Lionel 252 postwar crossing gate

The plunger should slide out, fall out on it's own if held upside down.

That's how the mechanism works. Energize the coil and the plunger's steel bottom is pull up by the coil's magnetic force. The non-ferrous brass top shoots up and hits the cam on the gates axle to lower it.

If it's stuck, that's a problem. Pull it out, twist it, yank it, it's just a smooth rod. They you need to see why it's binding.

Brother engineer said:

How do u fix if coil plastic is causing plunger to stick?

Click to expand...

Coil Plastic? Picture plz.

One of the issues with all these coils is the amount of voltage and length of activation (enough to melt the inner plastic). As I mentioned before, one of my gates has a broken cam - from the plunger violently smacking it to lower the gate. So I did some experiments to see the minimum voltage required to activate the gate.