Anyone upgrade a Lionel Flyer 4-4-2 Columbia?

[FEClionel]

I was looking through the Lionel catalog last night and I never would consider purchasing one of the "flyer" sets - but I started thinking if it was possible to upgrade one of these basic engines. Does the NYC set with railsounds/trainsounds have a flywheel? How hard would it be to upgrade to TMCC. What details could be added to make this set look better? When did Lionel start putting wire hand rails on these engines and how well do they pull? Lot of questions here - I want a basis set to run with my Polar Express under the tree - square footage is limited. I was thinking about a NYC flyer set of a PW set headed by a 1947 675 K-4 with various early postwar 40's rolling stock. Any thoughts???

[jimhaleyscomet]

I am curious also!

Jim H

[Jumijo]

A friend of the family gave us a 4-4-2 starter set loco last summer. I had intended to weather it up and see how realistic I could make it look. Instead, my daughter has requested that I paint it pink like the old girls set. I'll bet that with a little detail, these little engines could look stellar.

Jim

[ben10ben]

I have one that I converted to TMCC.

I put the electronics in the tender, and ran them to the engine through a tether. The tether is routed through three holes drilles inside the cab.

The hookup inside the engine is pretty straightforward. Two wires go to the motor. I did a little bit of minor rewiring to be able to control the smoke unit and headlight separately.

I left two wires for a possible potential Railsounds upgrade, although I don't know if that will ever happen.

The final two wires of the 8 wire tether were used to mount the program-run switch where the E-unit lockout switch had been previously.

Finally, I replaced the rear truck with a postwar coil coupler truck that was missing the sliding shoe, and hooked it up to board.

The board I used was the DC DLX from Digital Dynamics. Using newer compact electronics, it might be possible to mount the board where the E-unit once was. You could then leave the air whistle intact, or install Railsounds. Either option could be done with a small 4 wire tether rather than the bulky 8 wire tether I used.