Caveat Emptor: Replacement Postwar Smoke Units

[M. Mitchell Marmel]

Remember that nice, shiny new smoke unit from Olsen's Toy Trains I put in my 2025 during its recent restoration? 

Well, the cussed little thing conked out after an hour or so of operation.  After trying various things such as letting the engine sit  overnight and letting it sit in neutral with full power on for an hour or so to burn off any excess fluid, I sighed and dismantled the loco. 

To my chagrin, I discovered that the cement holding the plastic cap on had loosened, and the cap was floating free.   Since this particular design calls for the resistor to have a friction fit ground against the body of the smoke unit, it stopped working. 

After some mulling over and foul language, I decided that an external ground was called for.  So, I pried the ground out of the cap and folded it over the outside of the smoke unit. 

It was at this point I discovered that the Brain Trust at Lionel had, for some obscure reason, seen fit to mold yon smoke unit out of Cerroflex or some other low-temp alloy:

Oh, well.  At least it's grounded now. 

Helpful hint:  Don't wait until the locomotive is mostly reassembled before noticing you forgot to put on the smokestack gasket.   It's a darned good thing I love model railroading, else my workshop windows would, no doubt, have several locomotive-shaped holes in their panes. 

Side note:  Since I'm the paranoid cautious type, I also picked up a rebuild kit for the original pellet-based smoke unit, and that's been overhauled and is ready for action just in case:

If I DO wind up installing this one, I think I'll just run a jumper wire to the frame.  ;-)

Mitch

[cwburfle]

Was the replacement a pellet type or liquid type smoke unit.

I prefer to rebuild smoke units with pellet type heaters.
I purchased some of liquid type smoke unit renewal kits before replacement smoke pellets were brought to market. Since the pellets are available again, I've never used any of the liquid renewal kits.
 

[M. Mitchell Marmel]

Both the replacement and rebuild kits were for liquid type.  Less expensive than pellets, and you don't have all that residue to deal with.  :)

[cwburfle]

I'll take a little white power residue over the oily film that liquid smoke generates.

[RedfireS197]

The liquid conversion kits are junk.  I've had more than a dozen fail under normal operation.  Anytime I get a locomotive on the bench with one of those conversion kits in place,  I replace it with a pellet type heater.

Pellet heaters work fine with liquid, and I've never had one burn out.  The only pellet heater that I've had to replace due to damage was one that the owner used a screwdriver to clear the pellet accumulation.

[ADCX Rob]

RedfireS197

The liquid conversion kits are junk... ...Anytime I get a locomotive on the bench with one of those conversion kits in place,  I replace it with a pellet type heater...   ...Pellet heaters work fine with liquid, and I've never had one burn out...

Precisely.

[cjmeyers]

I'd have to disagree. I've rebuilt a handful of PW smokers with the liquid smoke kits and have had good success with them. They've never burnt out on me and I've experienced significantly improved smoke output than from the old pellet types.

[sulafool]

Agree with cjmeyers--whenever a customer brings me a PW engine wanting more smoke, I put in the liquid unit and they go away happy. Haven't had one come back yet. I don't use the fibreglas sleeve or that crappy yellow pac man wadding though. I'm sure some of them have been run dry as well, but again no one has complained.

[rtraincollector]

You my friend have been very lucky. I have never had a problem with a pellet where liquid like the other's commented in here have had problems with liquid kit. And the amount of smoke from the old pellet type replacement does me fine for smoke I do not need to be smoked out of a room. And my newer engines I have smoke turned off as I normally don't use it. The only problem I ever had with a original was as one poster above stated some one took a screw driver or something to get the residue out of it I had gotten a engine at a auction I put power to it on the track I didn't notice the damage to the smoke unit well when it started to struggle I gave it more power well at that point I had like a 5" flame come straight up out of the smoke stack I immediately shut all down and when engine cooled I took it apart and saw the smoke unit was toast replaced it with liquid kit which was only thing available at the time and it lasted a little better than a month so I said heck with it until the pellet type was available. 

[sulafool]

Wow! That must have been spectacular! Assuming you did a postmortem, what exactly was it that caught fire?

[cwburfle]

Lionel issued a service bulletin in the early 1970's about flames erupting from smoke units. According to my recollection, sometimes flames would shoot out of the stack when smoking Modern Era locomotives were run with Postwar transformers due to the higher voltage.

It was the smoke fluid that was burning, and Lionel claimed that no damage would result.

I forget what action was to be taken.
If someone wants to know, I will try to find the paper.

[rtraincollector]

the engine was A 2026 with original smoke unit. it had shorted out (the smoke unit ) and I hadn't put anything in it yet. big black mark inside unit. so anyway got another smoke unit and all was fine for a month or so it now has a pill unit in it.