I've had this set since my first Christmas and somehow it has stood the test of time. I am having an issue with the front trucks staying in contact with the track (went to a Fast track laout when Polar Express was purchased), this is at the switch points. Local shop said to put weight on the front trucks and so I did, to no avail. Any ideas or help?
Check to see whether the wheels are spinning true (nice and straight). For some reason, I see a lot of engines with bent axles on the front truck. If its bent, replacing the axle should solve your problem.
If they are not bent, try checking that the truck is not bent (the metal frame, not the wheels.). This is a problem I had with my 1666 (beyond the fact I ran the wheels off it ).
"IT's GOOD TO BE THE KING",by Mel Brooks
Charter Member- Tardis Train Crew (TTC) - Detroit3railers- Detroit Historical society Glancy Modular trains- Charter member BTTS
Those locomotives suffer from an incorrect steering geometry, which causes the pilot truck to oversteer and often derail on curves--the sharper the curve, the greater the effect.. If you put the locomotive on an O27 curve, you may be able to see that the pilot wheels are not parallel to the rails, but angled toward the inside of the curve.
The pilot truck should have a longer tongue and should pivot around a point midway between the pilot-truck axle and the middle-driver axle, which is about where the motor's front crossmember is located. You may get along with a stronger spring or more weight on the truck or both; but, if you're willing, the real cure is to splice on a longer truck tongue and to create a new pivot at the correct location, as by drilling and tapping the crossmember.
Fun fact: It's not really a "prairie", even though Lionel called it that. The 2-6-4 wheel arrangement is an "Adriatic".
Bob Nelson
I agree with the fact that the front trucks seem to want to dive off of the track on the inside curves, or if at a switch point not knowing which angle to accept. If I extend the tongue and the receptor to a larger turing point. If you move the recptor to the rear say a half an inch. directly in front of the motor chasis and then attach the extended truck you will have chaged the radi, does this not affect the area of the wheel radius behind the cow catcher?
European 2-6-4 tank locomotives (they only made real 2-6-4's in Europe by the way) have also been referred to as "Baltics"
Lionel sold thousands upon thousands of locomotives that used the pilot truck and lamp bracket. The geometry might not be ideal, but they work.
I recommend extending the tongue by 3/4 inch, all the way to the motor crossmember. That's an easier place to create a new pivot, and the location is almost ideal for correct steering geometry. Although the truck does take a shallower path from side to side, there is no clearance problem with any part of the shell casting. The old sheet-metal pivot can be simply bent up, out of the way.
Another, uglier, alternative is to remove the truck entirely. This is what I did as a kid with my 2026 when I couldn't keep it on the track any other way. By some miracle, I still had the truck when, as an adult, I figured out the root of the problem and fixed it. The front truck hasn't derailed since.
Remember that the truck should be in the same location on straight track that it had before. That is, you should extend the tongue by the same distance that you move the pivot to the rear.
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