A question for all who've purchased the new S gauge FlyerChief Polar Express set

This has been discussed here over and over again.  I suggest you look through the Polar Express topics posted here over the last month or more to see all that has been written about the Flyer PE set.

OK, Now I understand. A statistical count.

I have the wrong subframe on my observation car and did not cut off the steps.  I did not contact Lionel.  I am sure Lionel will not do anything to remedy this.  Think of the costs it would incur for them?     

All problems with my set have been solved to my satisfaction, but the main reason I'm NEVER getting rid of the set or sending it back????

Sam, who will be four in January, can now run Grandpa's trains!  He loves the bells and whistles. 

Uncertain which steps you're referring to, cocker. I have all of the O gauge sets semi-scale sets (conventional PE set, two LionChief PE sets, a 10th Anniversary LionChief PE set, the 10th Anniversary PE Diesel Streamliner set), and a scale PE observation car and none of them have the baggage car door steps I'm inquiring about.

As for the big deal -- would cutting it off void the Lionel warranty?

BTW, that's a sweet picture, Jerry.

Is the warranty on an observation car really that big of a deal in the first place?

Would you send an observation car to Lionel to fix?

I mentioned warranty on a passenger car, RoyBoy and cocker, as I once had a lighted passenger car with a combo riveted truck, coupler, electric pickup roller unit whose coupler stopped working and it cost more than I thought it would for a new truck unit and labor costs for removing and replacing the broken unit with the new one. 

I called "L" customer service the other day and they told me to cut the steps off.

And, replacement traction tires will be available in a couple weeks if you didn't get any with your set. 

Jerry caught what it's all about though.

Gregg

It would probably be easier (and neater) to carefully drill out the eyelet rivets that hold those steps on.

Rusty

The rivets are SMALL!  So I don't know if much light would come through.  Drill them out?  That would have been my fix had I not been able to swap a baggage car frame I had that DIDN'T have side door steps.  But if you have holes, you can always cover them with black electrician's tape.  Or let the light shine through and call it Vanity Lighting like airlines that illuminate the tail logos on their aircraft! 

And guys, thanks for the comments on Sam.  He doesn't seem to mind the small stuff we sometimes complain about.  It runs, smokes and makes noise!  Sometimes I forget what it's all about.  Sam reminds me every time we go into the train room.

The rivet holes will be covered by the underframe casting.  All of the other cars already have the holes in them (these are Alton cars... same thing) :

Rusty

Those rivets holding the steps on are very soft, maybe aluminum, I drilled them out of the steps with a pin vise. Doing this when you reach the step with the bit the step will pull off easily, the stub of the rivet stays in the chassis and no light comes through.

Ray

ogaugeguy,

If you look at Rusty's pictures above my post you can see on the bottom of the car the cast part of the car that is retained by two screws. the second picture shows the bottom of the car with the screws and the cast piece removed, with that piece off the rivets attaching the steps are visible. The drill size I used was 3/32" and as I stated I used a pinvise, and carefully removed just enough of the rivet so with slight pressure the step will come loose. I set these aside to possibly use on another project.

Ray

Removed two screws on that bottom plastic cast piece but it won't come off easily as I thought it would. Seems to still be bound somewhere somehow. Is there a trick to removing it? Have I missed something? I'm leery of yanking it hard, fearing I'll break something. Any suggestions, hints, or tips on what to do now to fully remove it and reveal those riveted steps? 

The cast piece is also held on one end by a tab in a slot in the stamped metal frame.  The slot is on the end with the lettering on the frame.  The other end of the cast piece can be lifted up and then the cast piece can be removed from the slot.

Thanks, Jerry and RAY. That explains it.

Thanks Jerry, Ray, and Rusty on that tutorial on removing baggage car steps. Drilling out rivet ends and lifting out steps couldn't be any easier, and neater than snipping steps off. Those rivets are so soft, drilling them was like going thru warm butter with a hot knife. Next project is replacing lights in cars with LED light strips and gunrunnerjohn's constant current lighting regulators.

Suggestions welcome on how to remove car body shell from frame so LED light strip can be affixed to car ceiling. If, as the user manual says, you remove the four screws on the frame as though you were going to replace the car's bulb, the body will lift off the frame exposing the car's ceiling. No tabs or anything to keep the body from lifting off the  frame -- correct?

You're welcome!  That's what the forum is for.

And the user's manual is wrong.  There isn't only four screws holding the body to the frame, there's six.  Four are near the corners and two are near the center of the body.  They're hidden by the cast detail piece that hides the bulb socket.  Once the die cast piece is removed, you can see the remaining screws.  To simply change the bulb, you don't need to remove the whole frame, just the die cast piece.  The bulb socket is just like the classic Gilbert ones. 

Replacing the bulb with an LED strip sounds like a great idea.  If I ever try to detail the interiors of these (or similar cars), I'll try it.  But with the lack of interior detail, it doesn't seem all the necessary, especially for a fantasy train.  Now my Pennsy set... ;>

Mark, You may soon find out the wire to the pilot truck was also attached with the bubble gum. I had to solder mine. The toughest part was keeping all the parts, the washers, spring and truck all together while reattaching the truck to the engine.

Ray

While running this set in a darkened room, I've noticed a considerable rooftop glow of the observation car from its interior lighting. The baggage car roof also has a considerable glow nearly as bright as that of the observation car. The glow from the roofs of the other cars is much less noticeable.

Before adding  LED light strips I'll either paint the underside roofs of all the cars flat black, or add black paper or electrical tape to the  ceilings to make them less translucent and more opaque.

I have used the warm white in all of my flyonel cars that are converted, in the PE I have also installed a control module purchased from EBAY to dim the strip just a bit.

Ray