A friend of mine wanted to put a train under his Christmas tree. I helped him select a starter set called The Silver Bell Express and bought it from a LHS. It did not produce any smoke from the smoke unit. He brought back it and was given another steam engine. This one produces a very faint amount of smoke. Does anyone know if this is a similar problem that Lionel has had with wires being reversed to the smoke unit causing poor smoke output.
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I bought the same set this year too. At first it would not smoke. I thought it was loose improper wiring or a bad switch. It seems these engines will not smoke or only smoke very little if you add too much fluid. Four or five drops at best is all it needs to produce a good amount of smoke. Turn the engine over and drain out any excess fluid then run the train for a while. It will then start smoking. Good luck.
Thanks JSP, I will advise my friend, I believe all he put in was 4 -5 drops, but it is possible that he put more in when he didn't the smoke at first.
According to the manual, you get more smoke at higher speeds. Sometimes running faster than normal will get the smoker going, then you can slow down and it will keep puffing.
It also means the smoke unit is wired through the reverse unit PCB. So your friend needs to make sure there is fluid in the unit when turned on. If not, the smoke unit can overheat and damage the smoke unit and the reverse unit. When not being used, it should be turned off.
Depending on the model, and I think this is a LionChief, it has full track voltage so smoke should not be an issue. For some of the conventional starter sets, the engine smoke unit is run off track voltage which is too low at normal engine speeds.
To get better smoke, you add a few more cars so you can raise track voltage with out having the engine go to fast. Or while in neutral raise voltage to full for a few seconds until the smoke unit heats up, than lower voltage and start train moving. It will smoke better for a while.
These are just not meant to be good smokers. Some have high resistance elements to prevent them from burning out. G
Unlike older locos, the newer conventional and LionChief starter set 2-4-2/4-4-2 locos don't get full track voltage to the smoke unit. The smoke unit uses DC power from the same PC board the motor gets it's power from. The voltage to the smoke unit is directly proportional to the voltage going to the motor. Slower speed, less voltage, less smoke. Higher speed, higher voltage, more smoke.
That's also why it's important to turn off the smoke unit if not being used. If it runs dry, it overheats and pulls very high current through the PC board. If the heat resistor doesn't burn out quickly, the high current damages the board. Sometimes the damage allows AC current through the board to the motor, taking it out too.
Retired Lionel Service Center owner.
In some of the starter sets I've successfully changed the resistor to a lower value to allow smoke at normal speeds.
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