Got this today!

Hi,

I'm new to this page.

I have recently purchased the LEC Amtrak (train only) and started the modification to run it on Plarail tracks.  It's not complete, but it already runs pretty smoothly.

What I essentially did was remove the wheels from the LEC train and replace them with the wider gauge wheels I took from cheap knock off Brio train.

Here is the train that I'm modifying.



The hardest part was the motor train, which is the second train.  I had to take apart the drive wheel axle to insert the Brio wheel axle.  But, in the process, the gears fell out and I couldn't put them together properly.  Unlike Plarail that has compartmentalized motor/gear housing inside the chassis, LEC trains' chassis double as the motor/gear housing, so gears fall apart fairly easily.  Since I couldn't put the gears back properly, I removed 1 gear, drilled a hole in chassis to move the drive wheel axle, reversed the battery (polarity) to compensate for the missing gear.





Also, the axle of Brio wheels were still too long for the LEC body, so I filed the axle to make it shorter.  

The wheels were too big for the chassis too, so I filed the chassis to accommodate the large wheels.

I glued the wheels to the axle to fix them in place.

When I did the test run, I realized the chassis was too low to run on the Plarail track, so I filed the bottom of the chassis as well.



Then, I realized the axle was still too long to put the body on, so I decided to put a wooden stick to stretch it wider, did a quick dip in boiling water to soften the plastic, and cooled it off to make it permanent.



To compensate for the gear that fell off, I simply reversed the battery.  And since the battery couldn't get proper contact with the switch, I inserted a piece of aluminum foil.  It was meant to be a temporary solution, but it's working rather well, so this might stay permanently.



I did a similar modification for the lead train (the one that looks like the motor train).  



It required quite a bit of filing to accommodate the larger wheels.



And that's where I stopped for now.  The goal is to replace all the original LEC wheels with wider gauge Brio wheels.  (Right now, the wider gauge Brio wheels are keeping the train on the track and keeping it from derailing, while the original LEC wheels are simply dragged along).  And instead of having 8 wheels per car, I plan on eliminating 4 wheels to make them total of 4 wheels per each car.

This simply requires a lot of filing, pulling, and gluing.  So, it might take some time.  And I will have to sacrifice 2 more knock off Brios like this one to get me the wider wheels.



It might be a while for me to complete this modification since I am also going away for vacation.  But, like I said, it already runs pretty good as is.

Stay tuned for updates.