Electroburgers on the menu!

This week marks the triumphant return of the Electroliner to active service. I bought the Electroliner new in the early 2000's. It is the only brass model I own, manufactured by 3rd Rail/Sunset Models. It is a beautiful scale model, but from day one it has had problems. While troubleshooting these problems, I quickly learned that I don't want to invest in any other brass models in the future. They are very finicky.

Earlier this year, I had the motors serviced in Michigan. This week I performed the final major work, which involved swapping two motor lead wires in the head unit (#802). The photos below show the 'Liner laid out on a foam "workbench", with wires attached to the roller pickups and wheels. It kind of looked like it was connected to life support, or was possibly part of an experiment being performed by Dr Frankenstein. Regardless, this allowed me to power up the train while it was laying on its side, and confirmed without a doubt that the front and rear motors were turning in the opposite directions. I also saw that the rubber tires on the front wheels had degraded to the point that pieces of them were whipping around. I removed the offending pieces of rubber. Later this year I'll apply some Bullfrog Snot to these wheels to provide more traction. Anyway, I opened the shell on the lead unit and unplugged the wires that lead to the motor. I cut the two wires and swapped their placement on the motor connector. I reconnected everything and powered up the Electroliner again, and all the wheels were running in sync. I can't prove it, but I think this was a problem from the factory, as the 'Liner had never run smoothly on the layout in Illinois. The two motors working against each other caused the rubber tires to fall apart, and eventually resulted in one of the motors being damaged (repaired earlier this year).

I placed the Electroliner on Track 4 and tried it out. I found that it has some trouble with electrical flow on the west side of the layout at slower speeds. But when I opened up the throttle, it zips around the whole loop flawlessly. The sounds and horn features work too. There is still some work to do: the aforementioned traction tire repair, the interior lights are out on the rear unit, and most of the interior window frames need to be reattached. But, I've placed the train back on the active roster, since it is performing very well on the track. I've now run the Electroliner more in Montana then I had in Illinois, and am very pleased with its performance. It has a GREAT "clickity-clack" sound which is quite realistic. I know this because I've had the pleasure of riding on the original #801-802 Electroliner at the Illinois Railway Museum. They are currently restoring it again, so we'll all have the chance to ride it again in the coming years. I won the race though: my Electroliner got fixed before theirs!

Also this week another historic Lionel Postwar 6464 car was added to the roster. The red Minneapolis & Saint Louis 6464-525 boxcar is from the original 1957-1958 production run. So far I've collected 5 of the 29 original 6464-series boxcars, and it's been fun so far!

I've updated some of my model railroad spreadsheets to reflect current train prices, and improved the layout on a tab containing Postwar Lionel information. I also purchased some more rolling stock, which will be detailed in next week's blog post.

Keep those rails shiny ~

Electroliner on the operating table

Electroliner rounds the SE curve of Track 4

6464-525, nearly 60 years old