Tomorrow I'm placing a large parts order with Lionel, and I remembered I have their model of the EM-1 that has not had that drive shaft issue fixed yet. Now, I've probably been told this info twice already, but for the life of me I can never remember it. All I remember is that the original ones are doomed to break at some point and Lionel did produce a correct one.
So, what exactly is this issue, how is it fixed, and what part do I need so I can put it in my order. Thank you in advance 
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I would take your question right to the source and give Mike Reagan a call.
I believe you have to do your own "fix", Lionel is out of stock on these driveshafts. If I'm not mistaken it involves drilling a hole and putting a pin through the u-joint so it does not spin on the output shaft. Others will chime in I'm sure, if you haven't tried a forum search, I would think this would come up as it was a fairy recent topic.
Drilling a hole and inserting a pin will do it for sure. For one of ours I just superglued the worm drive to the shaft and that seemed to work fine.
The problem is more 'worser'... more 'worser' than just a pin through the shaft. This is only the "Phase one" failure.
the problem is the universal drive shaft is made of Delrin plastic. like quite a few of the articulates.
the challengers
the Allegheny
the Y6B
the Y-3
the class A
the 2-6-6-2 mallets
every articulate released from 1998 to this date...
at the universal joint, the yolk fails over time. The plastic become 'embrittles' and fractures.
Unfortunately on the EM-1 everyone did a run on the parts above, so no parts are in stock with the front half of the part fails. I have figured out a repair with using the Allegheny rear drive shaft assembly. It works if anyone is interested they can email me on the repair.
There was an earlier thread that I posted with some pictures, however that was some time back.
There is a reason the part photo for this drive shaft displays like this:http://www.lionel.com/CustomerService/ReplacementParts/index.cfm?setID=&productID=&doAction=partFilter&q=6SP8051102&match=0
It is a simple fix in most every instance.
Mike
Lionel
Whoops, didn't even see that. Thanks so much for the info. It hasn't failed yet but I will be sure to do that when/if it does.
J Daddy-
I'd like the replacement drive shaft info you mentioned. My email addy is in my profile.
Thanks
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