Lionel Heavy Weight Passenger Cars

I did it with some Marx passenger cars.  I only refitted what was displaced but it wasn't difficult. 

The hardest part of the job was removing the car shell without damaging, scratching, or denting the car shell.  Once you carefully remove the shell, just remove the old window strips and them replace with the new ones. 

In the Marx cars, there was a little metal piece with which to push the window strip up and in and another at the botton to push the strip down and forward. There was one of the mounting pieces foward and one rearward on each side of the car.  Once you open the car, you should see how they are mounted and merely take old ones out and place new ones in.

Once agin, the most difficult and nerve wracking part of the job is to remove the shell without damaging it.    Hope this helps...Good luck

I did it on some Lionel heavyweights.  I don't recall it was difficult at all.  I did not buy any replacement parts: I just cut clear plastic sheet (as made for transparencies back when people used overhead projectors - they still sell that stuff believe it or not).  I made window shades and such (masking and/or fiberglas reinforced tape on the inside of the windows.  It looked good and was rather straightforward to do.

Thanks Brien and Lee!

I opened the package earlier this afternoon and laid the strips out to flatten them out.

It does seem like it should be simple. I will be getting started some time this evening and try to take some pictures of the progress.

Lee, was there anything special you used to remove the old strips's? Was there any old adhesive left to clean off? If so, would I be good to use isopropyl alcohol to remove that?

Thanks again.

Idon't recall anything special in cleaning it off.  It has been a while, but I think I just cleaned it with solvent to remove all old glue, then went ahead.  

For adhesive, use Micro's Krystal Klear. It is made by the same company that makes Micro-Sol and Micro-Set for decals, it comes in the same type of bottle, any decent LHS should have it. It looks like Elmer's White Glue, but dries Krystal Klear. If you get a little where you didn't want it, it should not be noticeable.

 It wont Fog or Craze plastic, back in my HO days, I installed the windows in some Athearn Passenger cars, I think that it was Testors standard model cement (in the orange tube), even though I hadn't gotten any on the windows where I didn't want it, the windows all fogged up (Permanently). My best guess is that it was the fumes from the cement, but it was the LAST time that I used model cement for windows, or IN anything with windows.

Doug

I finished the window glazing replacement on Monday. What a difference. The old glazing and the adhesive strips came off relatively easy. The observation car being the exception. The adhesive was a bit difficult to remove. Overall, it went well!

Lee, I took your advise and added some window shades here and there in all of the cars and used scotch tape to 'opaque' the rest room windows. I attached some photos below.

A project for down the road will be to research the proper interior colors, change lighting to LEDS, add more patrons, etc.

I am happy with the results.

Now I need to find someone that sells the friction bearing caps for the scale trucks for these cars. I looked up the cars on the Lionel parts site and the trucks are not available. Does anyone have a good lead on the trucks or the parts for the trucks?

Regarding the passenger trucks, I went back to the Lionel parts site and found the item.

Replacement truck ordered. The other one will become a parts source if needed in the future.