I picked up a new Lionel operating milk car (6-83252), and, as I've done for other milk cars, wanted to install an ERR Mini Commander for TMCC control and a dashpot from a post-war 36621 to smooth the operation.
Imagine my surprise when I took the shell off and found not the familiar solenoid that's powered every milk car since 1947, but a servo motor mechanism with a control PCB! No more buzzing and milk cans flying out at high speed. I'd idly wondered if operating cars could be updated with a servo mechanism, but hadn't realized that Lionel had taken that step.
The new design is even easier to convert to Mini Commander control, since it's already wired to get its operating power from the track. The sliding shoes are just to trigger the operation, not to actually power it (like the MTH operating reefers). I removed the sliding shoes and connected the wires that had been connected to the sliding shoes to one of the outputs of the Mini Commander. A half-second pulse from the Mini Commander worked well to trigger the servo mechanism.
Just too bad there will be no more Mini Commanders for operating cars....
