By a stroke of luck, this model of my dad’s somehow stayed with my own collection of trains when I moved out on my own after high school, and thus escaped the auction of many of my dad’s trains from his storage unit. Still, it has had a rough life. I have a clear memory from sometime in the early 80s of my dad, brother and me being surprised that it still worked after I was allowed to play with it for quite some time, off the tracks, as if it were a toy. I remember my dad or brother saying, “It’s a miracle!”, and then expressing my delight and surprise by repeating the phrase myself, over and over again. I was less than ten years old at the time. My memory of this model between that point and when I took my own collection with me is basically gone, but by that point, it had sustained damages on several parts:
- Missing draw bar in back (for coupling multiple units)
- Broken/missing draw bar pin on front
- Missing trolley pole spring
- Missing trolley pole retention post
- Broken and glue-smeared window plastic
- Damaged passenger silhouettes in windows
- Cracked chassis
- Missing headlight bulb
It also has some nicks in the paint job. I watched eBay for a while, looking for another one of these models that I could use for parts, and eventually found a good deal on one in very good condition. I was able to get all of the parts I needed, and I also used the new model’s motor brushes in the old model, since the new ones had much less wear. As an added bonus, the old trolley now has a box! Its original box has been lost for decades. After replacing the parts and cleaning and re-lubricating the old model, it ran like new. I continue to keep an eye out for a dummy trolley to match this one, but so far I have not seen it on eBay. Although the new model’s shell is in better condition than the original, I kept the original shell on the model.
UPDATE: I found a matching dummy on eBay in December, sold as a set with a powered unit, for just $23.00. To stop it from wobbling, I gave it some more weight. I took the motor and lead weight from the unit I bought for parts and installed them in the dummy (the motor is not connected). I may try some day to install lights in the dummy, since it now has metal wheels. Who knows, maybe some day I’ll install a DCC decoder into the dummy so that I can run the old trolley on a modern layout, as long as the dummy is attached. I don’t think a decoder will fit in the powered unit. Photos of the dummy added below. I’m not yet sure what I’ll do with the powered unit that came with the dummy. Maybe sell it on eBay at some point.
While researching this model, I found that its appearance is not prototypical of a Birney trolley. It has the single truck with four wheels like the Birneys had, but the rest of it looks more like a Brill trolley with one pole.
