Just received the new Poultry Dispatch Sweep Car by Lionel (6-83251). It was really loud but has a volume control on the bottom. Don't be confused by the two slightly more obvious knobs which seem to do nothing except perhaps rotate the light bulbs.
My unit was unable to make it across my 11 degree crossover without derailing. After careful inspection, it was determined that on one truck the ground wire was wrapped around the power wire in such away as to impede the spring action of the pickup. I cut the ground wire to unwrap it. It still worked fine with ground from one truck instead of two -- except with just one truck picking up ground, the rooster would crow after every crossing of the points (i.e. switches and crossovers). That really made me smile but I finally decided it would eventually drive me nuts so I spliced the wire back together. Now it can travel my layout and make sounds when the sweeper appears or the power is cycled. It helped that one truck did not have this problem so I could compare the action of the roller springs one to the other.
It's fun addition. I was hoping for more clucking -- the hens stop clucking just seconds after the door opens. The full volume rooster will make you cringe but after you lower volume the cocks song becomes almost endearing. The description says the clucking stops when the door is closed, which could be but how could anyone close the quickly enough to find out.
