Keeping Playmobil Running

James Day

James Day

Guano Corner Rly - Runs weekly - Guano permitting
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Dear All,

It is now around 18 years since Playmobil made their last track powered Locos. I own a fair few of these little wonders and many have done a good mileage in my ownership.

Last night a maintenance sessions on three locos consumed 6 of my precious pick up shoes! Luckily I have a chum who will from time to time (and very slowly) take my worn out ones, silver solder and polish them so that they can be reused.

I am just interested to know how others cope and keep the range running.

Here are a few things that I have found:

There are a lot of used Playmobil train parts available on e-Bay. Mostly from Germany. Even pick up shoes and wheel wipers, although be warned these are used and can be of varying quality.

From time to time on e-bay a guy in Mexico has brand new PM motor blocks and packets containing pick up shoes. I bought two lots of these from him and they were excellent quality sealed and brand new. There was a small issue with customs on one lot, but that was an error by UK customs and soon resolved!

The traction tyres made for the new RC Playmobil Disesel (available as spares from PM) will fit anything else in the range.

I have only ever had to cast aside two PM motor blocks as worn out. The wheels, gears and bearings were shot, although the plucky little motors were still running.

Finally the new type of plug in coupling loop as used on more recent RC locos, including the Modern Yellow RC Diesel is a much more positive design that that used on earlier locos, can be obtained as a spare and can be easily plugged in as a replacement.

James
 
Sorry Dan,

Playmobil skates are bespoke. Ironically they are made out of nickel silver, unlike the plated brass early LGB ones. The fixings are quite unique though.

Agree with the comments on PlaymoKing. Great dealer. Many successful orders from them.

IMG_0644[1].jpg

Pick up shoes: LGB Original, LGB New, Playmobil

James

 
Being new to G scale garden railways, I bought a Lehmann Stainz and a cheaper Marklin starter loco and then a £25 Playmobil 0-4-0 shunter and the Playmobil is by far the best runner and puller of any of them. I seek out Playmobil items rather than others. The Marklin can barely pull itself without wheel slip and the Stainz is so easily derailed by the slightest irregularity in the track but the cheapo toy shunter pulls decent trains in all weathers (actually runs brilliantly in the rain) and has run continuously all day.
It has one fault typical to all locos in that the coupling hoops don't have hooks. So this means that all stock has to be run the wrong way round or an adaptor truck is needed with hooks both ends. It doesn't appear that the couplings can be changed for any other type or has anyone managed this?
 
Dave500UK said:
[Playmobil loco] has one fault typical to all locos in that the coupling hoops don't have hooks. So this means that all stock has to be run the wrong way round or an adaptor truck is needed with hooks both ends. It doesn't appear that the couplings can be changed for any other type or has anyone managed this?
Click to expand...

Well it's debatable whether it's a "fault", more a design decision which I think is mainly to make things easier for uncoupling and "play". It's a lot more fiddly to uncouple when you've got hooks on both couplers. Similar design on other locos like my Hartland Mack.

The Playmobil loop on their locos is a unique clip-fit design, and the wagons have the loop and mount for the hook as a single moulding. You'd have to engineer your own replacement if you wanted to fit a hook, bearing in mind that the mount for the hook would have to sit behind the buffer beam.

I have to admit I really like the Playmobil hook with it's counter-weighted action and large pad for little fingers to press, I prefer it to the sprung action of (say) LGB. I have some cheap Hartland kit-built flat wagons that came with sprung hooks that were too stiff, I modified them to counter-weight action and they're much better.
 
Glad you like the Playmobil Loco,

They are very good as you say, but it is disappointing t hear that your Stainz is accident prone. The older or simpler LGB locos are generally very kind and forgiving.

Re the loops on the PM loco: The earlier ones are much more prone to unwanted uncoupling than the more recent ones. The new style loop, which has been in use for some time, is designed with a thin protruding wedge moulded inside the loop that engages with the cut out at the rear of the LGB/PM style coupling hooks. This gives quite positive and secure coupling.

If you don't have this feature on your loco send an e-mail to: DirectService_UK@playmobil.de and tell them you need a few of item
3020 8610 Loco coupling. They are 45p each, plus £2.95 Postage per order and will fit every PM loco ever loco made, except the RCE which has 4 wheel unpowered bogies facing out at each end.

Sadly Playmobil can only supply parts for current production items, or those recently out of production but are very helpful. You can also get bogies and coupling hooks as spares and the buffers made to fit the wagon in the new 5258 set, will fit almost anything ever made too (except the 5258 Diesel, Panorama Express Coach, RCE and Bo-Bo Electric), but are now black, instead of the former red.

The standard PM Bogie will also fit any coach or wagon, except the RCE and the Panorama Express Coach. So, if you have an old coach or wagon that takes the earlier sprung hook couplings, which are often either broken or missing, replace them with the new bogies and a pair of weighted hooks.

James
 
I fettled the Stainz and it runs well now. Dirty wheels and over strong springs in the skates didn't help, and a broken snow plough that had been glued and was hanging too low that was fouling over points.
I have 2 PM locos now as I've added a kitbashed steam tram loco as well using a PM chassis which after a bit of tidying up of loose interior weights and a good clean also runs and pulls well.
I have some traction tyres, hooks and a few other spare bits but probably the best solution for the 'missing' hook is a converter wagon/coach with two hooks and used with the PM locos to adapt to other non PM stock.
 
If you have a Playmobil set without the building instructions and want the part numbers, there are building instructions on the Playmobil websites here:

http://www.playmobil.co.uk/

although they don't cover all sets.

Scroll down to the bottom of the page and there is a link Building Instructions.

If you have a part number and want to know if it is available, there is a link (again at the bottom of the page) Find Spare Parts. (Note, the part number has to be entered as a string of 8 figures without spaces.)

This site is also extremely useful for finding part numbers:

http://playmodb.org/

but note that if you search on a part number it has to be entered as NN NN NNNN. (If the part number you have is NN NN NNN, just add a zero.)

The last site above is especially useful because parts may have appeared in different sets under different numbers because they are different colours, so if a search on Playmobil UK shows a part is not available, then it may be available under a different number.
 
Dave,

Glad that you have sorted out the Stainz.

Two hooks? Do you mean two hooks at one end? If so, that is a little extreme! Perhaps I have misunderstood?

Unless you have seriously uneven track you should not need that or to worry about the lack of a hook on the loco It is only sudden extreme dips or twists that will cause PM train to come adrift.

My approach would be to find the places where the loco unhooks the train and fix each one in turn with some minor track PW adjustments.

The other day I ran my Bachmann Brassworks Fairlie on my new extension. Despite all my other locos running well on the new track, (after lots of tweaking) this particular loco was less forgiving and came off at the same place on each attempt. 10 minutes of tweaking later there and were no more issues.

Playmofire - That is a good site. Thanks for posting it.

James
 
What I meant was non PM stock has a loop at one end and a hook and loop at the other so to run the stock the right way round with the veranda/platform at the rear with a PM loco you have both couplings minus hooks between loco and first truck so can't couple up. The work round is to run all stock rear end first. Obviously not an issue when using PM stock with a PM loco.
What I was originally asking was if anyone had found a way to change the rear loco coupling for one with a hook like Lehman/Marklin and other locos but it seems not.
The second option is to use an adaptor wagon/coach where both ends have a loop and hook then any other stock can be hitched the right way round. This is mainly for goods wagons as most coaches n/g are the same at both ends. I have fell foul of having two hooks together (like Hornby) and 1st radius curves can often cause derailment due to the hooks getting tangled or not having enough clearance.
 
For LGB stock, you can add a hook to the other loop. All my LGB has hook and loops at both ends.

This was because I had reverse loops on my layout, but as a bonus, you do get a more secure coupling too....
 
It is possilbe to fit a hook coupler to a PM loco, Waltstrains knows how. However, the hook doesn't swivel.

I've never had problems with PM rolling stock couplings getting entangled when "double-hooked" except when there has been a derailment (and not one due to problems with using double hooks).
 
Dave500UK said:
...run the stock the right way round with the veranda/platform at the rear...
Click to expand...

Who says that having the platform at the front is "wrong"? All stock runs in either direction - what happens when you reach the end of the line? Sometimes it looks nicer with the platform at the back though ;)

I have fell foul of having two hooks together (like Hornby) and 1st radius curves can often cause derailment due to the hooks getting tangled or not having enough clearance.
Click to expand...

LGB & PM couplings have reasonable sideways play and can usually cope with two hooks together round R1 curves. Hooks will only get tangled if the track is lumpy?

I find having two hooks together is an irritation when it comes to uncoupling. Fortunately most of my stock is american style with knuckle couplers so I can just lift straight out.
 
Not knowing much about the continental/US style stock, I just assumed as it all seems to have a loop at the plain end and a loop and hook at the platform end that when coupled to a non PM loco the plain end has to go towards the front as all locos have a hook only at the rear. I assumed that manufacturers didn't bother about real world operation and assumed everyone runs a roundy-round track.

It also crossed my mind as to why a box van would even have a platform with a door into the van as no-one would ride on it surely and if it was loaded you couldn't go through the door anyway? Or why any goods wagon for that matter has a platform, seems like a waste of carrying space to me.

What I found with two hooks together is that with 1st radius if there was a change from one direction to the other (zig zag) there was a greater occurrence of derailment especially when shunting than with one hook which shunts just as reliably as it pulls normally. As you say, uncoupling is tricky too.
 
Never had any problem with the Playmobil trains having hooks at both ends. If they do they are less likely to come uncoupled on uneven track.
 
With the Playmobil stock, even with two hooks, uncoupling needn't be a problem if you're doing it manually. All you need is something wide enough to allow you to press down both hooks at once. I use a pizza shovel from a Playmobil accessory set to do this as it's just the right width and has a long handle too. Now two hooks with LGB...that's a different (and a difficult) matter.
 
playmofire said:
With the Playmobil stock, even with two hooks, uncoupling needn't be a problem if you're doing it manually. All you need is something wide enough to allow you to press down both hooks at once. I use a pizza shovel from a Playmobil accessory set to do this as it's just the right width and has a long handle too. Now two hooks with LGB...that's a different (and a difficult) matter.
Click to expand...

Sheffield Steel Table Knifes do the job nicely. Must be nice n thin, charity shoos and bootsales good source.
JonD
 
You can use your 'loyalty card' key-fob, which you probably always have in your pocket with your car keys.. ;D

Or, plastic plant name tags from the garden centre.. these are cheap enough to leave lying around, and you can tape a few together for those hard to reach places.
 
Years ago my Dad and I spent ages developing a shallow U shaped device that could be placed against the rail and then pressed down, using the rail as a fulcrum, causing the prongs of the U to rise up and engage with the counter balances of LGB and PM stock. These then caused the hooks to drop and the couplings to disengage.

I was really chuffed with it and showed it to my chum.

"Oh" He replied. "I just use a lolly stick" He then stroked the coupling hooks between the loops from above and the stock uncoupled!

Awkward!

PM couplings are particularly easy to disengage as they have the buttons on the hooks that you can press. I wish LGB had these, but I suppose that I can always use a lolly stick....

James
 
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