send in Thomas and his crew to "fix a broken bridge at the eastern cliff of Great Travelton."
We received this in the mail today.The outer packaging was intact, no issues with the box at all... but I was disappointed to see the corners of this storage box appear to be cheap wood material and one of the corners had a chunk broken off.The closures on the sides seem to be very flimsy and poor quality plastic, even right out of the box it doesn't seem to be securely closed and I'm afraid it won't withstand the test our 3 year old will put it through.. not to mention that this is actually two pieces that come apart, not a hinged box that opens and closes easily like I assumed it would be.
Really a fabulous idea, but poorly thought out.In my opinion this is NOT worth the $60+ price tag.
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I asked my mom to get this for my son for Christmas.He loves Thomas and has lot's of engines to play with.My husband and I work full time and my son goes to my aunt's house twice a week for babysitting.He needed something to carry his trains in and I thought this would be perfect since it has a built-in track.This piece has worked out really well.The outside is made of wood, similar to that of the wooden railway tracks and trains.It's painted with nice bright colors.There are sturdy, plastic clasps on each side of the case.When you open it, there are no hinges.The two sides are not attached.It seems odd, at first, but it works perfectly.When it's open, you set both sides flat on the floor and push the two inside edges together.There are magnets on each piece that hold them together.
On the inside, there is a clear plastic with slots that are sized just right for holding enginges and cars securely in place (generic wooden railway pieces also fit).There are 8 slots on each side but you can only place trains in one side or the other.You can fit 2 Thomas sized engines or cars in each slot, so you can have as many as 16 pieces in the case.The larger engines with coal tenders would take up one slot each, so you could fit only 8 of those. I usually pack 2 or 3 engines plus 2 or 3 cars, so it provides plenty of storage for our purposes.I don't see the need to schlep ALL of his engines and cars back and forth.
A bonus feature of this case is that it is fitted with 2 female track slots on each side.If you have the case folded in the closed position, it is the perfect height to attach 2 ascending pieces of track so that you can connect it with your regular wooden train tracks.The downside is that both sides are female, so you do need a male/male adaptor piece to make it work, which we have, so it's no big deal.It makes sense, though, that if they had a male end sticking out of this case, it just wouldn't work.It would most likely get broken off, or something, so it's not unreasonable in my opinion.
It seems to be fairly sturdy, although, my step-dad dropped it in the driveway when he was unloading it from their car and it has a chip in one of the corners.Also, the paint, which is like the paint on the wooden engines, seems like it will eventually get scratched up a bit.Several of my son's engines have chips in the paint because he's dropped them on the hard floor.Knowing how boys can be, I figure that's only to be expected.
As I said before, this piece is a must-have for us.My son LOVES playing with it.It's perfect for toting his trains when we go visiting someplace and we don't HAVE to bring track with us everywhere we go because it's built in.Although, you could fit a few pieces of track in there if you wanted.It's great!I love it, and my son loves it.
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We bought this for our boys, ages 3.5 and 2.5, to have a portable thomas track to take with us on short trips or visits. It is working out great so far! When we are not traveling with it, they love using it as the storage place for their trains. At night when we clean up before bedtime they put their trains away in the case to "put them to bed".We have not had any problems with the latches. I guess you could say they are quirky, but I don't expect them to break. My kids are not too rough on their toys tho.Lastly, I did not pay the price on Amazon because it was twice as much as what was advertised elsewhere. But for the price I paid it was absolutely worth it!
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This toy is fantastic in concept, but in reality the function of the design is a complete disaster! Similar to other reviews I've read on the toy, we've had the same experience with this item. WHY wouldn't they put piano hinges on the case? Foolish me, I figured that's how it was designed when I looked at the picture on the package. Magnetic connection to keep it together during play? Yeah, right. The worst part about this toy isn't even the lack of attention to detail in the hinging of the case, but rather, the fact that since all four connections coming off of the case are female ends, when you build a track coming off of the case, you can't connect them because you end up with two female ends together. There is no way around this unless you purchase (separately) the adapter. To top it off, the height of the case is exactly the wrong size to use the elevated track piece to rise up to or down from the case to the floor. We had to stack DVDs (three high) under the case to get the track elevation to line up to the height of the track piece that rises and falls. So, to sum it up. Do not buy this product! Avoid it like the plague! Even at $39 on sale, you're better off saving your money on this one!
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