Lionel L-1

Try pushing it forward or backwards on the track, I got mine to unlock that way

Thanks so much. It worked!

@Vinny DeAngelis posted:

Thanks so much. It worked!

No problem, make sure u grease that gear box

Grease isn’t going to help this gearbox. You shouldn’t have to ‘break loose’ a gearbox if it jams itself up. Not cool! This is what my 1369 did before I sent it back. Lionel needs to know about this.

@Norm Charbonneau posted:

Grease isn’t going to help this gearbox. You shouldn’t have to ‘break loose’ a gearbox if it jams itself up. Not cool! This is what my 1369 did before I sent it back. Lionel needs to know about this.

They don’t care. They’ve been given ample evidence this gearbox is garbage, it’s basically the same one as the one in the H10s and K4s.

These engines are basically being delivered with dry gears. Jamming or not it is imperative an ample amount of grease go in the gearbox.

I put about 3 ml in mine in 1 ml increments then running it in briefly and adding more.

Mine was noisy out of the box , but is quieting down the more it's run. Not unlike my 0-6-0 from last year.

Norm is right, they did a poor job on setting up the gearboxes on these. I'm going with extra break in time in lieu of shipping it to them, hoping it's fixed right, and doesn't get crushed on the trip back.

I have decapod on order, and crossing my fingers for the best as it's a unique wheel arrangement on my layout. If I'm lucky they may be forced to use the MTH chassis on this one.

After that, I've had enough. Generally speaking ,build quality has been on a slow but steady decline since the days of early Legacy.

Paint issues, and gearbox issues seem the be regular occurances. Throw in the occasional board that cuts out, or doesn't hold programming.

I am totally in the dark about new Lionel motors.  I ordered a Cotton Belt Legacy GP20 from the 2023 catalog, last I checked delivery 12/31/23.  Would this engine have similar problems, or is this something only model steam locomotives have?  That might be a dumb question.

I’m curious what Lionel has to say about these engines. Somebody who sent one in could let us know what they said they did to correct these …….I wonder what their remedy is?…..honestly, they need to ditch that entire concept of the Kline style motor mounting system. They were underpowered, & bad news back then, and clearly it’s not working now …..whoever thinks these things have “plenty of power” is only fooling themselves. The MTH L1 is an absolute tank. Why in the world Lionel put all that effort to swap it to a lousy 385 Mabuchi boggles my mind, because they clearly modded the MTH chassis to suit their needs,…..I could see if they only bought the shell tools, and then adapted their existing Mikado chassis, but that ain’t the case, …..I see all the evidence you’d need to see to know it’s the MTH chassis, hands down…….I’d bet the reasoning is to fit that “rugged” Legacy board fitment…..😉

Pat

Mostly a steam issue.  The L1 was an ex mth tooling Lionel acquired. What no one expected was them to no get the mth Drive line.  The gp20 is also ex mth, tho I don't think diesels have as much gear issues as steam, but knowing Lionel..........

@harmonyards posted:

I’d bet the reasoning is to fit that “rugged” Legacy board fitment…..😉

Pat

Bingo. In smaller locomotives the forward mounted small 385 motor allows for the Legacy electronics to fit and a wireless connection between the locomotive and tender. Keeping the large motor in the firebox with gear tower MTH used would result in all the electronics having to go in the tender, and a 20 pin tether between the locomotive and tender. Instead of redesigning the electronics to fit Lionel modified the chassis to fit their electronics, hence the smaller motor.

What series/size Pittman did MTH use in the L1? Was it the smaller one they used in their H10? I don’t think Lionel has a Canon replacement for anything other than a 92XX series Pittman.

@harmonyards posted:

I’m curious what Lionel has to say about these engines. Somebody who sent one in could let us know what they said they did to correct these …….I wonder what their remedy is?…..honestly, they need to ditch that entire concept of the Kline style motor mounting system. They were underpowered, & bad news back then, and clearly it’s not working now …..whoever thinks these things have “plenty of power” is only fooling themselves. The MTH L1 is an absolute tank. Why in the world Lionel put all that effort to swap it to a lousy 385 Mabuchi boggles my mind, because they clearly modded the MTH chassis to suit their needs,…..I could see if they only bought the shell tools, and then adapted their existing Mikado chassis, but that ain’t the case, …..I see all the evidence you’d need to see to know it’s the MTH chassis, hands down…….I’d bet the reasoning is to fit that “rugged” Legacy board fitment…..😉

Pat

I have been thinking the same thing too. What is their thoughts on these things? It is going to start being that anything that uses that type of gearbox setup won't be something that will be bought by the majority of the consumers if they know that these are going to be an issue. Most likely what will happen with some of us is that we will seek other things to buy and have them upgraded or altered in some way without having any of the gearbox issues.

What I am saying is that what we(or me myself) would normally order(preorder), will drastically reduce(or disappear entirely) regardless of a gearbox potential issue or not. I think @RickO has said it quite enough times over the years, they are losing his business because of quality issues that they don't seem to want to address.

Pat, you know I have a number of projects that we have chatted about that I haven't even sent yet. It will slowly become me asking you, "Hey Pat, I got another one of these old engines. I know we've done 6 of these already, renumbered, rebuilt, altered to a A, B, C, D or whatever it was, what do you think on this one that we should do?" Yeah, that is what it is going to turn into for me. Heck, @Norm Charbonneau is a tinkerer, be interesting to see him take another old engine and change it somehow.

@Dave NYC Hudson PRR K4 posted:

I have been thinking the same thing too. What is their thoughts on these things? It is going to start being that anything that uses that type of gearbox setup won't be something that will be bought by the majority of the consumers if they know that these are going to be an issue. Most likely what will happen with some of us is that we will seek other things to buy and have them upgraded or altered in some way without having any of the gearbox issues.

What I am saying is that what we(or me myself) would normally order(preorder), will drastically reduce(or disappear entirely) regardless of a gearbox potential issue or not. I think @RickO has said it quite enough times over the years, they are losing his business because of quality issues that they don't seem to want to address.

Pat, you know I have a number of projects that we have chatted about that I haven't even sent yet. It will slowly become me asking you, "Hey Pat, I got another one of these old engines. I know we've done 6 of these already, renumbered, rebuilt, altered to a A, B, C, D or whatever it was, what do you think on this one that we should do?" Yeah, that is what it is going to turn into for me. Heck, @Norm Charbonneau is a tinkerer, be interesting to see him take another old engine and change it somehow.

We say this everyday of the week old buddy!…..I speak with head mechanics at West Albany & Topeka shops on a daily basis, & the popular consensus is buy old & rebuild, at least you know what you got!!….seems like the mid 90’s till 2005ish??…..the stuff was built like tanks …..with maybe a couple of no-no’s …….when one of us does buy a  brand new locomotive, to the workbench is the first place it goes!…..although there’s one shop foreman in the inner sanctum that refuses to buy new, but he shall remain nameless in this conversation!….😉

Pat

Well, one thing we all know Pat, our locomotives are in good hands(great hands actually) at the Harmon Yards Shops.

Other than the dry gear box, my copy of the L1 (Santa Fe version) has been perfect.  Perhaps my L1 is the only one. I regularly pull 20+ cars for a couple of hours straight.  Can't do that with the Weaver or K-Line locomotives with the 385 forward facing motor as they will overheat. Forward, reverse or held in place there is not any jamming or slipping of the gears.  I know what to expect to hear if there where problems with the L1 as the Weaver pacific locomotive has significant slippage and grinding of the gears.

@harmonyards posted:

When one of us does buy a  brand new locomotive, to the workbench is the first place it goes!

I just picked up a NIB Premier PS3 Santa Fe 2900 class Northern from 2016. First thing I did after making sure it ran was to swap the stock generic motor for a ball bearing 9234 Pittman. I didn't need to, but I know it'll run better with the Pittman.

RS385 motors are fine in scale diesels, I've got no problem with them in that application. There's two of them, and quite a few people run multiple powered diesels when pulling a long or heavy train. Heavy, diecast, steam locomotives are not a good application for a RS385, especially since most people don't run multiple steam locomotives at the head of a train. A RS385 doesn't have enough torque even in something as small as a Mikado. MTH had the right idea with their Mikado chassis by fitting it with a 9434 size Pittman motor. It'll pull a Lionel Mikado backwards easily (don't ask how I know).

@Norm Charbonneau posted:

What series/size Pittman did MTH use in the L1? Was it the smaller one they used in their H10? I don’t think Lionel has a Canon replacement for anything other than a 92XX series Pittman.

MTH used a 9434 Pittman in their L1, same as what they used in their USRA Mikado.

@WBC posted:

Other than the dry gear box, my copy of the L1 (Santa Fe version) has been perfect.  Perhaps my L1 is the only one. I regularly pull 20+ cars for a couple of hours straight.  Can't do that with the Weaver or K-Line locomotives with the 385 forward facing motor as they will overheat. Forward, reverse or held in place there is not any jamming or slipping of the gears.  I know what to expect to hear if there where problems with the L1 as the Weaver pacific locomotive has significant slippage and grinding of the gears.

A 385 is a 385, it don’t matter how you sugarcoat it. I’m glad you can happily justify it in your own mind, and I’m glad yours is working as advertised. For some of us, we know it’s a pretty poor set up out the gate…….call it whatever you’d like, needing room for the electronics, or just plain being cheap. ( I claim the latter ) …..They could’ve done a better job at execution,…..Personally, I’d rather had seen them deal with coming up with a new tether solution, and had left the stock MTH chassis alone, ….as mentioned several times, as far as mechanicals, the difference between Lionel’s L1, and MTH’s model is night and day…..

Pat

To further point to what Pat is saying, it seems that some may be better than others out of the box. Pat had to mess a bit with mine to get it in better working order, or best working order depending on how you view it. Being that mine is the only one model that Pat looked at(1369), it is hard to say whether they are all equally the same out of the box. Are they all going to be sleeping wrecks waiting to happen, hard to say. As Pat had said on the topic with mine, "if you have no issues after giving it grease, count that as a blessing, if it makes some noise and doesn't run, it's not going to run without working on it", or something to that effect.

In any case, these are definitely not going to be the best models that came out of the box. Curious will be what the one of the set is like since we haven't heard anything yet. Will it be a sleeper?

I'm looking at all of these issues on new locomotives and I'm starting to get really worried about what the Strasburg #90 is going to look like as far as the drive train!  I sure hope they don't use the wimpy RS-385 in that one!

Lionel thinks it's a great powertrain...

• Powerful maintenance-free motor with momentum flywheel

Anyone want a deal on a bridge to Brooklyn?

I hate to look at it from this perspective, but we must, …..if we can get Mabuchi RS385’s onesy, twosies from the popular sites for 4-5 bucks a piece, maybe a little shipping on top, …..what are these train manufacturers paying a piece for them?…..granted, they’re in business to make money,…..but the finest example of this mistake in my mind is the pinnacle of die cast scale Hudsons, the Kline Hudson, …..here’s the finest die cast scale Hudson ever produced ( arguably, of course ) that can’t pull a bum out of bed…..and they knew it, and used the argument of cost cutting……Lionel even knew this when they got Kline’s equipment, …cause they modified that chassis in the other direction, and went large motor,…….they did this on quite a few runs of their Hudsons, ……all the way to the 2018-19 J3a’s …..I can prove that beyond a shadow of a doubt…..So, it can be done, the costs certainty will go up, but I’d have a hard time believing folks would squawk 75, 80, even 100 bucks more for a model built like a tank, vs. what they’re offering now, …..I mean whatcha y’all think??…..

Pat

@harmonyards posted:

So, it can be done, the costs certainty will go up, but I’d have a hard time believing folks would squawk 75, 80, even 100 bucks more for a model built like a tank, vs. what they’re offering now, …..I mean whatcha y’all think??…..

Pat, there's no way that the Canon motor they use would add that much to the price!  At least it's the right size to directly replace with a Pittman.

@harmonyards posted:

I’m glad you can happily justify it in your own mind, and I’m glad yours is working as advertised.

Given the context of the post I doubt that is the case.

@harmonyards posted:

.call it whatever you’d like, needing room for the electronics, or just plain being cheap. ( I claim the latter ) …

This is probably true. However, looking at MTH recent 2-8-2 production such as 20-3833-1, the MSRP is $1299.99.  I picked up the Santa Fe Mikado for $800 even with shipping. However, I think the MSRP for the Santa Fe is $999.99 while the others I think had a MSRP for $950 (Santa Fe's were more expensive due to the brass tender and probably the road name).  That's a good $300-$350 reduction in MSRP. Actually, I am kind of surprised that Lionel didn't put the MSRP at $1299.99 and use the 385 drive train. That would have been really cheap.

@harmonyards posted:

A 385 is a 385, it don’t matter how you sugarcoat it.

True, the 385 motor is a disappointment. I would much rather have a larger motor. Actually, I much rather have synchronous or induction motors, but that is another topic. With that said, my L1 functions as advertised and the compound gearing is doing its job giving the motor more leverage to do its job. 

@harmonyards posted:

.whoever thinks these things have “plenty of power” is only fooling themselves.

Just because someone disagrees with you they are not fooling themselves, sorry. You have every right to express disappointment and criticize the mechanics of the drive. That does not extend to dictating to persons who bought the product and are happy with it how they should feel about their product.  That statement is just plain arrogance.

@RickO posted:

Norm is right, they did a poor job on setting up the gearboxes on these. I'm going with extra break in time in lieu of shipping it to them, hoping it's fixed right, and doesn't get crushed on the trip back.

Lionel produced several road names for the L1's.  However, the only ones I have seen discussed are the Santa Fe and Pennsylvania ones.  Of the discussions, the only ones I see that are having problems are the Pennsylvania units. Just wondering.

@harmonyards posted:

..if we can get Mabuchi RS385’s onesy, twosies from the popular sites for 4-5 bucks a piece, maybe a little shipping on top, …..

During my time as a food chemist, buying 25kg bags each vs buying in 10-tonne lots there could be a factor of 10 difference in pricing. Thus, I would guess bulk pricing for 385 motors would be in the neighborhood of 50 cents each.

One last comment. This would require tooling adjustments. Why not implement a transverse drive system found in such postwar locomotives as 385, 2046, 2055 and such. That drive system in postwar locomotives is really robust (probably more so than the worm drive) and potentially saves even more space for electronics. Just a thought.

@WBC as far as which ones are showing signs of issues it is still a mixed bag. @Norm Charbonneau got two Pennsy units, 1369 and the other road number(can't remember which). 1369 just like mine showed some issues of running problems, but the other road numbers seemed fine.

I don't remember which one Chris of Chris's Trains and Things(I think I got that right), but he had issues with the first one(yes indeed, another Pennsy unit). The other one seemed to work fine.

The main thing is we only have the data of those who are reporting the problems here. There could be a whole host of ones of varying road numbers and railroads that are having issues or are just fine. This is why I said earlier that we had mine in Pat's shop and needed a few others to see what they look on the inside, preferably different road names and road numbers.

We won't know anything for sure unless it gets looked at. This is just like the K4'S in this regard. If I had not seen @RickO's video a while ago, I would be in K4 Heck(with the double L's). I would have probably ran them at first chance I got and would have heard the clattering of gears making a big mess. Mine are sitting to wait(the K4'S) to head to Pat when I have time and when he does as well.

As far as motor power, I'm sitting out on that but take the advice of @harmonyards and others at face value. They know what motors are bust and what can pull out stumps.

The three L-1 DT&I versions I know of here at the Detroit 3 Railers all seem to be fine just to add to the data.

@SteveMa posted:

The three L-1 DT&I versions I know of here at the Detroit 3 Railers all seem to be fine just to add to the data.

Did you add grease out of the box, no sounds of gears thumping or being loud either?

@WBC posted:

Given the context of the post I doubt that is the case.

This is probably true. However, looking at MTH recent 2-8-2 production such as 20-3833-1, the MSRP is $1299.99.  I picked up the Santa Fe Mikado for $800 even with shipping. However, I think the MSRP for the Santa Fe is $999.99 while the others I think had a MSRP for $950 (Santa Fe's were more expensive due to the brass tender and probably the road name).  That's a good $300-$350 reduction in MSRP. Actually, I am kind of surprised that Lionel didn't put the MSRP at $1299.99 and use the 385 drive train. That would have been really cheap.

True, the 385 motor is a disappointment. I would much rather have a larger motor. Actually, I much rather have synchronous or induction motors, but that is another topic. With that said, my L1 functions as advertised and the compound gearing is doing its job giving the motor more leverage to do its job.

Just because someone disagrees with you they are not fooling themselves, sorry. You have every right to express disappointment and criticize the mechanics of the drive. That does not extend to dictating to persons who bought the product and are happy with it how they should feel about their product.  That statement is just plain arrogance.

Lionel produced several road names for the L1's.  However, the only ones I have seen discussed are the Santa Fe and Pennsylvania ones.  Of the discussions, the only ones I see that are having problems are the Pennsylvania units. Just wondering.

During my time as a food chemist, buying 25kg bags each vs buying in 10-tonne lots there could be a factor of 10 difference in pricing. Thus, I would guess bulk pricing for 385 motors would be in the neighborhood of 50 cents each.

One last comment. This would require tooling adjustments. Why not implement a transverse drive system found in such postwar locomotives as 385, 2046, 2055 and such. That drive system in postwar locomotives is really robust (probably more so than the worm drive) and potentially saves even more space for electronics. Just a thought.

Just because someone disagrees with you they are not fooling themselves, sorry. You have every right to express disappointment and criticize the mechanics of the drive. That does not extend to dictating to persons who bought the product and are happy with it how they should feel about their product.  That statement is just plain arrogance.

give me your address, I’ll send you something for your tears, …..my treat, ….

Pat

@WBC posted:

Lionel produced several road names for the L1's.  However, the only ones I have seen discussed are the Santa Fe and Pennsylvania ones.  Of the discussions, the only ones I see that are having problems are the Pennsylvania units. Just wondering.

The difference in the two modles is a paint job, I doubt that affects the drivetrain!

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

The difference in the two models is a paint job, I doubt that affects the drivetrain!

In manufacture of food goods we had groups assigned to manufacturing stations.  One group was preparing a confectionery. During the process they forgot to put in a certain ingredient and the production turned out cr@p.  I had to go to the lab bench and test the formulation on a small scale to make sure it worked. Then I had to go and make a large scale batch to make sure the scale up of the formulation worked. I verified all processes worked. Later groups were also making the formulation just fine.  Going through the paperwork it was found that the group assigned to the production station didn't use an ingredient and their supervision did not catch the error. It took a lot to figure out what was going on. True story.

It definitely could be that a crew on the drive train production line on Monday and Tuesday manufactured the chassis for the Pennsylvania L1 production neglected to include a part.  Wednesday, Thursday, Friday production crew manufactured the chassis for the other road names and included the part. Thus, one group of locomotives have problems while the other group of locomotives do not have problems. This can happen.

Well, maybe "anything can happen", but I certainly would be betting on it in this case.

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

I'm looking at all of these issues on new locomotives and I'm starting to get really worried about what the Strasburg #90 is going to look like as far as the drive train!  I sure hope they don't use the wimpy RS-385 in that one!

Lionel thinks it's a great powertrain...

• Powerful maintenance-free motor with momentum flywheel

Anyone want a deal on a bridge to Brooklyn?

This reminds me of years ago GM had a shortage of transmissions in the Cadillac Division.  The fix and they swear it would work was to swap a Pontiac T-1000 transmission to keep things going. One problem it was designed for a car that weighed 1500 pounds not 3500……..you guess it did not go well. To this day they swear it worked fine.

What GM car weighs 1500 lbs?

Well, manufacturing model trains is different from food and food products. There may be more scrutiny during the process and production of food than model trains, at least you would hope that there would be. Aside from that we don't exactly know how the manufacturing does work. I know Rick had posted a video a while back which showed I think it was EM-1's being put through tests while some people were working in the background putting some others together. Heck, I can't remember if there was paint on them at the time or not, but I think that there probably was.

The other part of that is I believe that was shot in Korea, which may have different standards or contractual agreements with the company wanting to produce these locomotives(Lionel in this case). We could look at all this a hundred different ways but it really is going to come down to one question and one question only. Does the model(locomotive) work or not work as it is intended to? At least it is not like the Legacy Mogul debacle from a couple years back which only some survived as the consumers were able to work around the problems by finding solutions. The L1 is definitely not the Legacy Mogul, otherwise none of them would be working with little or no issues.

I would say that these are a 50/50 split. Out of the box it may need something to get it working right, or maybe not. Does it depend on the model we still don't really know. Yes it does seem that the Pennsy 1369 appears to be one that is having more issues than the others thus far, but until more information comes up, do we trust the other models without taking a look at what is going on inside? We are left just asking more questions it seems.

I could see the wrong size shim getting added or something.

I guess the $800 price tag was just too good to be true.

The worst part is I passed up a perfectly good MTH L1s for $500 when I heard Lionel got the tooling.

I still think the best thing to do is let Lionel deal with it. My dealer isn’t even taking my money for the 1369 until it comes back from warranty repair. I’m sure it will be fine upon its return and since I weather my stuff anyway, the booger green was hardly a showstopper after all. These engines were sold at a pretty nice street price and if they are in proper working order they are great sounding engines (two decent PRR whistles to choose from)  with smooth Legacy speed control. (I still like Legacy speed control the best with its 100% usable speed steps.) This engine also pulls the trains I intended it to. 20-30 full scale cars is what I normally run and the 1343 has clocked quite a few hours already.

@Norm Charbonneau yeah I watched that video. I do remember you saying Norm that originally you were going to double head them but it seemed like the one was more than willing for the task. Still would have been great to see the double head action. I guess when the other one gets all fixed up.

@Norm Charbonneau posted:

I still think the best thing to do is let Lionel deal with it. My dealer isn’t even taking my money for the 1369 until it comes back from warranty repair. I’m sure it will be fine upon its return and since I weather my stuff anyway, the booger green was hardly a showstopper after all. These engines were sold at a pretty nice street price and if they are in proper working order they are great sounding engines (two decent PRR whistles to choose from)  with smooth Legacy speed control. (I still like Legacy speed control the best with its 100% usable speed steps.) This engine also pulls the trains I intended it to. 20-30 full scale cars is what I normally run and the 1343 has clocked quite a few hours already.

Norm,

Which whistles do you considerr real PRR? Obviously number 1 the Banshee, but what number is the other?

I think #5 sounds like the PRR 3 chime. I can post a vid later..

Norm, A video would be great.