# Lionel Questions?



## bill 82801 (Apr 4, 2010)

First off I know I need to read more on Lionel trains so can anybody suggest what books would be good on Lionel pre and postwar trains?
Now for some basic questions to get me started.

Have new Lionel stuff now, trains and the fasttrack. But just started and dont have alot yet.

1. After looking at E-bay and seeing the post and prewar trains and cars I really like the look of them. The older stuff just seems more to my liking. But will these older Lionel trains and cars run on Fast track since thats what I have.

2. How about Vintage Ives Lionel cars, 1930's cars, I'm assuming new trucks and couplers would be in order to match my new loco's. Is that a hard replacement? Or is that even possible?

3. Was wondering on Vintage American Flyer O gauge will it run on the fast track and what about the couplers and trucks, do they need changed out for new stuff also?

See I really do need some good books to learn about this stuff. Sorry for such a long post. Thanks for any help you can give me on this.

Bill


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## T-Man (May 16, 2008)

Welcome to MTF. The questions raised aren't just in a book. The best thing is to go to a train show and see them. Fastrak is just a fancy O ,027 cars will work fine. Why do you want to mix cars of different eras? WHat I do is have different tenders that match up to certain couplers so I can pouul cars that are alike. The Steamers all have the same draw bar. The more you collect the less likely you will want to mix them up. This is just a general opinion. SOme cars will go together but others will look off. It is a good question and there are different ways to handle mixed cars. One is to buy adapters for the knuckles. You can even mix a car to do half and half, one coupler on each end. This stuff is better if you saw the items first.
I do admit I liked an Amercan Flyer S scale Gondola and switched it to Lionel Trucks. S gage and Lionel 027 are very close in size. But height is important. Some cars will look weird because the height is so obvious. This is true in modern and the prewar items.Just explore and have fun . If anyything else just post. THe 1690 1691 are close to Ives


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## bill 82801 (Apr 4, 2010)

*Lionel*

T-man when I first started this I brought new trains and the fast track. But now that I have looked at the older Lionel stuff it really does seem thats more what I want to get into. I guess mostly just wanted to make sure these older trains would run on the fast track. I'm looking mostly now at pre-war Lionel or American flyer O gauge. But thanks for your help and if I have a chance will go to a train show.


Bill


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## T-Man (May 16, 2008)

I missed the state. Wyoming. 
Evanston has a train show. Back in AUg of 01

For books, the Doyle reference, The Standard catalog of Lionel Trains 1900-1942. second edition. 

Prewar is a nice period. A lot is still out there and most of it is reasonable. I got lucky with the 610 and 612 passenger cars. 
Good Luck


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## tjcruiser (Jan 10, 2010)

Bill,

Good advice from T-Man. I'll add a bit.

I started 1958 Lionel. Dabble 1945. Then went tinplate prewar. Love it. Having a blast doing the restoration thing.

Doyle's books are great. He has a postwar 1945-1969 2nd edition, along with a 1949-1969 Lionel Sets book, too. Also, the Greenberg's compilation of Lionel service manuals is a must-have bible: Repair and Operating Manual for Lionel Trains, 1945-1969.

I'm running postwar and prewar tinplate (the smaller cars/locos) on O-27. No problems on the regular track, but some of these older tinplate locos (259, 1681 for example) are finicky when navigating over switches. Their pickups can short out occassionally on the switch frogs and such. I've never tried fastrack, but you might run into a similar problem.

Remember that Lionel bought out Ives in 1929. Early 1930's Ives stuff was still produced under the Ives name, then they transitioned over to the Lionel name around 1934. Because of that, many Lionel tinplate locos and cars are really carry-overs from Ives. Lionel used their latch couplers instead of the Ives type, but other than that, the cars are essentially the same.

Regards,

TJ


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