Aerotrain Aficionados:
My Aerotrain set is the Rock Island version with PS-3. I bought if on eBay from a hobbyist who placed weights in the loco and provided three add'l coaches (total of six) with figures installed in all of the coaches. When I placed it on my layout for a test run, I quickly discovered that the Aerotrain is "fussy" about trackwork and switches, especially its rear truck. The loco derailed at seven trackwork sites on my Lionel O-gauge O42 tubular tracks with K-line O42 switches (due to snags at the swivel rail).
Other locos in my collection ran OK on the trackwork, so I considered the issues with the Aerotrain as "Lessons in Trackwork 101" for my continuing education as a hobbyist/collector. Tips from GRJ at the OGR FORUM helped; however, he has applied more "tricks of the trade" to his Aerotrain set than I have done so far. However, I'm "walking in his moccasins."
My young helper and I fixed the trouble spots in two afternoon work sessions -- an exercise in humility for me from previously-laid trackwork and clearance spacing errors along my right of way. That adventure was the reason I wrote an article for publication in THE LION ROARS magazine. It's scheduled for publication in the October issue.
Later, I found and purchased three more Aerotrain RI coaches; now I have nine coaches. At the next operating session, I'll find out if the loco can pull them all. I expect the greatest challenge to the loco will be pulling this consist around the O42 curves and through O42 switches (especially when set to the curved path). I kept the "wide" diaphragms in place, but I have the "narrow" diaphragms on hand -- just in case.
I'm willing to persevere with the Aerotrain because I was a teenage passenger when it was assigned for a while in the mid-1950s to Rock Island's PEORIA ROCKET route as "The Train of Tomorrow." That was a memory-maker!
Mike Mottler LCCA 12394
