My 12V sleeper plates keep breaking

[tabicat]

I have some European 12V Lego trains that have been in storage for 30 years. While trying to reassemble them, my sleeper plates usuallt break when I try to remove them from the rails. Does anyone have any tips on how to safely detach them?

[rogul]

honestly at the cost u can get some on bricklink dont worry about it.. its near impossible not to break a few (or even a lot).

[JopieK]

That is also my experience, for me the reason that I do not use 12V anymore, switched to 9V and/or PF.

[AlmightyArjen]

That is also my experience, for me the reason that I do not use 12V anymore, switched to 9V and/or PF.

Same reason here... It's impossible to remove the sleepers without breaking the half of them...

[rogul]

u damn well cursed me.. i broke 10 today when doing a redo of my layout hehe

[antp]

A solution is using regular 2x8 plates even if it is not as well attached (if it is for a temporary layout).

Last time I assembled my 12V rails, I ended up using the simple white plates of the blue tracks also for the grey tracks.

There is a way to detach the grey sleepers properly (that does not require much force), but it is not easy to find (and I am not sure I achieve it each time), and anyway it is not easy to not break them.

Edited August 14, 2014 by antp

[LEGO Train 12 Volts]

I use a little screwdriver to split the rail from the sleeper

[dr_spock]

I carefully use my fingernails but they still break from time to time. Some feel very brittle after 30 years. I gave up and use new PF track. I put the old tracks and sleepers away.

[Pizzareno]

It is just a shame that the centre metal rails from the 12v won't clip on to the curved track. The straight rails are fine but the curved ones have a supporting piece of plastic in the wrong place. Otherwise you could use PF track and still run 12v. I feel like experimenting with cutting the bottom of my 12v curved centre rails and seeing if that will work. Has anyone ever tried that?

[Rail Co]

As I never got the me-models Metal track when it was first released (I will get some when they do release it). I was wondering if you could use the me-models track with the 12v center rail and still conduct power on both pieces! Then the ultimate piece of track would be born "The Universal Track"

If anyone has both of these pieces I am curious to see if that would work!

Keep Brickin'

-RailCo

[EDIT]: If the 12v center piece is to low you raise it by 1-2 1x2 plate! I hope that works for you guys as I cannot test it myself!

Edited August 18, 2014 by Rail Co