locking pliers Archives - The Silicon Underground

Restoring Tootsietoys and other early diecast vehicles

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 02 Mar 2017 12:00:48 +0000

Restoring Tootsietoys can be a fun and satisfying way to enjoy old toy vehicles. Whether you want your childhood toys to look nice again or just enjoy bringing new life to neglected examples, it can be as easy and as affordable

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Lionel KW diode installation

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 23 Jan 2017 12:00:03 +0000

Lionel transformers use a selenium rectifier disc to produce a jolt of DC voltage to activate their train whistle. These discs degrade over time, so a decades-old transformer often produces a pretty anemic whistle–even one of the bigger transformers like

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Repair Lionel ZW binding posts cheaply

Dave Farquhar — Tue, 10 Jan 2017 12:00:42 +0000

If your Lionel ZW or VW transformer lights up and hums but doesn’t output any voltage on one or more of its pairs of binding posts, there’s a good chance one or more of the binding posts is bad. It’s

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Fix a Marx 999 that derails a lot

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 22 Feb 2016 12:00:34 +0000

Marx’s most popular locomotive might be the 999, because it can pull anything Marx made–6-inch tin, 7-inch tin, 3/16-scale tin, 4-wheel plastic, and 8-wheel plastic–without looking out of place. It really only has one problem: The front trucks on many

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Fixing a bent Lionel 2034 die-cast roof

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 04 Feb 2016 12:00:07 +0000

I had a Lionel 2034 engine that had, at some point in its life, suffered a fall off a table, most likely onto concrete. The result was a severely bent corner on the cab roof. But a fall off the

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How to attach trucks to Lionel train cars with screws

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 22:59:05 +0000

Frequently the trucks (the wheel/coupler assembly that sits under train cars) come unattached. Lionel trains from the 1970s and first half of the 1980s are especially prone to this, though other makes of trains aren’t immune either. And sometimes you

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How to straighten bent prewar/tinplate axles

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 20 Feb 2011 14:01:36 +0000

A common problem with prewar/tinplate cars, regardless of make (American Flyer, Ives, Lionel, Marx) is bent axles. If the car wobbles when it moves, one or more of the axles is bent. Reproduction parts might or might not be available,

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Fix or restore Lionel track

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 13 Nov 2010 12:32:52 +0000

It’s that time of year again. Time to get that old Lionel (or Marx or American Flyer) electric train running before the holidays sneak up. More often than not, the track isn’t in the best of shape. Fortunately, it’s not all

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Build a quiet and reliable toy train layout

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 27 May 2005 17:24:40 +0000

I hear two complaints about Lionel/American Flyer/Marx toy train layouts (besides the common complaints from uptight scale modelers, that is). One is the amount of space they take up, and the other is the noise.

Let's tackle the noise. While we're at it, we'll tackle reliability.

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How to get that dusty old train running again

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 27 Nov 2004 21:46:05 +0000

It's the weekend after Thanksgiving. The time of year when nostalgia runs high and ancient toy trains come out of the basement or the attic and get set up again until sometime after the new year.

Well, hopefully they make it that long. Here are some tips for getting old Lionel, American Flyer, Marx, and similar trains running again.

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