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At the Allentown train show last week I purchased a Thomas the Tank Engine "Diesel" LionChief for $70 with remote.  I had no intentions of running this engine.  It was going to be my donor test engine.

Today at the York Greenberg show I purchased this "dead" Weaver U25B for $40 ( I misspoke in the video).  The fella who sold it to me said it needed a home and did not run.  When I took it apart, I saw the board was scorched.  This would be a great test of my first LionChief donor and is was cheap.

It works!  So for $110 I have a poor man's command and control.   The sounds that come with the LionChief are poor at best.  Maybe I'll buy a sound system from Dallee.  

The board has open ports for lights, chuff, smoke and switch (not sure what that is).  I assume all LionChief engines run on LED, so I'll assemble some LED lights for this new to me Engine.

The process was smooth and easy and took me just under 30 minutes to remove the board and install in the new engine. 

Oh Yeah... The engine is missing a fuel tank.  So I need to look for one or make one from scratch.

Now that I see this is very easy, I might be doing other engines in the future.

Have Fun!

Ron

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Good work! One of my favorite things is fixing/modifying broken trains.

I love what I call "junk box trains" and a friend calls "broken wing birds".  Just today, I put together a scale Milwaukee road E6 with a Lionel shell, an MTH chassis and motors, and a Dallee reverse unit. I love fixing broken trains.

Good work on your finds and use of the LionChief board.

If you do some hunting on the Lionel parts website you can purchase the LionChief Boards and matching hand held LionChief remotes. Ordered a few at the recent parts 1/2 price sale. There are a variety of trains types that you can buy.  Just have to hunt hard for in stock boards that are available to order. Many are not available.

Let us know if your board holds up. I have swapped around lots of LionChief boards and fear that your board made for a light duty single motor may burn out / over heat running 2 heavier load motors. 

Nice job, but ^^what KJ356 said.  I'm not sure if there's more than one version of the LionChief board for diesels.  That's something you might be able to figure out by comparing parts lists / exploded diagrams on the LionelSupport website.

In the meantime I can tell you that "Thomas" kid stuff is all plastic and very light-duty; that board may not have enough current capacity for a dual motored diesel with lead weights (!) in the body.  My prescription would be to ditch the weights and rewire the two can motors in series instead of parallel, if you didn't already connect them in series when you installed the board.  This will reduce current draw, and you'll get better slow-speed operation as a bonus!

You can use wood or plastic to make a new fuel tank, or even just the sides; if they're thick enough no one will know that it's not solid all the way through.  Good place for a speaker, and you'll add back a little of the weight with a lower center of gravity.

Last edited by Ted S

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