20 yr old dreams!

7

77railer

Member
Dec 11, 2004
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South Carolina
Hey gang,
Two weeks ago I remembered that when I was 7 my uncle gave me some old trains. Ive never played with them because everytime I wanted to my dad would go buy me a train set and why play with old trains when you have new ones right. To make a long story short I now have opened those old dusty boxes and found a #303 loco, #21160 loco, and #L2001 Game Train loco all with tenders as well as various cars to boot. Also got 84 curves and 53 straights. These things need a serious cleaning from dust but other than that they are near perfect. I dont have a power pack to run them but I know they work. I watched them roar around the track 20 yrs ago with sounds roaring and steam flowing from the stacks. They have been stored this entire time, never once even looked at. If anyone has any suggestions on how I should go about firing these boys up without hurting anything please help me out. Ive got this unexplainable itch to play with these things that just wont go away. Im saving pocket cash for a transformer but until then I can get everything ready. I cant wait till I put these boys back on the track they longed after for the last 20 years.



:cool: 77Railer:cool:
 
I have to check, but I think I have a n extra transformer - I'll let you know - You can have it for what I paid for it $15.00 Plus shipping :) :)

I'll let you know...

PM Me (Click on my name to the left & click Send Private Message)

It looks like this:

Flyertransformer1.JPG
 
As far as "getting them Road Worthy" - Just be sure to oil all the axles & other moving parts along the wheels (Drive bars etc..) and take it easy at first. You might have to give them a bit of power & nudge them into running at first.. But Mine worked right away after 30 + years :) :) :)
 
o0o0o0o hold up on that oil! a better idea to keep them in better heath is to get a can of compressed air. you can get these at your local office supply store. you may need 2-3 cans of it. if you know you can take the loco's apart with out damaging anything and be able to reach the drive train and internal parts, do so and then use the compressed air to dust them out extreamly well. some places it may take a few more times than other b/c dust is thicker and a bit stickier than other places. also if you can get in to the gear box (make sure you know how it came apart!) and take each gear out one by one spay them and clean them very good so there isnt any trash in them to cause problems. then put the gears and drive train back in and add just a "little" oil to the places they are needs and in the gear box (if any) then put it all back together. (be sure there arnt any spare part's left over! lmao) also to clean those "i know they are" grimme wheels. for wheels the best thing to use is a cleaner called "Goo Gone" pick it up at almost any home improvment store or maybe even your local hobby shop... (just ask!) hope this info will get those old tymers running smooth! good luck and have fun!

Charles
Shreveport, Louisiana.
 
i would HIGHLY advise against taking apart an old locomotive...they're more then likly riveted together and as we all know, rivets don't go back together again. As for, if you DO take them apart, taking the gearbox out and ripping it to pieces, i wouldn't. Thats asking for trouble.

Dust shouldn't get into the insides too badly...a couple drops of oil (ONLY[/b] a couple drops...don't overdo it!) on the axles, driverods, gears, etc and things should purr.

Don't use 10W30 for this either...get some LaBelle oil...it's plastic compatable and a much finer and softer oil then anything else, even sewing machine oil.

Hope this helps
 
I know for a fact the Flyer 21160 can be opened by removing a small number of screws, either two or four of them. It goes back together very easily. I worked on a 21160 this fall and just a little bit of oil on the axles and a little grease on the worm gear inside got it running very smoothly without much effort. I think most Flyers come apart just as easily--trains this vintage were meant to be taken apart and lubed.

In a pinch, you can run Flyer on DC power, so if you have a fairly beefy HO power pack, you can use it. I like how they run on AC a bit better, but that may just be me being a purist. I know a lot of Flyer people use DC.

I know the 21160's power pickups are in the tender, rather than in the drive wheels, and it wasn't the only Flyer to do this. So clean the wheels on your tenders.

AF was exceptionally high quality stuff, so it usually doesn't take much to get them going again, especially if they were working when they went into storage and were stored in a reasonably dry environment.
 
So basically clean what I can, and oil what I can. Throw some power to it and see what happens? Right now all I have is straights and curves but I have 1 or 2 trestles for it so I should be able to do some kind of figure eight or something of that nature. Its been so cold here at night I havent had the guts to go set up the track yet,lol. I will keep you guys posted and I really appreciate your help.

77Railer
 
i have 2 extra transformers for sale. they are in great shape and all one of them need is a little dusting on the throttel. i might be able to sell them to you for around 25 to 30$ plus shipping
 
Yep, that's what I'd do. Just go sparing on the oil. And make sure the track is clean; clean rust with a kitchen scouring pad if there is any. Once you get it running, run it at slow speed, gradually increasing the throttle, and fairly soon it ought to get used to running again and I wouldn't be surprised at all if it ran like new. If you want to be really sure it's OK and will stay OK, run it a minimum of 10 minutes a day for a week. AF-S is good stuff. And that's a high compliment coming from me, seeing as I'm a 3-rail O gauge guy.
 
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