Lionel 1991 lift bridge gray 6-12782 help now in sutable walwart needed

I have this bridge and only operate it on rare occasions because the failure rate on the electronics is so high. In fact it's packed away now so I can't look at the parts.

Re: your question 1, I'm editing my original response because I might have misread your query.

Are you just looking to replace the original wall wart, i.e. this part:

This is rated as a 12vdc, 3 amp supply. A quick search on Amazon etc. reveals quite a few possible substitutes although (a) you might need one with multiple barrel tips to find what actually fits the input on the bridge's control box and (b) better check the  bridge manual to see if it discloses the exact power input specs in light of what I say below.

Alternatively, there was an option to power the bridge from track/transformer power. You need to check the manual for exactly how to wire this. From memory it was not straightforward although I have used it.

if you are needing to replace the black control box, it's basically pot luck trying to find one. This bridge's manufacture was actually a sub-contract by Lionel to Mike Wolf of MTH and neither have access to a direct replacement (see linked thread below). Replacing the black box comes up every so often here and I recall a thread ending with a proposal by a forum member to create a substitute but I don't know whether he or anyone else did: https://ogrforum.ogaugerr.com/...r-lionel-lift-bridge

I vaguely recall another thread where someone took the box apart to repair old components but can't track that one down. Hopefully someone else can weigh in with additional info if there is a substitute available. I'd certainly be interested in knowing if there is.

Question 2: I had to replace a tower strobe light on mine too, which came with incandescent bulbs on the towers. After reading about the delicate electronics I decided to source a screw-in incandescent bulb as a direct replacement instead of wiring for LEDs. These bulbs are easy to find; I think that they are basically the same size and spec as those used for K-Line illuminated bumpers.

Are you sure to power supply is bad? The usual failure mode for the bridge is the power switch in the control box, not the power supply itself. See this thread for a history and what to do.

As far as changing the bulbs for LEDs, that may be problematic. The circuit ramps the voltage up and down giving a distinct look to the bulbs. I don't know if LEDs will respond the same way. Check some of the other threads about wiring LEDs into the circuit. I know a resistor is usually required.

Best of luck with this project!

Chris

LVHR

Guys thanks for the info. I just got this one used and no power supply was included. Seller stated he used a standard ac transformer to power the box. I am going to try that today. As for the thread about the bad rocker switch did anyone find a sutable replacement rocker switch? Or is jumpering the old one and installing an inline one still the way to go if mine fails. 

As for the LEDS. I may put the suttable bulbs back in place. I just need to find some. 

Also one other question.  Is the pcb poard in the tower of the bridge a concern. Does it also have a failer rate. If so maybe I will find a second bridge just for spare parts as they are hard to find as I am finding out. 

This realy is a nice bridge and when I find room on my layout it will definatly be a show peace thats for shure.

Lionelzwl2012 posted:

Guys thanks for the info. I just got this one used and no power supply was included. Seller stated he used a standard ac transformer to power the box. I am going to try that today. As for the thread about the bad rocker switch did anyone find a sutable replacement rocker switch? Or is jumpering the old one and installing an inline one still the way to go if mine fails.

As for the LEDS. I may put the  bulbs back in place. I just need to find some. 

Also one other question.  Is the pcb poard in the tower of the bridge a concern. Does it also have a failer rate. If so maybe I will find a second bridge just for spare parts as they are hard to find as I am finding out. 

This realy is a nice bridge and when I find room on my layout it will definatly be a show peace thats for shure.

In case you have not got it, the manual number for this bridge is 71-2782-250 and is available here: https://www.lionelsupport.com/...ents/71-2782-250.pdf

This shows various track power options.

There is no spec in the manual for the tower bulb but the replacement I used was a midget screw base bulb that was a K-Line part (from the Supersnap lighted bumper) made to run off of track power. 

Not sure about the failure rate of the sound system; most of what I have seen relates to the black control box.

Thanks for the pdf instructions. I hooked up the bridge to one of my old cw80 transformers. Set it to 16 volts and it works. Now to hook it up with some fastrack at either end and see how that goes. 

Went to find the bulbs for the strob lites. Hard to find. Any one know where to get them? If I cant find them will LEDS work? What kind and what would I need to make them work? 

The bulb is a standard Model Power type red bulb.  The board makes it blink.  Do it right and don't mess with what it is.  Buy a clear bulb and color it res with a red Sharpie.   I had my control box go bad years ago and searched for 8 years to find one.  Dotty found one on fleabay  for $45.00.  The next York I finally found one at $100.00 and was very happy to buy a back up.  When I needed the box, Mike Reagan had nothing at Lionel and Mike Wolf could not turn anything up as he made it for Lionel.

I would use a 3mm flashing red led, approximetly a 850 ohm resistor would be used if over 12v, around 15 is good, the more voltage, the higher the resistor..

Marty

Martin, that is a not a good idea.  You mess with the board and that is not available on the planet.  Use the bulbs I told you to use if you want to do it right.  Standard bulbs and the board makes them blink.  The bulbs are not blinkers, they are standard bulbs.  Same bulb MTH uses for some RK steam headlights.  Below is a pix of a red one from one of my bridges and the clear bulb from old Model Power lights.  Color the clear bulb with a red Sharpie and you are up and running.  You may be able to find red bulbs.  Town and Country Hobbies at York will have these.  I have my own bridges and have worked on many over the years for Charles Ro.  

Marty will these work?

I did not know the board controlled the flashing, I totally agree with your post on using regular bulbs.  I just figured the LEd's would have a bit more kick to them...

Marty

Those are the bulbs.  Color them with a red Sharpie and you are blinking the night away.

Marty, I would figure the same as you.  The LED would look cool.  I got to know more about this brige than I ever wanted to.   I went crazy looking for a box.  My bridges work and they are staying down.

Marty also is it ok to power the control box with an ac transformer with 16-18 volts. The one I have has no power supply and the seller included a barrel jack that fits with the striped wires. I hooked it up to an old cw 80 and set it to about 16 volts and tested the bridge. It seemed to work ok. Just wanted to know if the transformer will damage the hard to find control box. Thanks.

Marty Fitzhenry posted:

Marty, I would figure the same as you.  The LED would look cool.  I got to know more about this brige than I ever wanted to.   I went crazy looking for a box.  My bridges work and they are staying down.

Hi Marty,

Many years ago my neighbor had his bridge fail.  I was able to get schematics from Mike Braga (a really long time ago!) to see what could be done.  That circuit was an example of how not to do electrical engineering, believe me.  I was able to make up a sound board for the warning horn and bell.  Finally got it to run.  I could see if Ron (neighbor) still has the drawings.  

Lou N

Lou, that would be great.   I may have that other item we conversed about.

Marty

Is it still ok to power the black control box with an ac transformer set around 16 volts? Dont want to damage anything by doing something wrong here. Just found and orderd the bulbs and will color them red thanks marty. Now on to building a permenate modular wooden base to mount this on. This will hopefully  be added to my layout in the near future. 

Marty Fitzhenry posted:

Lou, that would be great.   I may have that other item we conversed about.

 

Marty

Excellent; thank you sir.

Lou N

Lionelzwl2012 posted:

Is it still ok to power the black control box with an ac transformer set around 16 volts? Dont want to damage anything by doing something wrong here. Just found and orderd the bulbs and will color them red thanks marty. Now on to building a permenate modular wooden base to mount this on. This will hopefully  be added to my layout in the near future. 

A post above says the wall-wart for the bridge is 12 volts DC with 3 amp capability.  (After looking at my own, I believe that should be 12 volts AC - the 3 amps matched on my supply)

Why would you tempt fate by applying 16 volts though?  You should probably keep it as close to 12 as possible.

{edit:  I just looked at my wal-wart for the bridge, and it says 12V AC output.  Sorry if anyone read my un-edited original post and saw my comments about the bridge needing DC.  I am certain the supply is AC.}

-Dave

Thanks dave. I contacted the original owner who I purchased this from. The owner emailed me and stated I could use a standard transformer set anywhere bettwen 16 and 18 volts. This is what he said he did. I have tryed it that way and it works, but thought about your original post and had to ask the question. Do not want to damage anything on this because as you know parts are either non existent or very hard to find. I am finding out how finicky these can be. Going slow and thinking thinks through are helping me get all the various operating things right. Thanks for looking at you wall wart for me. 

Lou N posted:

Many years ago my neighbor had his bridge fail.  I was able to get schematics from Mike Braga (a really long time ago!) to see what could be done.  That circuit was an example of how not to do electrical engineering, believe me.  I was able to make up a sound board for the warning horn and bell.  Finally got it to run.  I could see if Ron (neighbor) still has the drawings.  

Lou N

It would be great if the schematics could be found and made available; if you find them I'd definitely like to have a copy. Lionel has no information of this kind.

It was my mistake to interpret the Lionel replacement part description as VDC instead of VAC. It stands to reason the wall power supply would be AC if the bridge can also be run using track power. The manual actually says very little about the wall power supply - except, I belatedly notice on page 3, that the wall supply is AC! 

Title change to reflec my next question. As dave 45681 stated looks like I need a 12v 3amp powersupply for the black control box. I found two that I think will work for this. Before I purchase either one. My question is which one will work or are they both ok to use? It looks from the photo that the barrel jack is the right size. Although I am not sure. This is why I am seeking those who know here about this. I have attatched pics of the two I have found.

If these are switchers, which it appears they are from the size and capacity. they should be regulated and they should work.  Before actually connecting them, I'd measure the output voltage without a load.

Since these are available on eBay for around $3.50 and up shipped, it's not expensive to try a couple.

Thank john. Thats what I thought. This bridge is very hard to find if not imposible to get replacement parts for. Ask marty he will tell ya. I purchased mine used here and the seller only included a barrel jack plug with two bare wires. He stated to me I could use a accessory transformer set bettween 16v to 18v. It does work but the original power supply is only 12v. So I dont want to tempt fate and blow a board or somthing. Thats why I was searching today to find a suttable wallwart replacement. The stock lionel one is no longer available. 

Those 2 supplies pictured seem to be DC output!

Note the "+" and "-" on the tip polarity diagram and also the "- - - - - - -" and "----------"  (doesn't translate to text well, but one broken line and one solid line).  I am 99.99% sure this also means DC for the output.  If it was AC output, there should not be a "+" and "-" pointing to the inner and outer conductor.

You want AC output, which is much harder to find in wall warts.

I'd re-read Marty's post about how long it took him to find a control box. 

On the plus side, the price on these bridges has come down a bit over the years, so you can probably buy a spare for  somewhere between $350-$450 quite regularly.  You will then just have a spare or static bridge to go with the dead control box.

-Dave

Are you sure you need AC?  If so, probably a small PW transformer would be the way to go.

If the items were not so hard to come by, I would love to let my extra power supply go but my luck I would then need one.    When the bridge first came out, they were a bit costly and dealers had them hanging about for a while.   I purchased 10 extender cables when they were available.  Parts are tough and Mike Wolf put some serious effort in trying to help me when I needed a control box.   Never let anyone lift the bridge up with hands.  These things are a pain to re string.  Been there.

gunrunnerjohn posted:

Are you sure you need AC?  If so, probably a small PW transformer would be the way to go.

I am sure that my wall wart I looked at is AC output (I double checked with the confusion yesterday). 

Having not tried to take apart the black controller box to draw a schematic, I am not sure it doesn't do something to rectify the AC to become DC less the diode drops, but I would assume one would not want to discover the design may not react well to DC  by testing it!

Marty Fitzhenry posted:

.................................  I purchased 10 extender cables when they were available.  ......................

Now those are probably good to have.  I was lucky to buy just one years ago from someone on eBay.  If you ever decide you can do with just 9 of them, let me know .  I might someday like to have another for my second bridge, but I'm pretty sure I will not ever find one for sale (without being in a package deal with another bridge also, at least) in the wild.

-Dave

RadioRon posted:

I wonder why neither Lionel, or Mike, whomever "owns" the tools & rights to the bridge, have never re-engineered the electronics and re-released it.  Gee, it has been 25 years... one would think there would be a market for a re-release... even though is is very large. 

Well, they did make the smaller lift bridge with metal structure (14167) styled after the post-war one that never made it into production.  I think it was cataloged in 2002, IIRC, so even that was almost 15 years ago now when it actually came out.

It's also a somewhat sought-after piece, but unfortunately it is no where near as generous in clearance.  Even some smaller items have issues making it through the structure.  (and it's not as involved, no horn or bell, just a simple switch to move the unit up or down - though it does have a light on a removable mast on each tower.).

-Dave

Yes marty they are. Even one string gets of a pulley wheel and its a pain to get it back on.

Marty would a small accessory transformer work if set to 12v output. The seller provided a barrel jack cable with the two wires that I can use to hook it up. See pic below. I have tryed it briefly with my old cw80 at around that just to test it out and it worked ok. Just when I permanetly hook this monster up I dont want to damage or fry any of the electronics. So I would like to know I am powering the black box with the proper voltage. 

As for the second bridge option. That had crossed my mind. The extra 300 or so is awfull pricey for a spare. Plus if I had two they both would have to be on the layout side by side like I have seen in some pictures in the old linked post about martys trouble finding the black box. That one photo of them looked very impresive. Cant remember who's layout it was on.  

I am happy with the one I purchased here on the forum. The seller was great and he packed it verry well. It was as he described it. Knowing now all the problems finding replacement parts. I wish I would have spent the extra and got one new in the box off flea bay. That way I would not have needed anything else. The other side to that is now I know what the problems were and what to look for. I too like marty will be looking for another control box as a spare. 

Dave in my search for lift bridge parts there is an exstender cable for sale on ebay last I checked. It was just last night. Not to pricey either. Though you may like to know.

OK, we'll go for AC, not that difficult to find.

12 VAC 3 AMP WALL TRANSFORMER

What's so special about the extension cable that you can't make one?  I'm missing why this should be rocket science.

gunrunnerjohn posted:

OK, we'll go for AC, not that difficult to find.

12 VAC 3 AMP WALL TRANSFORMER

What's so special about the extension cable that you can't make one?  I'm missing why this should be rocket science.

Good find on the wall wart, assuming it's really available (says low stock, and will ship if available?).  Looks to fit the bill, with possible barrel connector change (didn't measure the inner/outer dimensions, so I have no idea if that's a direct match or not - and the listing also doesn't say the outer dimension.).

Re; the extension, it's been a long time since I considered looking, but way back when, I wasn't able to  successfully find the male and female matching connectors (at least not years ago).

Yeah, if I want to cut up the cord, obviously it's easy.  I don't want to cut up the cord.  If I did, I would just use whatever kind of readily available 10 pin connectors I can find spliced in the middle of the original harness with some extra ribbon wire.

I never suggested it was rocket science, BTW.  Just that I don't see extension cables for sale often (didn't know about the item Roger mentioned, as I was not currently looking - so I am wrong about them never being for sale).

-Dave

John I realize its not really rocket science. I just am not good when looking for the right wallwart. There are lots out there also the barrlel end must be the right size for the jack on the black box. Not sure the size of it off hand. When it comes to electronics lets just say I know just enough to be dangerous. 

From the peek at the connector I can get from the single picture, it looks like a pretty common connector.  Hard to believe it's that hard to make one of these.  However, since I don't have a dog in this fight, I'll leave it at that.

The power supply is shown and the plug on the end is the same size plug that goes into your TIU.  

That should be an easy power supply to find.  Not so with the box.

What do you think one of those control boxes is worth?

Dotty found the complete set up on fleabay for $45.00 and I paid $100.00 to have a second back up.  I would just keep looking.  I have talked to Mike Reagan about reverse engineering it.  I do not know how many extra boxes were built for parts if any.  I would rather have a knock off than an original.  The knock off you can control the quality of the parts that go in the box.  If I ever see another, I will be on it.  If I am able to see plans from Lou N, I would be curious how many would be in demand.  It might be a good article for OGR.

Marty the problem with the black box is the rocker on/off switch right? The other buttons and toggle switch are ok right. Just asking as in the old thread about this. Fred stated he wired a external toggle switch to turn the unit off/ on. I was thinking if I leave the rocker switch on the black box set to  the on position I could turn it off/on with an inline switch placed in the cord of the wallwart. I am going to try to order the one john found.

Lionelzwl2012 posted:

Marty the problem with the black box is the rocker on/off switch right? The other buttons and toggle switch are ok right. Just asking as in the old thread about this. Fred stated he wired a external toggle switch to turn the unit off/ on. I was thinking if I leave the rocker switch on the black box set to  the on position I could turn it off/on with an inline switch placed in the cord of the wallwart. I am going to try to order the one john found.

It depends on the cause of the switch failures. Failure form over current. (Switch underrated) . ( Due to over current) Or some sort of mechinal failure from manufacturing or use. I highly suspect the first.

It comes down to whatever the seller wants for it.  I picked up my second at York for $100.00 and was very happy to get it.  The first one was $45.00 and I do not think the seller knew what he had.   I got the wall power and all the parts with that.  

I just want one to dissemble. To remove the power switch and find a correct replacement. 

Shawn, lots going on inside that box.

Understood! Not really a big deal.  I haven't had this bridge out of the box in years. I have a spare controller....time for a operation. I use to design switching power supply's. The scope hasn't been out in years. All my other projects are finished. This should keep me busy for a bit.

if I recall, I believe the controls were installed from the outside (panel mount) and the board soldered to all of the control terminals.

Check the old thread.

A spare box went south for reverse engineering and that never happened.

Lou N posted:

Marty Fitzhenry posted:

Marty, I would figure the same as you.  The LED would look cool.  I got to know more about this brige than I ever wanted to.   I went crazy looking for a box.  My bridges work and they are staying down.

Hi Marty,

Many years ago my neighbor had his bridge fail.  I was able to get schematics from Mike Braga (a really long time ago!) to see what could be done.  That circuit was an example of how not to do electrical engineering, believe me.  I was able to make up a sound board for the warning horn and bell.  Finally got it to run.  I could see if Ron (neighbor) still has the drawings.  

Lou N

Marty,

Check my latest post.  I posted the schematic wiring diagrams.  My neighbor still had the drawings.  Hope this helps.

Lou N

I'm resurrecting this thread as I intend to finally install mine on the layout.

First, Lou, thank you for posting that pdf! The latter half with the admonition about additional insulated tracks is invaluable! I've had mine out of the box and run it stand alone many times, although not recently, and never with track connected to it. Knock on wood as I write this, but it has worked well.

So my questions: Has anyone installed this bridge on their layout and used GarGraves Track? If so, what did you do about the sensor pieces? I can see operating the bridge without them, but then there is no safety factor if the bridge is up. Given the location I plan for the bridge, the sensors may not be necessary, as 1) it won't be on a main line, and 2) it will likely stay in the down position for most of the time.

Chris

LVHR