161 mail pickup accessory

[dsmith]

Mark,

I used a 12 volt DC solenoid that is attached underneath the platform so that it would pull the lever and push out a barretl.  To retract the lever I used a thin piece of stiff steel wire to act as a spring to retract the lever when the solenoid is turned off.  A single diode is used to convert the AC of my transformer to 1/2 wave DC and a push button was added at the control panel to trigger the barrel loading each time the button is pressed.  The platform origionally came with"wooden" barrels but they jammed too easily so I made my own oil drums out of small pieces of wood dowel and painted them orange with silver tops.

[Lionelking313]

Dave, what kind of mechanism did you use for the manual barrel loader?

 

Mark

[dsmith]

I have the modern repro version of the 161 on my layout and it works perfectly every time.  Instead of gluing the magnet on the outside of a boxcar, I pruchased a more powerful magnet and clued it on the inside of a Lionel mail car.  The magnet attracts the mail mag, that then sticks to the side of the boxcar.  The critical part is to get the mail pickup mechanism at just the right distance from the track and then screwing it down to the layout.  I like using the Lionel mail car becasue you can pickup and drop off the mail.  The mail dropoff is less dramatic because the bag is small and it  all happens very fast.

Here is a video of the mail car in operation, both pickup and drop off.  If you go to 6:11 in the video, that time were the mail happens.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zXihu92pqME

 

 

[Buzzardbreath]

Has anyone got a 161 mail pickup on his layout? I see this item in the Lionel catalog but have never seen one in operation, I am thinking about using  one for my layout and am wondering if it is a P.I.T.A. to use or not.  thanx for any info!