Hafner Trains

Looking good and a nice string of herald cars. I always loved Hafner, second to IVES of course. Although in my opinion they had the most durable clockwork motors. I have only seen a few that did not still run. A wonderful product for the price.

Hafner is under appreciated!  Any chance we can get some pics of those pieces?

 Hafner you say?

...just ask an Overland Flyer.

cheers...gary

Gary

Love the colors in the little Overland Flyers and Sunshine Specials. As you can tell in  my photo's, most of my Hafner is the later Streamliner types. The past year or so prices have gone down enough on the earlier types to allow me to add a few. Very reliable motors also.

Steve

you sure are right about the colors of Hafner.  having every style might fit on a small wall, but every color combination would likely fill a warehouse.

i like your extra long passenger trains.

standard sets typically came with only three cars.

another favorite of mine, this color combination is the only one listed in the Greenberg guide as a lighted 5½" observation.

cheers...gary

Hi all,

I inherited my dad's O gauge sets, and pulled them out after Christmas.  Some need some parts or are missing items, so they didn't make it under the tree.  In any event am hunting for a Hafner locomotive, and with the help of traincollectors.org  I am told I have a blue 2000 set, which just happens to be the blue red and silver guy 4th row in Mr. Eastman's  wall of Hafner 2.

Since I am very new to tin plate, I was wondering if anyone can point me to some good places to look for my missing loco?  I also have a bunch of 6" four wheel Marx.  Naturally the loco is missing/bodyless in this set.

Gary,

Thanks!  The hunt is on!  The train museum said that a prewar tin plate lionel boxcar I have is the first time they had seen one like it.  We found the whole set in boxes on sat!  If only my search for better employment went that well!

Geez, I thought I was the only nut that liked this stuff! Have only two sets, a later freight set, and a streamliner like Mr. Eastman has on the shelf, it is in decent shape, traded some Lionel repairs for the price of it, and think I got a bargain. These two and my prewar American Flyer whistling Blue Streak boxed set are my non-Lionel prizes.

Ya gotta love Hafner!  They are nice running clockworks.  I have a couple of Hafners on the workbench right now.  I just repaired this one for a friend of mine, needed a new hub for the mainspring:

Just got my first Hafner set here at York.  A blue 1110 steamer with assorted freight cars.  

It came without a key.  It seems to take the threaded variety.  Will a threaded Marx key have the same thread size or do I need to find a real Hafner key?  There seem to be repro Marx threaded keys available but no Hafners?

Gary is correct, they are the same thread diameter and pitch.  A Marx threaded key will work in a Hafner, but a normal (short) Hafner key won't work in a Marx - because the Hafner key is too short to reach the motor without hitting the body first.  At least, that's what happens on a CV!

Thank you gentlemen, this is most helpful.  Marx keys seem relatively easy to come by.  Gary, if as you say the key doesn't turn as the spring unwinds, maybe the larger key won't be too much of a problem.  Can't wait to get it home, this should be interesting.

very nice Steve!

Steve

The white background really makes the colors stand out which is duly noted. Hafner was my introduction to clockworks and they are seriously underappreciated except by the true connoisseurs.  I need shelves myself but to install them I have to rearrange everything but like you, having stuff in boxes bugs me as it negates having the stuff and it bugs me. Your display looks terrific. Just got a #30 Hornby 0-4-0 and it's the longest running one I have and has reverse. The weird thing is I bought it cheaply as the seller said the spring was broken. It wasn't.  How can you get mixed up with a loco running versus not running? If the couplers were not so high mounted, they could be coupled to the Hafner cars, without modification, hence my mentioning it.

Bruce

Hojack

I have a spare Hafner key if you still need one..send me an e-mail if so. I'll dig it out.

Thank you Bruce, email sent

Here is my only Hafner/Wyandotte train.  It is running around my layout that won 1st place in the "O Gauge Micro Layout Design Contest".

I often see Hafner/Wyandotte referred to together with that slash - what was the relationship, did one buy out the other at some point?

Hafner Manuafacturing(Chicago, Ill) made windup trains from 1914 - 1951.  They went out of business in 1951 and the company was purchased by All Metal Products Company(Wyandotte, MI), the makers of Wyandotte brand of stamped metal toys and they produced the trains until 1956 when they went out of business too.  The tooling was then purchased by Marx and sent to Mexico. 

If you look closely at the 3 photos of my train you will see that the Hafner name is still used on the sides of the engine and tender along with the round Wyandotte Trains logo on the front and side of the engine.  The gondola and caboose also have the round Wyandotte logo.