I have seen lionel 700T's with pickup rollers directly to the center of the base and some with a connecting wire/plug running from the tender to the engine. I've also seen a similar pickup on the 717 caboose; the pickup mounted directly to the base. Anyone know the story behind these differences?
Replies sorted oldest to newest
The pick up roller on the 700T tender was so in case the locomotive ran over a dead spot, the roller on the tender would keep the engine going by keeping the AC hot connection through the tether wire to the motor and e-unit.
As for the caboose, Lionel didn't have a mold for pickup rollers on the new die cast trucks, and had to add a pick up under the chassis instead.
This is before my time, but when running outside third rail, I think the third rail collectors needed to be farther apart than the two locomotive rollers. So when outside third rail collectors were used one collector was placed on the locomotive and one on the tender.
And I thought that the only reason for the tender 3rd rail pickup was for the whistle.
If you plug the wire in between the engine and tender all three collectors are connected together. The outside third rail shoes come out between the drive wheels. So they would only be a few inches between them. Not far enough to get through a long switch points. So with outside third rail shoes one would be on the locomotive and the other on the tender.
Access to this requires an OGR Forum Supporting Membership
