Repair and restoration of a postwar Lionel Type "Q" transformer from 1946. Enjoy! Support Eric’s Trains: / ericstrains Eric’s Trains Merch: www.ericstrains... Try my other channel: / kitbashedsurvival
Excellent job Eric! Just a great change of pace. BTW I also like to do repair work as part of my hobby enjoyment and find that ArmourAll or Pledge works great to clean and polish out the bakelite black plastic cases and knobs. Well done! Bob in Seattle.
My son and I just got done doing a V that we picked up at the train show for a dollar cleaned it all up,, new globes,,, looks like a brand new piece...
Tip for melting old solder...add some new solder. The additional solder increases the area being heated and helps with heat transfer. From an old pinball repair guy... :-)
Nice job Eric. Would never have thought to use a magic eraser to cleanup the face-plate. I do vintage hi-fi audio equipment restorations and will have to try this on face-plates which so often with chemicals or liquid solutions removes the delicate silk screening.
If you have power cord issues even after changing the wire, i usually rub a little piece of sandpaper in the solder terminals to rid of any corrosion. Great job on the repair!
I just watched this again, and I loved it. You need to more of your old Lionel transformer restorations. I purchased a KW, a 1043, and a 1073. All 3 need help, but I want to learn how to do it myself, especially soldering new line cords on them. Seeing and learning what you did makes it look possible.
I watch just about all of your videos as time permits. I just want to tell you how glad I am that you are doing post war and hopefully prewar episodes. I really enjoyed watching you bring that transformer back to life and hopefully once you get into the older engines and rolling stock people will see how fun they are to work on. Thank you for the great video and hopefully a whole series on the old stuff.
Living in the United Kingdom I have a few old Lionel transformers all made to 240V mains input, including type R and type Z , perfect for my standard gauge trains, enjoyable video thank you
This was really fun to watch! I have an old American Flyer and I'm still trying to dig it out of my basement. It doesn't work anymore due to what I believe was a short circuit and caused the outlet to "explode" years back. I'm gonna try and find it and see if I can fix it up. Thanks Eric!
Also something I think you would really like on your layout is a DM&E Centerflow Hopper. They are a beautiful yellow with a crisp blue logo that think you would really like and I know Atlas makes them. P.S. DM&E is my favorite railroad.
Hello Eric. I just picked up one these Type Q transformers last week. Ever since I saw this video originally 3 years ago, I’ve been wanting to get this exact transformer variation, and I finally found one that appealed to me. It came with the original box and inserts. It tested out perfectly on all of the thumbscrews, and I cleaned it up. Even though the power cord is in good shape, I do plan on replacing it with a new one. Watching this video again really helped me out. Thank you! Are you still planning to do future postwar transformer repairs? I look forward to it. This video was excellent. Thanks again, Tom
Thanks for uploading this, Eric! This helped me replace a brittle cord on an LW transformer I just picked up that I will be using for a 3x7 rollaway layout and I was nervous about messing it up. Hope you do more videos like these in the future. - Chase
Eric, I must say that I almost didn’t watch this video as I thought it would be somewhat boring. In fact it was extremely interesting and educational. Thank you very much for another excellent video !
Lovely job on that transformer! My grandfather had a much simpler controller for his pre-war setup, but it did have the whistle controller you mentioned. It's amazing just how long these kinds of controllers will last - The electric finger setup in that reminds me of a real EMU/streetcar controller setup! The font on the faceplate and the design in general is very late 30s. Using old controllers for accessories is something I also like to do, though I mainly use things like old Tyco or Mehano ones that don't have a very good speed range - And the all-metal ones look cool. Soviet O gauge, ooh...
Great video Eric I have a few posts war zw's I use to run my trains with my 180w bricks. I just got some 10A in line fuses between the zw's and my track works great.
Nice work, thanks! I actually used one of these as a boy in the late 1940s-early 1950s with my Lionel Train set. Taught me basic electricity so I'll always be fond of it. But my sister and I managed to destroy it pretty much. Bought a LN one on ebay a while ago. Never knew about the 2 empty hole faceplate version.
As someone who lives in the U.K., I’m surprised that the early post war Lionel Transformers don’t have a ground ( earth) connection. The early post war Hornby Dublo and Triang transformers which had metal cases were grounded.
I appreciate your attention to detail, and there is nothng wrong with your soldering skills. I run a ZW and KW and per your warning I installed quick acting circut breakers between transformer and track
Awesome repair work really like the series looking foward to further post war repairs love all Lionel products I like to bring old locos and lionel products back to operating condition myself really enjoy that aspect of the hobby
Eric Love your shows. While seeing this you could have reused the terminal solder plate with the new terminals in sted of soldering the wires to the terminals. Also, you should have transferred the cloth sheath to the new wiring. I would have replaced it with cloth wiring. But since most people would not have cloth wiring reusing the cloth sheath on the new wiring would future-proofing against shorts. Out of all the pre/post-war trains I have repaired I have yet find a cloth wiring that has disintegrated over time. The cloth wiring is good for future-proofing the transformer.
Great video as always. Good idea with the Magic Eraser on the face plate. I've always worried about scratching those up in the past, so I'd just not clean them. Thanks for sharing, looking forward to your next video.
These old transformers have a very high start speed. I have a set from 1972 that was the very bottom of the line train sold that year. 1972 wasn't known for high end to begin with. The little Kickapoo train comes with a circle of O27 track. No straights. At the lowest speed the train flies off of the track. With my much more powerful MRC 180 watt transformer it creeps along. Lionel really dropped the ball on that set.
Nice, just a month or two ago I rebuilt two Type S transformers. I replaced the A.C. cord, disc rectifier in the whistle circuit with a diode, the circuit breaker with faster acting bussman 5A, removed the faceplate and repainted the housing, attached a new faceplate sticker to the original one and couldn't swaged those rivets so I had to glue them. The appearance and functionality is showroom condition. I still have to tackle the RW transformer.
@@Ericstrains thanks, im only in electric trains for two years and that is in TT scale. I needed a hobby after my stroke and picked TT because of the scale 1 inch = 10 feet, being a now retired Aerospace Quality Engineer and Metrologist I could figured out the prototype even though they're European. I'm been in O gauge only since Christmas when my brother took down my late father's 1931 249e tin plate set all boxed and mint. This is only the second time in over twenty years that I've seen it.
Interesting video! The Q transformer is actually a prewar piece and was first cataloged in the 1939 catalog and was carried over into the postwar period for only the year 1946. When it first came out in 1939, it was part of Lionel's new Trainmaster series of transformers that included circuit breakers. THe best of these was the Z. Another reason not to use this to run modern trains is that the voltage maxes out at 25 volts and that is too high for many of the modern locos.
Really enjoyed watching the type Q Repair and Restoration. I have to assume the Type A 90 would be restored the same way. I have both among several other transformers. Thanks for the info.
Thanks for a great video very informative. I hope to see more postwar restoration videos of the items shown in this video( the cars especially). Thanks Eric, Scott.
I didn't read all the replies so don't know if this was mentioned or not. For soldering electronic components never use acid flux or acid core solder. It will turn beautiful copper wire into green crusties. Always use rosin flux and rosin core solder. Also use 40/60 solder, not the "low lead" solder the "green police" are trying to sell us on. 40/60 means it is 40% lead and 60% tin. It takes less heat and less time make your solder connections and less chance of a "cold solder" joint. If your worried about lead poisoning, just use common sense - ventilation and wash your hands when finished.
Eric you did fabulous work on that transformer I'm glad it's working I had the big Lionel transformer with a handle keep doing new ones and morcellation work and keep doing excellent videos like that video you 😀
Excellent video! I learned a great deal and now have the confidence to restore one of my old transformers. I am curious whether the throttle control is working properly since the train seemed to run very fast even though you moved the knob very little. Looking forward to future videos. Thank you Eric.
Thanks for the tips here! You said to not use those old transformers to run modern trains, but is it safe to use modern transformers to run the old trains?
I have 2 trains I also have very old ones to and copper track but I can't use all of them cuz all of the old ones are broken but my dad is going to try to fix one of the trains the old trains are wen my mom was a kid it was my mom's brother and he would play with the old trains so hard to the point that the trains would break and it's so sad that he would do that to the trains
For the love of god oil the 249e ! 🤣 I'll give you one tip with soldering. When putting 2 wires together tie them for machical connections solder is not that strong. Otherwise a outstanding video!
Do you have any experience building your own transformer/controller? I run longer double header consists and find 3amp basic trans/contr too weak. Looking at diy 10amp unit.
@@johnsmith6974 Nope. I do 3 rail because that's what I started with when i was a kid. The way I see it, the 3rd rail helps us remember that the most important ingredient in enjoying model trains is imagination. Also keeps me from taking things too seriously.
