Tinplate photo/video gallery

Marklin clockwork #970:

Finally got the Flyer motor #3015 into service this week after making a few repairs for damage incurred during shipment. After that, a lubrication and a new bulb and off we went:

 

Now the #3015 doesn't much care for the two prewar Lionel turnouts on the inner-loop, so it'll be banished to the outer-loop, where it has a problem negotiating the single-span Lionel 270 bridge (the "automatic" direction-control arm keeps snagging on a bridge support). No worries, easy enough to move the bridge to the inner-loop. Manufactured for one year only, 1927, it runs well for its 97 years.

It's American Flyer O-gauge, oace, one of the larger O-gauge locos made by Flyer.

I've had a battered, roofless Lionel 813 stock car on the back of the workbench for years...finally starting to have a look at it. One sometimes wonders how people manage to do this to their stuff:



Hopefully salvageable, otherwise it's off to the parts bin.

Oh boy, Healey36 and oace, now you've done it - you just entered the world of intra year change.

In 1927 American Flyer introduced the Jeffersonian set headed by a #3015 which looks just like the one you have (note how the catalog illustration of #3015 differs from the actual production).





This set was offered as shown in the 1927 catalog








However, sometime during that year Flyer decided to change the engine to one with a longer frame (there is also the question of what appears to be a change in the frame of the passenger cars but that is a question for another time).

 

...and then in 1928 the whole set got a complete makeover - cars, engine construction (now a 3115), paint vs old litho, etc.



The fact of the short life of the first version of the Jeffersonian coupled with the intra year change is one of those facets of American Flyer trains I find so interesting.

  So guys, your next objective will have to be finding the long frame version of the #3015.  

Managed to bend the couplers on the beat-up Lionel 813 stock car back to functional form (not pretty or particularly straight, but functional). A bit more work might further straighten them, but the metal is stressed from the bending, so maybe best left as they are now:



It's important to preserve the originals if possible, as they are spring-loaded. Finding spring-loaded repros is nearly impossible, at least for me.

Meanwhile, the replacement roof made a couple passes through the paint-booth yesterday and today. 

Thanks, af...I'd be interested in seeing one.