Hi Sheldon,
That bus looks great compared to any that I have seen! Nice find.
Dave
Thanks Dave, both are like new. Some of the overhead is less than perfect, but that too is generally “lightly used”.
These are likely late 70’s or early 80’s production, AHM branded, made by Brawa after they took it over from Eheim. And they have the improved finer scale overhead.
There are lots of the 50’s/60’s Aristo Craft branded sets out there in poor condition.
We will see how they run.
Sheldon
I don’t remember the brand was but they may well have been from AHM. I have seen half a dozen or so over the years and every one of the bodies was badly warped.
Dave
This is very interesting. I hope you get them to operate in a way that makes you happy.
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Keep us posted.
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-Kevin
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Dave, except for the design change where the trolley poles exit the roof, as shown in the photos Ulrich posted earlier, the Aristo product and the AHM product are from the same tooling/manufacturer.
Ehiem sold it to Brawa pretty early on, and they made only small changes. Later on they improved the trolley poles, improved the overhead, and used better plastic as time progressed.
And yes the early versions would tend to warp if run for a long time.
Sheldon
Sheldon, just FYI as you look for more overhead, I recall seeing ‘turnout’ type overhead poles at one time for the Brawa / Eheim / AHM busses. They were operable, but I don’t recall if it was a manual or electrical switching mechanism. Been a looooong time, and I didn’t have these myself, just recall seeing them somewhere. Very fuzzy on the details, but I distictly remember seeing them. They were not homemade.
They were manually operated.
They are extremely rare these days and therefore quite expensive.
Actually, the earliest ones like Ulrich posted were manual, later they offered an electric one, as well as a “automatic” one for one way return loop traffic.
I have found a web site belonging to a guy in Germany who has posted lots of great info on the Ehiem/Brawa trolley buses and documented a lot of the history.
http://geogus.dyndns.org/trolleys.jsp#!/doc?dId=110
After BRAWA took it over, they first changed and improved the overhead about 1964? The new overhead required different pickup shoes on the poles, so for a brief time the old style external steering was retained but with the new style shoe.
The new style shoe works with both overhead systems, the old shoe only works with the old overhead.
Then about 1967, they changed both the steering and the motor in the bus.
The old Ehiem bus used a Marklin A/C motor with a rectifier onboard. These are the ones you see all warped and distored. The motors ran hot, the rectifier ran hot, the plastic not so good.
The newer buses, like mine, with the internal steering mostly all have a newer DC motor, still diode protected to only run forward.
Here in the US the products were first marketed by AristoCraft, but shortly after BRAWA took over, US distribution changed to AHM. AristoCraft was getting out of HO in the mid 60’s, AHM was coming on really big. All the AHM labeled product I have seen is the newer overhead and newer bus.
The one my father had years ago was the older version, likely purchased about 1960. It eventually failed, warped body, dead motor.
Ehiem did have an electric turnout in the old overhead product line, it was very clunky with the motor located above the “switch”. The new style overhead used a turnout with the motor located on the ground, attached to the pole.
I am still working on my street plan/trolley plan, but I don’t think I see turnouts in my trolleybus future, bu
Well, I did some basic tests, and both buses run.
One is a little better than the other, both need lube and new light bulbs.
I tested them with a really basic DC power pack, so it will be intersting to see if a better throttle improves perfomance.
Remotoring does not look impossible, but if I can get suitable performance without that I will be happy.
More later.
Sheldon
The diode may serve to round off the PWM output of your good power system, but it still should be better than a basic pack. I always wanted one of those old Aristo ones when I saw them in books, crude though they were. But, they didn’t use those around here, and I think my 1956 dating puts me past most of the regular tracked trolley service in town, not that I really have room for it. Former co-worker friend of mine is the expert on the local trolley lines, I can ask him.
–Randy
I ran Eheim HO Trolley Busses for years (about 8 years ago) I retired and had to give up the layout. If set up correctly, they run very well and add interest to a layout. I still have several Trolleys and accessories for when I can once again model. Wish I knew how to post pictures on here…
To post photos here, you need to store them at a hosting site, such as photobucket, flickr or imgur.
Wayne
Vancouver , British Columbia, Canadaland has 262 fairly new trolley buses and has has maintained long history of trolley buses, Calgary used to have them also.