Lionel Prewar-O Photo Gallery

[winced36]

This battered Lionel set #98 found its way to me recently. I'm not one for restorations of vintage equipment, but I think I might make an exception here:





It's always fun to see what the old-timers did with their equipment, for example that interesting coupler adapter. Anyway, the guy that dropped it off said it had been in his parents' attic, untouched for close to sixty years. He said it belonged to his father, probably from new (late 1920s), and had faint memories of it running around the Christmas tree when he was young. I'm humbled to have it.

Started making a parts list...

[winced36]

Drove down to Halethorpe yesterday morning to pick up a lot I acquired from an estate sale. A 1930's era Lionel set that's been carefully repainted (albeit not in original schemes), it's probably worth about the thirty bucks I gave for it:



My understanding is that this set was received new back in the day (a couple cars added subsequently), then refurbished by the original owner decades later, perhaps in the 1960's. It had been sitting in a nice dry attic for the last 30-40 years after the original owner's passing. Virtually zero collector value in this condition, but epic provenance.

Plan to service the locomotive, replace any missing parts (loco pilot truck, lumber stakes, brake-wheels, etc.); otherwise it'll be left as is. Someone took a lot of time to "restore" it to their taste; far from me to undo it.

It'll need a new home.

[winced36]

I picked up this Lionel 1688 locomotive at York this past week:



It was missing its pilot truck and its tender. TrainWorx stocked a replacement pilot truck and retaining clip, and I had an orphaned tender up on the shelf. The 1688 cleaned up nice and runs well, but it has a small chunk knocked off on one side under the cab window/door. This will be a placeholder until I can find a better one.

Lionel introduced the 1688 Torpedo (2-4-2) in 1936, and followed it in 1937 with the 1668 Torpedo (2-6-2). Both were part of Lionel's O-27 line until 1940. They were typically offered in sets with the lithographed 16XX-series O-27 freight cars or the 169X-series passenger cars, both of which Lionel adapted from the Ives catalog. They are nice colorful sets. The real Pennsy Torpedo was a shrouded (streamlined) K-4 Pacific designed by Raymond Loewy, one of the great industrial designers of the era.

[winced36]

Probably two or three decades ago, I found a battered 2679 at a local meet that had a frame fashioned from a piece of wood and was painted top-to-bottom in satin black paint. I was at a loss for why someone had done this and had decided to just tear it down for parts. Fortunately, before I did this, a fellow enthusiast saw it on the workbench and asked where I'd found one of the wartime freight cars sold by Madison Hardware. I had no idea what he was talking about, but the story is that MH used a bunch of excess prewar stock from Lionel to "manufacture" a few 16XX/26XX series freights which they sold in the shop during the war (a time when the toy manufacturers were prohibited from metal toy production and were instead producing various pieces for the Army, Navy, etc.). He expressed great interest in it, so I gave it to him for his collection.

It got me to thinking, what if Lou and Carl had made blacked-out versions of the more ornate/complex 654...what might that have looked like. I had a few rough examples on-hand, so I used one of them to come up with this:



Now Madison, if their technique on the 2680 was a fair measure, would have just painted the entire thing black...trim, domes, journals, number plates, everything but the wheels and couplers, but I couldn't bear to do that, so a bit of a compromise. I submit a 654 as Madison might have made it in 1943 until they ran out of bits...maybe.

[winced36]

We started the refurbishment of the prewar #98 set a while back. First up was the 253 electric. It was in pretty rough shape as found:



I'm not one for strip-n-repaint methods much anymore, but this one was hurting. I had the required replacement bits in the parts box, so we just got on with it. Finding a matching paint for the cab was tough...I used Scalecoat #2079 BNSF Green. Not a dead-on match. but maybe close enough. The frame we left in its as-found condition, just a wash with some mild soap and a bit of a polish with some cleaning wax:



It still needs its pick-up assembly replaced, but left the old in place for now. A thorough cleaning of the motor and some light lubrication and off it went.

The 610/610/612 cars next.

[winced36]

Lionel 299W set from 1936-1939:



Their version of the M-10005/M-10006 City of Denver.

[winced36]

Most collectors don't give the Lionel 259/259E a second look, but I find them terrific. Here's three examples from the shelves:



I think the top one is legit first-gen 259E from 1932. It ticks the boxes for copper/brass trim, red pilot/trailer wheels, red spoked drivers, and the little four-wheel tender with copper journals, all in black.

The middle one is a bit unusual, a 259 which I believe Lionel cranked out in 1935 from bits laying around. It has the slot in the top of the boiler for an E-unit lever, but the manual reversing lever on this loco is in the cab. Nickel trim, eight-wheel caboose, all in black.

Not sure about the pedigree on the bottom one. I consider this to be 1936, although I'm not sure about the date of introduction of the thin-rimmed blackened drivers. Coffin-style tender, all in gunmetal.

Correct me if you know more/better. There's a lot of variation with this stuff, so my presumed dates could very well be off a bit.

[winced36]

Here's another 259E that's been sitting very near the bottom of the project pile for a couple of years. It, along with a number of similar-vintage 800-series freights, were found at an estate sale in Halethorpe (across the tracks from Arbutus where my parents grew up):



Looking closely, you can see the original owner (and there was only one owner according to the relative running the sale, her grandfather) made a number of modifications to it. Everything in the set had been repainted, and the 259E received a decently applied respray of flat black (almost a crackle-black in appearance). At some point, he soldered in a red light in the cab, presumably a sort of firebox light(?), and trimmed off the handrails at the pilot where he inserted a couple of "toothpick flags". He'd also pried open the tender and dropped a large steel bolt in it, presumably for added weight.

The wheels on the pilot and trailing trucks have rotted down to almost nothing. A friend out west found me a replacement pilot truck on one of his parts runs, and I have a replacement trailing truck around here somewhere. One day I'll put some power to it and see what happens.

[winced36]

Lionel set #139 from 1931:



The 261 locomotive is missing a few bits, but looks to be in generally good shape (haven't had it on the track yet). Generally unfamiliar with this locomotive, I discovered that the 261 is one-direction only...there's no E-unit or manual reversing lever. This fits in with the notion that this was the entry-level O-gauge steam set for 1931 (the only year the 261 was made). The next year the 259/259E was introduced and the 261 was discontinued.