Double Heading Lionel Legacy Moguls

@superwarp1 posted:

Where are you guys finding these moguls?

Alex M had the one I got listed for $349 on the for-sale forum.  I figured I'd take a flier on it for that price and hope that I could rescue it.  Now that I'm looking at it, it's clear that the front driver is missing bushings, there is a huge amount of slop in those rods.  I'm afraid to even power it up before I get that fixed!  I don't see an issue with the rear driver bushings, the slop there isn't nearly as great at the front ones.  Truthfully, they look about the same as many of my other steamers.

Pete is spot-on with the traction tires, the rear drivers (bare) are 33.3mm in diameter, the front ones with the stock traction tires are 33.9mm in diameter.  That's a fairly significant difference and would surely cause some issues.  To make matters worse, the traction tires are on the front drivers, that's the driver set with the missing bushings, so it's providing most of the drive with the rods flopping around.  Small wonder it's so screwed up!  Someone will have to explain the logic of burying the traction tires behind the cylinder pistons to make them as hard as possible to change.  They'd probably be more effective at the rear and much easier to change as well.

I do have MTH traction tires, since I have some of every size, I'm sure I have something that will fit.  When I have the rods loose, it'll be easier to spin that driver set to put the tires on.

Missing bushings? Lionel had to send them back to China for missing bushings?

This was the part missing in action. $.40.

The easiest way to change the tires is remove the driver set. The bottom plate comes off. Just be careful you don't lose the springs above the rear drivers. No springs for the front and center drivers.

Pete

@Oman posted:

Missing bushings? Lionel had to send them back to China for missing bushings?

According to Dave Olson,  there were many issues. Missing bushings, and over sized traction tires were just part of it.  The factory changed the gear ratio from the approved production sample.  The new gear ratio was right on the edge of what the RCMC board could handle.  Causing the board to go into shutdown, and throwing a code.  The flashing cab light.  At least that was what my engine was doing.  Now Dave also said no two were alike problem wise.  Some were simple fixes and some couldn’t be fixed.  As for them being shipped to China,  I couldn’t find anything they did and mine ran no better.  So I sent it back to Lionel for a full refund.  So Dave was told to drop it and move on, kind of sad and I know Dave feels he let us down. 

with that said, Pete has had great success fixing the ones he’s gotten his hands on.  Hope John has the same success.

I am pretty sure the three I have never went to China. All had missing bushings and I have never had any speed issues or flashing lights. The ones that went back may not be so easy to fix if they changed the gears and thus the RCMC programing.

Pete

@Norton posted:

This was the part missing in action. $.40.

The easiest way to change the tires is remove the driver set. The bottom plate comes off. Just be careful you don't lose the springs above the rear drivers. No springs for the front and center drivers.

Pete

Not remembering how these are assembled, can the front driver be moved to the back? So the traction tires are under the fire box?

I am pretty sure the can. You can also get the driver sets from the TMCC Moguls except the center one won't work as it has a different gear but if you wanted to get rid of the traction tire use a rear TMCC driver on the front of the Legacy engine.

Pete

I have a conventional mogul wheelset, the one with the cam.  I got it because I was hoping I could just drop it into the TMCC version, but that doesn't work.  However, I also have a conventional Mogul that I'm going to upgrade with TMCC and cruise.  I may have to evaluate it and see if it would be possible to squeeze the Legacy stuff into it, but I don't know if the gear ratio is the same.

Were the tmcc mogals with odyssey ok? Did they have any issues? 

@Lionelzwl2012 posted:

Were the tmcc mogals with odyssey ok? Did they have any issues? 

Zero issues. They run like a watch. The TMCC Moguls came with a small Pittman motor too. The only odd thing is they came with a two lobe chuff came while the conventional ones have a 4 lobe. Installing a 4 lobe cam will give four chuffs.

Pete

Thanks pete

Pete, the conventional 4-lobe cam is too fat, so I'm guessing you made the cams?  I upgraded a conventional with the TMCC version motherboard, the ERR CC-M, and my Super-Chuffer.  It also ran very well, nice little engine.  Knowing what I know now, I could have retained the wireless drawbar.  I have a conventional one in my closet for upgrade, it'll get the same treatment, but I will retain the wireless drawbar.

I need to pull mine back out and look at it to see if it's missing that bushing.  So glad to see people are getting these running.

I don’t have a horse in this race but they are nice looking engines. 

Long shot idea... seems unusual to have traction tires on front drivers.  Could it be that the front and rear wheel sets are reversed from the factory?  Just wondering if they were assembled incorrectly causing these problems. 

The Legacy engines are identical to the TMCC engines except for the motors and worm gear. They run fine with the tires on the front. Here is one of TMCC Moguls with the stock tires on the front which are thinner than the ones on the Legacy engine. The only mechanical mod to this engine was replacing the two lobe cam with a four lobe. It will run slower than this but I was trying to juggle the speed control with the camera.

https://ogrforum.com/...-mogul-gets-a-helper

Pete

Finally got around to pulling the wheels and rods off of my Mogul.  I don't see any bushing or place for bushings on the front or rear axle.  The center axle has a top hat shaped one.  The only way a bushing would fit in the front or rear is if it's paper thin.  Here is a photo of the parts.

As for the traction tire, yes, it is bigger then the rear wheel, about .015 inch radially.  The center blind wheels are even smaller then the rear wheel, by about .005 radially.  I measured a couple of my other Legacy steamers and all their traction tires are larger then the other wheels.

When it was assembled the play in the front and rear axle wasn't that much greater then I notice on other steamers.

What else should I be looking at to get this to run right?  Again, what it does is runs for a while in one direction and I stop it, it won't continue back in that same direction without first moving in the opposite direction first.

Only the front driver on the Legacy Moguls is usually missing a bushing on the rod. You only have to try and move the rod to feel the difference in play between it and the rear driver. Further research shows Lionel intended to use a different rod screw with a larger diameter shoulder instead of the smaller shoulder screw with a bushing as they did on the early 2000 engines. The rear driver rod doesn't normally need a bushing. Wanting to fine tune the engine I made one anyway.

Since yours is apart compare the rod screws removed from the front and rear drivers. If they are the same you need a bushing. If not you are OK.

Pete

Pete, I got the new screws from Lionel for the TMCC Mogul, I haven't tried to see if they eliminate the bushing you made.  One is certainly a larger diameter, I haven't measured it yet.

It should work John. According to Lionel the shoulder should measure .174". It will be just a tad looser but work fine. I have used bushings with a .174" OD without a problem.

Just habit from building motorcycle engines I like to keep the tolerances under .001".

Pete

It looked visibly correct, I'll have to dig the Mogul out and give it a try.  I'm glad you pioneered the effort to figure these out, mine runs like a top with your bushings installed.  Neat little locomotives.

@Norton posted:

Since yours is apart compare the rod screws removed from the front and rear drivers. If they are the same you need a bushing. If not you are OK.

Looking at my parts now.  The rear shoulder screws are .120" & .121", the connecting rods holes are .127" & .126".  The front shoulder screws are .121" & .121", the connecting rods holes are .127" & .127".  So the front and rear as the same size.

@Norton posted:

It should work John. According to Lionel the shoulder should measure .174". It will be just a tad looser but work fine. I have used bushings with a .174" OD without a problem.

But if the screws are suppose to be .174" then there is no way they'd fit in my connecting rods.  So I'm at a loss as to what my course of action should be.

If the rod hole for the front driver is in fact .127" then you are set. I have not yet seen side rods with the front hole at this dimension. Was you engine sent back to China. I wonder if they swapped rods. Yet you say the engine locks up when changing direction so something is still amiss.

Pete

Yes, it was returned to Lionel as part of the big batch.  They must have swapped rods as there is clearly no bushing in the hole.  And it doesn't lock up changing direction, it locks up after coming to a stop and then continuing in the same direction.  It is only by changing direction that it will run again, or I reach over and push the locomotive in either direction.  Maybe I'll swap the front and rear drivers and see if that changes anything.

I think John tried that and it made it worse. The front driver is unsprung but the back driver is sprung. The traction tire on the rear pushes up on the spring changing the rod bearing centers and causing a slight bind. He can explain in better detail.

Pete

Yep, tinkering around with the thing, the final solution was the thinner traction tires on the front and of course, adding the bushings as I didn't realize the proper rod screw was still available.

It ran better, at least I couldn't get it to give me any issues, neither did my 16 year old son.  But 10 min after I gave the Cab-2 to my 7 year old while I went to make dinner he did it.  I didn't get to see how he did it, but he did.  So John, I need to know what traction tires you used as that's about the only thing I have left to try.  Thanks.

I forget the exact part #, I just measured the wheel and picked the appropriate sized MTH tire.

As I recall Lionel was not happy when the Moguls were returned. They still had issues and many returned theirs for a refund. I was fortunate to find three that had not been returned to China plus the one that John has. Those could be made to run fine by eliminating the excess clearance in the front siderod. Thinner traction tires are icing on the cake but probably not needed. The TMCC and conventional Moguls run smoothly with their fat traction tires on the front driver.

Pete

My Legacy Mogul would climb the rail on Fastrack switches with the fat Lionel tires, the MTH tires eliminated that issue totally.  Other than that, the tires weren't hitting anything, and maybe running on different track, they'd be fine.

Sigh, guess I'll just have to live with it sometimes not wanting to keep going the same direction after a stop.  Perhaps it because it's on the edge of what the electronics can handle.  It doesn't even seem like it tries to move, it just start flashing the cab light.  A reset and change of direction and away it goes.

@sinclair posted:

Sigh, guess I'll just have to live with it sometimes not wanting to keep going the same direction after a stop.  Perhaps it because it's on the edge of what the electronics can handle.  It doesn't even seem like it tries to move, it just start flashing the cab light.  A reset and change of direction and away it goes.

I am pretty sure when they went back to China one of the changes was the gear ratio. Lionel had to reprogram the RCMC do deal with that, which it was mentioned, was at the edge of what the RCMC could handle. I would suggest a motor and wheelset swap but Lionel shows the motor, center geared wheelset, and RCMC all NLA so no way to return it to the original state.
One thing I have done on all my Legacy Moguls was move the motor back from its mount by about 1/16". There was thought when the engines were first released that the end of the motor worm closest to the motor was hitting the worm gear. This is the area where the thread stops. I have no idea if this is what is happening to yours but its not that hard to do. You do have lift the RCMC off its mount to get at the screws holding the mount to the gearbox. Then remove the two screws holding the motor to the mount and slip in a couple of washers. When you reassemble the motor, leave the siderods off the drivers so you can feel the mesh between the motor and wheelset for any binding.

Pete

I guess it was lucky that I found one that Lionel didn't send back to China, mine was a virgin.

Is it possible some of these are just no quartered properly?

@rplst8 posted:

Is it possible some of these are just no quartered properly?

That was considered originally but I have not found that to be the case on any of the Moguls. The fact is the Legacy Mogul's mechanical parts are identical to the earlier TMCC and Conventional ones except for motor worm and worm gear and electronics. 

Pete