Can anyone show me pics of their AF#4743? I have what is left of my dad’s old engine that has been sitting around for 25 years in a box and I’d like to try and restore it but I need some detailed pics of what it should look like. Mine is missing the whole top of the train. Basically I have the engine motor and the body sides. I do know the motor still worked when power was applied years ago. I know I can get some replacement wheels and other parts. I just don’t know all it should have. Any help would be greatly appreciated.
No photos of a 4743 in my collection. Here is the information that Schuweiler provides in his book about American Flyer Wide Gauge:
When the book was published in 1989 there were no reported sales of this uncataloged engine, so I guess you could say it must be uncommon. I have never seen one.
So now the question is what to do with this engine.
Enjoying the World’s Greatest Hobby
Northwoods Flyer
EDIT:
I did a little more research and the #4743 was the engine the headed up the Empire Express with the Knickerbocker and Henry Hudson cars. I do have photos of this set in my collection. If you google American Flyer 4743 you will find more photos in the images section.
Thanks for the info, that will help a lot. I found an ebay auction that had the Empire Express version of the engine, but it is nice to know what should be installed on the engine as it was originally built. The question is really what do I do? I have wanted to put it back together as the motor worked back when I put power to it back when my dad gave it to me. I just don’t know if I’ll ever find a replacement roof for it.
I don’t think I’m ever going to find an original roof so I was thinking maybe I could fabricate a new one with a few repro parts. I just need some measurements from someone who has the engine…anyone? Please tell me if you think I’m crazy forthinking this could work. The caboose roof just needs to be trimmed and curved a little. I’m thinking the repro top of the caboose may be to small sho I could cut and reshape the cattle\stock car roof to mimic the raised section of roof. THe only thing that might not look right are the raised ridges on the stock car roof. Then it’s just a matter of getting the panograph, bell, rails, and light.
Big time Update: I opened up the motor and cleaned it out really good and replaced the wiring from the switch to the brushes and changed out the old brushes and springs with new ones that I order from Hennings.
Old Brushes\Springs meet new. Notice that one brush was completely gone:
After putting it back together I applied power and it tried to run, I was getting power to the to the armature but there must have been a short. I decided to spring for professional help and sent it to the Motor Doctor who rewound the armiture and repaired the commutator.
Then came the fun of adding the new wheels\axles [|(] I managed to get them on there and will have to touch up the paint on one hub but I did it! I still have a little surface rus
I haven’t posted any updates lately. A lot has gotten in the way but I have made some progress. I found a donor roof from a green 4644 on ebay that had a 4643’s roof which only has one hooded light fixture just like the Empire Express.
With that decided I needed to try and find a good match of paint for the body so I took a fellow collector’s suggestion to help clean up the engine body and see if the paint could be saved and also used to match it. I used Griot’s Complete Compound to clean it up and applied some Maguire’s wax to try and restore some of the color. After all that it looks like this:
The closest match I could find was with Hobby Horse’s American Flyer 4021 Light Red. So I stripped all the parts from the donor roof and then stripped the paint by soaking the roof parts in Zepp Orange Citrus over night. I did it at the same time I was stripping a 4667 that was badly repainted and I decided to make a custom color, but that is another story I’ll get too. [;)]
