Blue Comet Windows Fixed: 37 minutes (at least for the first car).

Excellent!!!!!

Outstanding!

PCRR/Dave

Now that looks great, what was Lionel thinking! 

Looks great. I am actually having a too bright light question with the Plasticville I am trying to light up with Christmas Lights. I am going to try painting them white with light bulb paint when I get a chance. Maybe that would help you? No guarantees though.

Thanks Lee - very helpful..... what diner?.... I don't know anything about a diner....

Lee,

Nice work on the tint removal.  I'm going to save this thread so one day I'll do mine.  Once again you mention a diner car, but Lionel hasn't made a Blue Comet diner car since 2002.  What diner car are you talking about?

It's 6-15406 from the 2002 catalog I'm trying to find.  My LHS thinks they may be able find one for me.  I don't know if it will have clear or tinted windows, nor it if will match the paint of these.

If no luck there of if the paint does not match, I will take one from an expansion pack and make one.  The photo in the 2002 catalog looks as if the body casting is the same as for the other coach cars (the windows are in the same places, etc.) - its only the interior that is different.  No problem to make an interior.

Much better, bravo.

Lee,

The Alton Diner from than time has the green windows.

The window strips for the heavyweight cars are available from Lionel (620-5500-023) , but...in the exploded parts picture, the strip is clear. When you pick on the individual picture for the strip, it is green. My guess would be the replacement is green also.

Aristo-Craft made a nice G scale set of the Blue Comet a couple of years ago. It has the correct trucks, 3 axle on the diner and 2 axle on the other cars.

This would not be an easy fix on the Lionel cars.

Here are some pictures of the set I found.

http://www.golddawg.com/GDRR_2007_ACBC_P2.htm

As one can pick up from my various postings I am not one for precise correspondence to the prototype - I go more by what looks good: green tinted windows don't, but six-wheel trucks do, so they stay. 

I've got seven Lionel Pullman and NYC heavyweight cars, all just silhouette, that I bought used.  I had originally intended to make my own Blue Comet cars by modifying and repainting those, but a friend very correctly pointed out that matching the paint and doing the interiors and all would be a hassle. Anyway, they have ABS bodies that are basically identical to these and don't have quite the detail on the trucks.  If my LHS does not find my that BC diner, and I realize they may not be able to, I think I will make a diner and one other car out of two of those. 

Personally I think the tinted windows look better then the  clear with the tape blinds. Now the lights are too bright per your posting, are you going to do anything with the lights? I would have tried a smoke tint if I didn't like the green. Just one man's opinion.

Lee, here is the coach and combo add on set, that is available, in case you are interested.

http://www.grzyboskitrains.com/detail12657.aspx

Yeah, I'm going to turn them off.  I don't really do lights on my layout and never do "night' on the layout.  Few on my buildings have lights.  I have a few passenger trains with lights in then and it is fun to turn the lights in the trainroom off and watch them for a few minutes, but I normally run in "daylight" with train and building lights out, too.

During "daylight operations" I do not like to have any lights on (in buildings or in cars).  Even with the green tint, and forgetting the tint for a minute, the lighted cars look unnatural during the day because you can see the bright illumination from inside.  In the real world during the day, train car and building windows look dar - you really can't see the lights. 

I even thought of removing the LED strips from these blue comet cars while they are disassembled, since I will run with lights off, and then I thought - Why? I'm not going to put the lights in anything else, so I left them, but flip the switch underneath each to off.

If I understood you correctly, it sounds like Lionel is using LED strips in the cars which is a huge improvement than using incandescent lights (less power and heat).  I have no idea if the 2001 / 2002 cars did that, but for sure the windows were clear in 2001 / 2002.  Also, all the catalogs show the windows as clear in the picture, but they probably used 2001 / 2002 models for stand ins.  If Lionel makes add-on cars in the future (and I think they will), we won't know if these new cars will be green tinted or clear.  We will just have to wait and see.

Yes, they are LED light bars.  I removed one to take a photo of it to show what it looks like: see last photo below. 

I finished converting the other three cars.  BTW I left the green tint in the windows of the end vestibules - I removed those on one and put them back after seeing the result - vestible ends look weird with clear windows - I like the darkened look in the vestibule windows, and its so dark inside them that you  cant really tell it the window is green so it works out well. The most dramatic different is at the end - the rear of the observation car.  That looked terrible in green tint, and looks spectacular clear.

Lee, if the lights are too bright now, it looks as though it would be fairly simple to fit a diffuser strip (Thin white/ivory plastic sheet, or sanded clear plastic.) just below the LED board. This might also improve the overall look of the interior too, as it could hide the light board from view if it were constructed to imitate the car ceiling.