PE Lion Chief Track reads 39 Volts!

The power supply that comes with the PE Lionchief set is DC, while your CW-80 is AC.

If you are trying to measure DC volts with the meter set on AC, you will get wildly inaccurate readings.

The Lion Chief power supply is probably unregulated and with no load, it's not uncommon for the voltages to shoot up way past their advertised output. 

Put the locomotive and cars on the track and then see what the voltage measures.  I'll bet you'll see a much lower voltage.

Rusty

That's probably it.

You will find that is true of most "wall wart" power supplies. They are just a simple transformer with a diode bridge / rectifier that converts the AC to DC. With no load they read high.

i did not see the DC symbol on the wall pack, that was my mistake.  Measuring with for DC I get the 18 I was expecting.   Thanks. 

Lionel must have included the nuclear powered wall wart in your set! 

Actually, I learned something from your posting - did not realize the Lion Chief was DC.  Good to know.  Don't have one, not getting one, but I always like to have the knowledge.  Thanks for posting it.

Lionchief will work on AC or DC powered track. On AC you just set the transformer to 100% and operate the locomotive with the remote control.

The starter sets come with a simple DC wall wart to reduce cost.

Set the voltmeter's selector to DC and you will probably get about 18 volts.  

If that baby was actually running at 39 volts, you would sure notice it!