Smoker stopped working on Santa Fe freight train

May 31, 2014

Jim asks readers:

“I have a Lionel Santa Fe freight train O scale (8689) with whistle and smoker. The train sat idle for much of the spring, but now that my son has gotten back to using it, the smoke stack no longer seems to work. Does anyone have experience with this? Could it be the fluid that was in the loco before he stopped using it glopped up while sitting idle? Or is it more likely an issue with what I presume is a tiny motor that pumps the fluid out? I’d like advice on how I could fix this, if anyone has any suggestions. Thank you.”

Add your comment to help Jim.

If you have a question you would like published you can submit it to the blog moderator for consideration. The link is in the right hand column.

Facebook

Twitter

2 Responses to Smoker stopped working on Santa Fe freight train

Dennis says:

July 2, 2014 at 1:29 am

Smoke units get clogged up. Turn tranformer up 1/2 to 3/4. Hold locomotive over track. make contact with wheels to track holding up loco. The motor will run fast and heat up smoke unit. This will burn out old smoke oil. Then run on track with fresh oil. It will smoke loke new unit.
Enjoy

Reply
Jamie says:

July 2, 2014 at 7:34 pm

I had an old DC Steam engine with a smoker, which I hadn’t used for several years while occupied with other things in High school. In my case a few drops of smoke fluid was added directly to the smoke stack which basically contained a tiny brass cup-shaped vessel which heated up to produce the smoke. After several years of disuse the smoker wasn’t working anymore. I had even disassembled the engine to see if there was a bad solder point or something, but in the end I simply took a sewing needle and VERY carefully scraped out the residue in the brass vessel. After that it started working and I ran a couple of doses of smoke through it to make sure it was good and cleaned out.

Reply