Hello,
I am sitting here with the July 1995issue of CTT and reading up about Prewar Hiawathas made by American Fly and Lionel. The Lioel is an atractive model, but there is one thing I don’t like about it. It requires large diameter cures, If I built a flor layout, that shouldn’t be a problem, but a premanet layout with Marx swithes wouldn’t do at all.
I like American Flyers Hiawath Better because it has a prototypical paint scheme, small minimum radius, and a prototypical obsevation car.
I would like an American Flyer or a Pride Lines 0-31 Hiawath on my soon to be built layout with marx switches. It shouldn’t be a problem if I don’t run it onto a siding.
I saw on the Girard and Oak Park Railroad website that someone mad a Marx Hiawatha With an American Flyer Champion locomotive shell. Imight try that too. Here is the link.
http://www.sover.net/~getty/gop/gop.htm
Is there any thing moreI should know about prewar Hiawatha’s ?
Bert and Mary Poppins aka Nick
Flyer made two version of the prewar Hiawatha - the Champion set headed by the engine on the Marx website and a bigger version to compete with the Lionel set. The larger set has close coupled cars and a beaver tail and takes about an 0-42 curve. The tinplate Champion has articulated cars and a beaver tail. Some of the Champion engines have a very nice mechanical whistle powered by gearing from the electric motor. The 1936 version of the larger AF set has a whistle in the tender which was powered off of a 4th rail. Flyer’s first attempt at making a “Hiawatha” actually occured in 1935. #9915 - the aluminum cast oddity - was actually an amalgam of the design styles of the Hiawatha and the NYC Commodore Vanderbilt. It didn’t look like either one (there are some collectors who will tell you it was a model of the CB&Q “Aeolus” which it does sort of resemble but the “Q” built that engine a couple of years after AF brought out #9915) and it was a very poor seller.
Speaking of Marx and Hiawatha’s, I lsurfed into the “new” Marx web site this weekend. www.marxtrains.com. Looks as if they’re going to bring out a Marx diesel this year. Based on the FM Erie Built’s it will be decorated for the Olympian Hiawatha. The prototype pictured looked very good. Lots of toy train appeal. I hope they make some cars to go with it!
Helo,
I would like to find a couple American Flyer Champion brand sets. Two passenger and one for modify ing to make a Marx Hiawatha.
Bert and Mary Poppins aka Nick