Running 1700E's on Christmas day 2020

[pjdog350]

I thought I'd make a video of a couple of my restored Lionel 1700's running today. I thought I have a train running around the Christmas tree this year. However USPS took 17 days for my Lionel track EBay order to go from Garret Indiana to Indianapolis. That's a total of 146 miles. 17 days? Things are really a mess. The track has never arrived. So I went to the mancave and ran them on the garage layout.

First thing was I had to clean the track as they would not run. Then the Orange & Brown 1700 ran fine. However the chrome & red just sat there. Light didn't even light up? I just went through the motor. New E-Unit. New wiring? Tested the motor by itself and it ran fine? I'm not use to a repair before you can run trains. I pulled the motor out and put another motor in from the silver set. Now it runs. I have the chrome set pulling extra cars as I have two chrome & red sets. You can tell the longer set runs slower and is pulling 1 extra volt? Also the chrome & red set would derail coming back from the garage door? Prewar trains are allot of trouble! Turns out the vestibule where it attaches to the power unit was warped up. So the movement was sticky causing the derailment. Fixed now. I'm sure all the prewar guys on this forum already know how to avoid these problems.

Anyway - Merry Christmas to all and I hope you enjoy my 1700's.

[Terry]

You trains look good.

There are always problems with the trains. It makes the satisfaction even better when we do get them running. After all, anyone could take a bew train out the box and run it.

[pjdog350]

Thanks Terry. It’s been allot of fun doing them. I was really surprised that the red & chrome was dead. I just did a new e-unit, brushes, & tested the motor before I installed it?

 I’m putting a 229e motor in the other power red & chrome unit. I think the 229 motor is very smooth runner? Still waiting on USPS to deliver but it is in Florida so it’s getting close?