legotownlinz

Me too. But for children two end cars might be better as it is unlikely they get two sets. A coach sold separately would be the ideal solution. My favorite is the passenger train and I think it will look better than on the leaked images when stickers are applied. The stickers are missing on the leaked images.

Train doors (of real world trains) have evolved a lot during the last decades. There's neither a step nor a big gap between the train body and the doors, thus doors are no longer characteristic elements of trains. They are barely visible. Actually they are so invisible that they are sometimes highlighted with an orange border so that visually impaired people find them easier. In addition, there are no swing doors anymore. The brick built doors of the Horizon Express (aka TGV Sud-Est) are nice, but not accurate, they should be sliding doors.

I don't understand the obsession with doors, I've never played with doors, neighter as a kid nor as an adult. Passengers enter Lego trains through the roof.

The tilting looks brilliant!

I hope it has no side effects on the plastic-only version...

When will R56 come out? I'll order a few of the other curves as well, just for fun, but R56 is the one I actually need.

I hope there is still an AAA battery box. I like the LiPo battery very much because it can be charged without disassembling the trains, but none of the LiPo batteries will still work in 10-20 years. Only the AAA boxes will because AAA batteries will certainly be available for the next decades. Ideally, there will be two battery boxes again. If they release a PF2 receiver with the same size and the same connectors as the current IR receiver to upgrade existing trains, then I'm fine and I would not care about new connectors or form factors of the new PF2 parts.

Warning: If you dislike modifying or gluing bricks, you should stop reading at this point. The Wiener Linien offer several Lego models in their fan shop, including the tramway E1 and the trailer. They are made by DerKlassiker. A pic of the real tramway is available at https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/a/af/30_Stammersdorf.jpg/2560px-30_Stammersdorf.jpg. There are three issues with these models, the second one being severe if you want to run it on your layout: They are unstable, which is fine for display, but not for playing. It uses part 6092658 (bearing element 2x2) and a 1x1 brick with knobs together with small train wheels. The distance between ground and the bearing element is not large enough for the tramway to run over switches. It gets stuck. The wheels are rough-running and jarring. A single motor is barely able to move the tramway. Thus I modified the model a little bit. First, I removed 1.6 mm (half of a plate height) from the bottom of the bearing elements and the 1x1 bricks using a CNC mill (Stepcraft 600). You can see a the milling here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCAWKObQn_U. Below are the modified parts: To make the model robust enough for playing I glued together all parts shown below: The drawbar between the tramway and its trailer is to high to pass switches, too. Fortunately, this can be fixed be removing the bottom plate. To remain stability, I used glue again: I've used a special glue for ABS plastic: To make the tramway run smooth, I used the machine grease shown below. According to the instructions it is suitable for plastic. The results are really stunning the, a single motor is enough, even for inclines and the noise is pleasant: Btw, the grease is also highly recommend for the Lego 60097 City Center's tramway, which has the same wheel issues. I've used it on all my models with small train wheels.

I've investigated several options but none of them worked. I could not find any easier solution than swapping the wires, which is actually very simple because the soldering points are big. As far as I remember the motor cannot be rotated, it is not symmetric and would not fit. Flipping the gears is not possible, there is no space for the gears on the other side. The chassis is not symmetric.

You can either label reversed motors or just test the motors whenever building a new model. Of course it is also possible to restore the old polarity. I'm using two motors in all engines and rarely take trains apart, so it's not an issue for me. A switch that must not be switched feels wrong for me, thus I'd never use the switch in my trains. A single IR receiver is better than two because separate receivers may run out of sync if one of them misses a command. This sometimes happens with my high speed trains where a motor is located in each engine.

There could be a great future for Lego trains. I'm collection Lego, N and H0 trains and all but Lego sucks when you actually want to play. N trains look great because they are usually made to scale, but they often don't work reliable. H0 models are either expensive or not to scale and a decent H0 layout takes lots of place. Both N and H0 models are too sensitive to run them on the floor, but most people don't have an extra room to build a permanent layout (which gets boring when completed). Sometimes it is even difficult to find a spot to touch a model without breaking off handrails or other small details. When I invite friends, I make sure they handle the trains with care before I allow them to play. All in all, N and H0 gauge are nice if you have a large room left or if you just want to collect models and displays them in a showcase. Otherwise, Lego is perfect and if there are more products like the Horizon Express or the Maersk train, it could attract many adult model railroaders. And it's nearly impossible to destroy a Lego train. All I've damaged so far is the yellow lever of a switch.

The reversing switch is part of 8293 Power Functions Tuning Set, and can probably be purchased separately in the Lego web store. Anyway, the soldering solution is cheaper and looks better. It takes less than 10 minutes per motor for people with average soldering skills.

Sure, but soldering is cheaper, more elegant and saves space in the engine.

A single motor for two Horizon Express sets is not enough for a decent speed. Inclines do not work at all without a second motor. It is easier to put the second motor in the second engine than both motors in the first engine because the engine's bogies are not identical, the front one is too small to be replaced with a motor. I've described here how I changed the polarity of the motor. This is necessary no matter if you put the motor in the second engine or the second bogie of the same engine.

Today’s Lego City train sets include a PowerFunctions motor that works very well for short trains. However, if you add additional wagons, the traction of a single motor is not sufficient. An obvious way to fix this issue is adding a second motor. Another option is adding weight to the engine as the motor has power for some additional wagons but there is not enough friction between wheels and rails. In this posting I discuss an issue with the first approach: While adding a second motor sounds like a straightforward task, you will encounter a problem: The motor of the second bogie must be rotated so that the cables of both motors point towards the holes at the center of the engines base plate. Due to the rotation, the motors move in different directions. To make the second motor go in the same direction, the polarity of the motor must be changed. This can either be achieved by swapping the cable leads either in the plug, in the middle of the cable or inside the motor housing. I prefer the last approach – swapping the leads directly at the motor – because its easier to open the motor housing than the plug and the modification will not be visible. What you need: PowerFunctions train motor Soldering iron Torx T6 screwdriver Tweezers (optional, helps with getting the gears in place again) Instructions: Remove all six screws at the bottom of the motor and open the motor housing. Remove the gears and axles. You can just take them out, they are not fixed once the housing is open. Remove the motor and the clamp piece that is used as strain relief. Unsolder the leads from motor. Put the motor back into the housing at its original position. Cross the wires and arrange the wires and the yellow inductor. It is possible to cross the leads below the clamp piece, it still snaps in with the crossed leads below it. Solder the leads to the motor. Restore the gears and axles. This works best with tweezers. Close and screw down the housing. Motor after opening the housing: Motor removed from the housing, leads crossed: Unsoldered motor: Motor back in the housing: