My friend has the complete polar express set with all the add on cars plus 3 more extra cars. He and I went to a train show he works at and ran the set and 5 PE cars that I brought. The track that they have is Lionel's new Fastrack and the new controlling center Lionel legacy. So he ran it for so long that the smoke unit burned up and some light bulbs burnt out.
So two things:
Is the smoke unit replaceable
and how do you take the roof off the coaches to get to the light bulbs
I would suggest posting your inquiries on one of the O gauge web forums. My personal favorite is the O Gauge Railroading magazine forum:
http://ogaugerr.infopop.cc/eve/forums
or perhaps Lionel has a forum where your questions could be addressed.
James:
If you keep the smoke adjustment on high on high for >1 hour, it will burn up. I run my Legacy engines on low or medium, and with fan driven smoke, it's plenty for my sniffer. Lionel just went thru an extensive service program upgrade, and there are many named dealers who have completed Legacy training. I'm pretty sure that I saw the latest list in Jan or Feb Classic Toy Trains Magazine.
James,
I looked at Lionel.com and if you go to "Parts Lists and Pictorial Diagrams", a search on "polar express" will get you close, nd the correct Lionel part# from your loco should take you to the correct docs.
Oh and by the way...I run Bachmann On30 trains with their DCC on my layout too...love 'em!
Thank you
and how do you take the roof off the coaches to get to the light bulbs