I'm looking at adding this 2011 issued locomotive to my collection and I'm curious if anyone has any experience with it. It claims whistle steam effect but with a single smoke generator.
Any issues that anyone has with it? Would love to hear your experience.
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I have a couple of these. They have two smoke units. These have the RS385 direct drive gearboxes which I am not a fan of but they haven’t given me any issues.
2011. Can’t believe I have had my two that long.
Mine run well. They both have the gearbox fix and one has an inoperable whistle steam effect. Nice looking engines.
I have two of them as well, and there are indeed two smoke units.
Thanks for the responses! My "one smoke unit" comment come from looking at the manual. Silly me to believe manuals.
Does anyone have a link or explanation of the "gearbox fix" that Ron refers to?
@LionelAG posted:Thanks for the responses! My "one smoke unit" comment come from looking at the manual. Silly me to believe manuals.
Does anyone have a link or explanation of the "gearbox fix" that Ron refers to?
There is a known defect in SOME models that exhibited the cluster gear to walk away from the motor gear. Some models exhibited it horribly to the point of skipping teeth, some had only minor walk, ….many opted for the cheap insurance plan I devised some time ago when I campaigned the fix for this issue…..
Pat 
Thanks Pat! Is a fix available from Lionel or only from service independent from Lionel?
@LionelAG posted:Thanks Pat! Is a fix available from Lionel or only from service independent from Lionel?
No, Lionel did not address the problem. ….The problem was by the time the issue developed, these machines were out of warranty, and off Lionel’s radar,….I developed the fix and campaigned the repair. If yours exhibits issues, or want cheap insurance, get a hold of me via profile for details….
Pat
@LionelAG posted:If anyone would be willing to part with one, I'm in the market and would like to discuss buying or trading. Send me a private note on my profile.
Tim
Tim, post this in the want to buy forum, and delete the above reply…..sure fire way to get a thread closed down….
Pat
Pat, done.
Imo, I would avoid this model.
This engine marks the beginning of Lionels noisy smoke fan epidemic, and poorly designed gearbox issues.
Unless a reputable seller has had Pat fix the gearbox . I wouldn't touch one.
I replaced the smoke fan motors only to have them get noisy again a year later.
My engine only had an hour or two of run time and the secondary gearshaft bushing was turning to shavings.
Maybe lionel will reissue this loco, but then sure the colors will be wrong. Correct colors is the one huge plus over the issues plaguing the 2011 k4.
@RickO posted:I replaced the smoke fan motors only to have them get noisy again a year later.
The gearbox is the real issue. I replaced the fan motors with MTH smoke motors, never heard from those again. Truthfully, unless it's a Lionel smoke unit that requires the short motor, I always use the MTH motors.
I have the 11265 and its been running for a number of years now with no trouble is this the same as the 11264 as far as gear boxes?
@Rick Rubino posted:I have the 11265 and its been running for a number of years now with no trouble is this the same as the 11264 as far as gear boxes?
Mechanically Rick, they’re the same, ….however, as I’ve said before, I’ve had some so bad they skipped teeth, then I had some not so bad, but I was there, so the cheap insurance policy kicks into play, …..it’s one of those things, buddy, if I’m gonna open it up & have a look around, I’m just gonna stick the fix in there and not even question it,…the above example actually belongs to John Will ( it’s a spare, and I just keep forgetting to send it back. 🙄 ) it was skipping so bad, it was starting to mangle teeth, …but even with the edge mangled, when I put the fix in it, it’s useable again….
Pat
Yep, that was one that I got to before it totally ate the gear, I replaced the drive block on a couple that had nothing left to engage the worm, a total loss.
@gunrunnerjohn posted:Yep, that was one that I got to before it totally ate the gear, I replaced the drive block on a couple that had nothing left to engage the worm, a total loss.
It’s also prototype # 1,……the one that I first adapted the fix to! …I used to keep count, now I couldn’t tell ya how many I’ve done …..almost as bad as the Pittman swaps….
Pat
It's great the fix worked out, I am curious to see exactly how it was done. 
I never understood this issue. What gets out of alignment badly enough to cause the damage?
Here ya go Norm, …this pic might explain it better? ….
Pat 
I have parts from the half off sale to convert one of my K4s to the postwar pilot version. I will take a peek into the gearbox when I do the conversion. Any idea if the damage and misalignment can occur in forward or reverse? It will be interesting to look into now that I’m intimately familiar with the L1 gears.
Didn’t really matter the direction Norm, once it kicked it to one side, it just tended to stay there and grind away, ….the whole cluster would walk over the thickness & + of that brass bar stock,…..I put a half moon bronze bearing on the other end of that bar, and angle cut the far end as a trap, ….then one screw holds it in place….
Pat
@Norm Charbonneau posted:I have parts from the half off sale to convert one of my K4s to the postwar pilot version. I will take a peek into the gearbox when I do the conversion. Any idea if the damage and misalignment can occur in forward or reverse? It will be interesting to look into now that I’m intimately familiar with the L1 gears.
Before you even take it apart it's merely a matter of shining a flashlight through the spokes onto the secondary shaft and bushing in the chassis.
Then, with the loco powered off rock the engine back and forth. In my engines case the shaft rocked back and forth inside the bushing, and the bushing was worn oblong.
This was only on one side of the shaft were the brunt of the secondary gear load was taken.
I could see it being a major prob if those bearings oblong out. Just wondering if that first gear slips and shifts over under load. These gearboxes are not my favorite especially after the L1. Gotta wonder why they would even build them like this. Assembly at the factory must be a hassle. Fixing one of these after a failure with new parts (if you could get them) would require quite a bit of precision labor. Luckily my two K4s are OK so far. Got one new and picked up the second one used.
The worm wheel, & the spur gear are pressed on that shaft pretty tight. They don’t budge. The side that has the spur gear can’t move but so much in that direction obviously because the spur gear will run into the wall. On the opposite side, when the brass bar isn’t there, the whole cluster shaft can walk over and start beating on the tiny bushing in the gear box wall, ….I think it’s that erosion that makes it walk even further over, and eventually enough to disengage the motor gear, or grind on it like the example above did, ……even with the edge wiped off like the one pictured above, with the bar stock & bushing in place, the worm wheel is again useable, and the motor gear makes good contact in the center of the worm wheel,……clear as mud, right?
Pat
I think the saddest part of the Legacy K4s debacle is that even after they knew about the problem, they didn't bother to fix later releases. I have a 2019 WGH Funeral version (which is cool because it's 3570 in it's early configuration with the forward piston rods, oil lamp, round number plate, and a shorty tender (albeit the wrong model with the wrong deck height). However even with the 7-8 year gap in production, it has the same tiny bushing that the others have on the intermediate shaft. It also suffers from the disco lipstick red tender deck.
Mine has had NO issues. 3+ years.
@Mike Wyatt posted:Mine has had NO issues. 3+ years.
It's mostly a function of how much you run it, and I suspect how many cars are behind it.
I don’t have a 1361 Legacy K4 but I do have a #1330. Never had any trouble with it, both smoke units work fine. I double head it with a Legacy K4 # 3380 which started life as a Polar RR K4 #25.
Some of y’all ma never have an issue,…..some had actual skipping gears, and that’s why the fix was developed. I can’t say for certain if a particular cab # is more affected than the other. If you’re not experiencing problems, that’s great news! ….but if you do, as long as you don’t grind it to a pulp, the engine is very much repairable now.
Pat
As a side comment, I have a Legacy 4-6-2 No. 1361 K4s that looks and runs beautifully. But, there is a catch. My sample was a factory return which was gone over completely by Dean Brasseur when he was the head of the Lionel Repair Department and purchased at a Lionel open house when the company was still headquartered in Canfield Ohio.
But, I digress. 
Bob
@harmonyards posted:Some of y’all ma never have an issue,…..some had actual skipping gears, and that’s why the fix was developed. I can’t say for certain if a particular cab # is more affected than the other. If you’re not experiencing problems, that’s great news! ….but if you do, as long as you don’t grind it to a pulp, the engine is very much repairable now.
Pat
Having replaced four drive blocks for this issue, and I don't repair that many of them, I have to laugh about the naysayers. I'm here to say, the problem is real, and it's potentially an issue with every one of the same design without shims to limit the gear traveling on the shaft! I also have a couple of the suspect K4's, but I haven't run them long enough or with a large enough load to cause the issue, that's probably the only reason I haven't had the issue!
They'll run a long time appearing to "not have the issue". If one doesn't observe the condition of the secondary shaft bushing in the chassis ,just above the driven axle .
My k4 still ran smooth as "buttah", while the shaft was generating bronze shavings on the outside of the bushing.
I parted with it before it self destructed. I was only pulling 4 k line 15" cars.
The engine had a few hours at most and was thoroughly lubed with red n tacky out of the box.
A real shame. These k4s run way smoother than much of the newer stuff delivered these days.
@gunrunnerjohn posted:Having replaced four drive blocks for this issue, and I don't repair that many of them, I have to laugh about the naysayers. I'm here to say, the problem is real, and it's potentially an issue with every one of the same design without shims to limit the gear traveling on the shaft! I also have a couple of the suspect K4's, but I haven't run them long enough or with a large enough load to cause the issue, that's probably the only reason I haven't had the issue!
I’ve learned to simply not challenge their happy place anymore John, …..😉
Pat
@harmonyards posted:I’ve learned to simply not challenge their happy place anymore John, …..😉
Pat
The information is out there, and now people can choose what to do with it. That’s a win in my book, and is what most people use internet forums for — information.
In addition we have great talents like yourself that can derive a fix!
Pat-
You kindly responded to my query previously regarding K4 models and reported a gearbox issue with the 2011 Lionel models. I'm curious if you've seen the same issue with the 2016 issue of Lionel 6-84115. Did Lionel fix the gearbox problem by then?
Tim
@LionelAG posted:Pat-
You kindly responded to my query previously regarding K4 models and reported a gearbox issue with the 2011 Lionel models. I'm curious if you've seen the same issue with the 2016 issue of Lionel 6-84115. Did Lionel fix the gearbox problem by then?
I have the 2019 K4 WGH funeral train and it still has the same problems. It’s unlikely the earlier 2016 release is any different.
Not to add on to the list of bad news, but considering the other thread going around about the LC2 motor shafts, are the shafts on the motors themselves something to look out for as well?
Pat's given the insurance plan on 3 of my LEGACY Mikes, so they're great now and I love them, but I'd love to hear what he says about the hardness of the worm shafts on Lionel locomotives in the past decade or so.
@Mikado 4501 posted:Pat's given the insurance plan on 3 of my LEGACY Mikes, so they're great now and I love them, but I'd love to hear what he says about the hardness of the worm shafts on Lionel locomotives in the past decade or so.
The worm wearing out is yet another issue that seems to be rearing it's head based on a few threads I've seen recently. That's going to be really distressing if some of your $2,000 locomotives are rendered inert because the worm wears out and there are no replacement parts! 
@gunrunnerjohn posted:The worm wearing out is yet another issue that seems to be rearing it's head based on a few threads I've seen recently. That's going to be really distressing if some of your $2,000 locomotives are rendered inert because the worm wears out and there are no replacement parts!
Doesn't ever seem to be any good news. I know at of the list of locomotives, I've got quite a good number that have to see Pat when I get time and when he does.
@LionelAG posted:Pat-
You kindly responded to my query previously regarding K4 models and reported a gearbox issue with the 2011 Lionel models. I'm curious if you've seen the same issue with the 2016 issue of Lionel 6-84115. Did Lionel fix the gearbox problem by then?
Tim
Gearbox failures see link below, it's on there.
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