Does anybody know what this is?

Been under a Christmas tree.  Looks like a Christmas ornament holder-loop

Looks like it came out from inside a xmas ball... Top part that the hook goes thru..

Erie_Lackawanna posted:

Looks like it came out from inside a xmas ball... Top part that the hook goes thru..

 

I bet that is what it is. If anyone else thinks it is a train part, please advise.  Thank you!

It's not a train part. It's from an ornament.

yup.....ornamente loop.

It's the spring that holds your locomotive's baffle sprocket in place. The encabulator could fail without it.

Or it could be from an ornament.

disc brake pad anti-rattle clip from your car? Hairpin for an Afro?

handyandy posted:

It's the spring that holds your locomotive's baffle sprocket in place. The encabulator could fail without it.

 

Or it could be from an ornament.

I wish I could delete this thread ... 

all in good fun George!

It also could hold a truck on a train car by circling the slotted truck post  The scalloped ends go through a slot, like a cotter pin, to hold the truck post in place. There might be a washer too.

Or it could be from a Christmas ornament top.  Or a clip for those funny cigarettes my college roommates use to smoke.

George S posted:

handyandy posted:

It's the spring that holds your locomotive's baffle sprocket in place. The encabulator could fail without it.

 

Or it could be from an ornament.

I wish I could delete this thread ... 

What? And end the merriment? Guessing next November you'll have an ornament sans hoop!

The question is......where is the missing ornament?

That is definitely the question.

ah this too shall pass.....

Its a finnagan pin! Must have fallen of of the fetzer wheel!

We've all been there. 

Found it!  According to George O. Smith's reference Lost Art (Volume II, pp. 191 Boucher compilation) it's "a dololly that plings the inghams" which is essentially an advanced version of "a kind of a dingbat that does things."

Robert S. Butler posted:

Found it!  According to George O. Smith's reference Lost Art (Volume II, pp. 191 Boucher compilation) it's "a dololly that plings the inghams" which is essentially an advanced version of "a kind of a dingbat that does things."

I think I am the only dingbat in this situation.

George, thanks for giving all of us a chance to have some fun.  When I first saw your picture I said to myself, " Ah yes, an ingham plinger." ...and then I tried to remember the source of that label. It came to me this morning - it was part of a conversation between two characters in Smith's short story Lost Art which is in the Treasury of Great Science Fiction collection.

Its a gift from me to you.

That's your new snap on stand for a soldering iron.

Merry Christmas!

I recall a poem in an 1970's Model Railroader that a stanza had in it "air fern desiccator fork" the gist of the poem is someone makes an article on how to make something and it requires all these specialized tools and hard-to-find parts.