American Flyer tin Litho Burlington Zephyr With Mechanical Whistle 1936

[Terry]

I got this neat set months ago, and just now got around to it. The tin litho Zephyrs came in a few different versions - wind up or electric, and with or without a mechanical whistle. This has a mechanical whistle that tweets as the train runs. (The whistle is explainedin the video below.)

This set has the power car with a rear truck, and only one truck on the observation. Earlier sets have only a motor on the power car, and two trucks on the observation.

The boxes shown in the back are sleeves for the cars. Numbers are 555 for the observation and 584 for the coaches. The setbox label is not readable, but the number ends in a 3 or an 8.


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a video of the train running with the mechanical whistle explained:

The clunk just before the loco comes into view at the far end of the layout is the gears hitting the Lionel 072 switch frog. This has wheel gears like Marx, and does not like Lionel switches. At slow speeds it will get through the switches with a bit of noise. At higher speeds it derails.

[early0electric]

That's a hell of a layout! Love the straightaway.

[Terry]

I like the long straights too. I bought this house to get them.

The whistle makes three short toots and then a long toot. 0 for short; - for long.

 0 0 0 – Flagman protect front of train.

Or if it's a long and then 3 shorts it's

– 0 0 0 Flagman protect rear of train.

Interesting. I would think they would make it give a grade crossing code.