Hi everyone,
I have an older train that I dearly love but I can not find out any information on the type of coupler that is attached to it. I have not seen one like it anywhere. Here are some pictures of the coupler & the train itself.
Also I would love information on the train as well.
This train came in a box that looks like woodgrain and has the name Liliput on it and it says Made in Austria.
The locomotive cab is marked DB which is Dueich Bunderspan (yes, I know it’s not spelled correctly) which is German Federal RR. The coupler may be some kind of loop and hook coupler that is common on European models.
Really good looking piece. Most likely made by Rocco. Just not familiar w/ the European equipment, I’m sure others can help you out. The marklin guys
Liliput was an Austrian maker of German, Swiss and Austrian railroad equipment in HO and HOe (9 mm narrow gauge) and has been around since at least the 1970s. It had some financial issues and was bought in the late 1980s by Bachmann’s European operation. The line is now manufactured in China.
The hook-and-loop couplers work well enough for short trains – there will be a wire loop on all of the freight and passenger car couplers that slides up over the vertical hook and drops into place.
Reynaulds sells the line in the US. Google “Liliput trains.”
DB is for Deutsches Bundesbahn, usually translated as German Federal Railways, which succeeded the DR, Deutsches Reichsban, after WWII.
The first two digits on the locomotive, 97, are the class number.
Here you can see how matching coupler looks like (this is btw. older type of coupler, so called “standard type”):
This coupler has NEM-362 draft gear pocket, earlier European rolling stock did not have this draft gear pocket (I assume your locomotive does not have it either).
This type of coupler was used earlier on all European rolling stock, now most locomotives and cars have short coupling mechanism and use different types of couplers that are mostly not compatible with coupler your loco has. But, as all new cars have NEM 362 draft gear pocket, it is possible to change the coupler and use one like shown under above link, to be able to couple it with (older) loco like yours.
The model has the “hook” half of “hook and loop” couplers. That type coupler is quite common on G-scale rolling stock sold in the U.S. even today, though they are not prototypical for U.S. models. Your model is of a German engine.
I’m not sure what type couplers you use in Australia, but if you have no rolling stock with matching couplers and want to convert to a U.S. style knuckle coupler, Kadee makes a replacement called NEM 362 couplers.