Mth auxiliary water tenders

You cannot. The tenders have a coupler and back up light and require a connection to a locomotive via tether to function.

You would have to convert them to work with TMCC so you could remotely control the coupler and light through Legacy.

Ok thank you. I wish Lionel would make the Norfolk and Western water tender that goes with 611 but oh well. How would you convert it to TMCC?

Buy all the parts to go inside  for a TMCC or Legacy tenderand install them. Since the 611 is a passenger loco, the necessity for the water tender to function is kind of mute since they dont uncouple much or spend much  time running in reverse. You  want it to work they it should but you'll find that the reward of that project probably wont justify your efforts. Youll put in a bunch of time and some money to do something that doesnt get used that much.

Ok thank you! I’ll hold off on the water tender

Plan B would be to do a small mod to the aux tender and main tender.  Use a 4-pin tether, I prefer the Miniatronics Micro-Mini Connectors,

Two of the pins extend the coupler to the aux tender (you'll have to swap the coupler for a TMCC compatible version), and the other two are for the back up light.

A DPDT switch installed under the tender can be used to switch the light and coupler to the aux tender or to the main tender.  This mod will be a lot cheaper than doing the full TMCC upgrade for the tender.  If you have Legacy, there is no easy upgrade path, you'd have to buy the parts and "roll your own", not nearly as easy a task.  This mod handles Legacy or TMCC equally.

Thr Railking Models are just empty shells with coupler tabs at each end. They use to be electric with a wire connected to the back of the tender. Don’t know if the Premier tenders are like that. 

I had plans to do one with TMCC parts until I realized that A) I never uncouple the cars from my passenger trains and B) I rarely run them in reverse and when I do, I dont care about the back up light since there are usually a set of passenger cars behind the loco. I also thought about Johns idear of adding the tether but I decided I could live with it and my time was better sent on other things. A tether is fiarly easy and straight forward but youre still looking at a number of hours of labor involved.

SDIV Tim posted:

Thr Railking Models are just empty shells with coupler tabs at each end. They use to be electric with a wire connected to the back of the tender. Don’t know if the Premier tenders are like that. 

The Premier models have a connector for the backup light and coupler that mates with the primary tender's tether.  At least the two that I have are done that way.  Both of the ones I have are later models and have an LED for the backup light, obviously for PS/3 locomotive/tender combos.

Do any of you think Lionel will ever make a Norfolk and Western auxiliary tender for the 611?

Uhh... I think that's a Lionel question, I personally have no idea if that might happen.  I wouldn't hold my breath if that's what you're asking.

I need an auxxtender for my J and my S3. Gina have to be an MTH one

LionelLegend posted:

Do any of you think Lionel will ever make a Norfolk and Western auxiliary tender for the 611?

Didn’t they do that many years ago?

Doug N posted:

LionelLegend posted:

Do any of you think Lionel will ever make a Norfolk and Western auxiliary tender for the 611?

Didn’t they do that many years ago?

They did but it was for the A class 1218.

Here's my Legacy Y6b with the 2016 MTH Tender, they also had one that matched the 611, I sold that one as I don't have that locomotive.

John, Do you know if there is a compatibility problem with a PS3 Loco and a PS2 Aux tender? Back up light change to LED ? What about the Electro Coupler and the harness plug ? 

Thanks RWDeano

The PS/3 tender would need a lamp change I suspect, but the couplers are the same between PS/2 and PS/3.  I honestly don't know about the connector as I haven't really looked at the differences.  That's one of those little details that I deal with when the issue arises.   The PS/3 tender I have looks to have the same 4-pin tether connector as MTH uses for a variety of products.  The main tender would have the tether as there is just a connector on the truck on the aux tender.

Thanks for the info, I will just have to open both tenders and see. Did not want to or would I buy new tenders over again if I can just R&R LED lamp. Thanks

RWDeano

You can use the LED for the PS/2, just add a 220 ohm resistor and make sure the polarity of the connection is correct.