More Swiss 0 Scale Narrow Gauge: Cog Railways that Work

Hi Steinzeit:

Have had the pleasure of riding the Brig Visp Zermatt line, the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn, and the Eiger Monch Jungfraujoch to the "Top Of Europe" in Switzerland, during various trips over there.

Love the Swiss railways, and they form the greatest part of my model train collection......Buco O Gauge 3 rail by Bucherer, now under the ownership of Buco Spur O GmbH of Bauma, Switzerland https://buco-gmbh.ch/

Looking forward to your next installment.

Peter.......Buco Australia.

In their 1986 catalogue Fama announced two new locomotives, a four wheel diesel switcher and an electric locomotive;  it is possible that Fama did produce some switchers, but I believe they really first appeared under the Utz label;  this was certainly the case with the electric.

The switcher was a good model of the Furka's 4971/72 diesel hydraulic switchers.  The prototypes were built by Schoema in Germany in 1961;  the FO acquired them in 1976 and first had them overhauled and regauged [ from 860 mm ! ].  A third unit was acquired later;  models with all three road numbers and slight variations have been made by Utz, Roco, and possibly the others.  It was also made in two other liveries, a green and a blue.  The blue was also used for some freight equipment, lettered Fama Werkbahn, but these blue cars also appear with FO lettering and sans any markings. Photo four shows two of the Utz models, boxed in typical Utz packaging, with a model shell by [ I think ] Roco sitting atop.

The electric model was more significant, for, not coincidentally I think, the prototype was to become the new standard loco for all three of the major cog railways.  The first model to appear was for the Furka Oberalp [ Photo 5 ], and this permitted a "real" Glacier Express or similar to be modeled.  These HGe's had both trucks motorized, and had different gearing that give a higher top speed than the model HGm diesels.

Sommerfeldt, the catenary folks, make a overhead system specifically for the FO.  When the FO still climbed up and over before the Furka Base Tunnel was built, the winter conditions of snow and avalanche did not permit year round operation, so major items such as the overhead and even a bridge were dismantled in the fall and rebuilt in the spring.  A simple trolley wire rather than catenary was used, and the wood poles were attached to more substantial foundations.  Photo six shows a Sommerfeldt pole;  the trolley wire shown is removable, but it can be neatly installed and soldered in place.

To be continued.....

Very interesting. The only cog road that I have ridden was in Greece. It was cog only on the grade(s) up to the town that it terminated at. The train was interesting in that it was two passenger cars separated by a boxy power/mechanical unit. I also saw one train that had one of its passenger cars replaced by a boxcar (filled with cans of olive oil, I believe).

Now that there was the new HGe 4/4 electric in the product range, Utz could make models of the Swiss Federal's only narrow gauge line between Lucerne and Interlaken.  But this line used reduced size versions of the SBB's standard gauge cars from the late 1940's, not what Fama had been producing.  No problem -- Utz tooled up for three different versions of those cars, a first class, a second class, and a composite [ both classes ].  Photo seven shows the first and composite, together with a car from the Roco years, a Luzern-Stans-Engelberg second class car.  LSE cars could be seen mixed in with Brünig cars, as they shared the same tracks out of Lucerne;  this was the only LSE car Roco made.

By the time Roco took over the line the SBB had received its production run of HGe locomotives, the two prototypes being returned to the manufacturer, reworked [ different cog, voltage, couplers, brakes....] and sold to the Furka Oberalp as the last two members of their new fleet.  The SBB had a new color scheme for the locos, and red replaced green on the passenger cars too -- photos 8 and 9.  Roco did only the composite and second class cars in red, as the SBB replaced the fully first class cars with the ng versions of their new standard gauge Panoramic cars.  So for the third car I've attached a BOB second class car by Roco;  like the LSE, they only did this one car.  The Berner Oberland Bahn connected with the SBB at Interlaken East;  there were usually no through cars, though it could happen.

To be continued........

[ I am finally getting around to the next installment......]

With the tooling for the SBB Brünig cars Roco had still another possibility, for the SBB sold some of their cars to the Brig Visp Zermatt, or BVZ;    photo 10 shows a Roco BVZ HGe and the two cars offered, a second and a composite, spliced by a "Panoramic" car of the FO, photo 11.  This 'Pano' was the only new car tooling Roco did for the 0m

line, regrettably;  they also later catalogued it as a BVZ car, but I'm not sure if this was actually made, at least by Roco, or not.  Notice that Roco did not do a first class only ex-Brünig car, because the BVZ didn't buy any;  as on the Brünig, the new Pano cars took most of the first class trade, at least on the through trains, so there was no need for them.

There was one extremely interesting sidelight to the BVZ's purchase:  They bought the SBB cars because they wanted to quickly get more rolling stock in service -- but the SBB used a different brake system, different couplers, and a different cog wheel [ for braking, primarily in emergencies ].  Changing the latter would have to be done, but to get some cars into service quickly the BVZ assembled a train set of just these 'new' cars, changed out the couplers on the outer ends of the end cars, and installed a vacum-to-air brake translater in the end cars.  So running a solid set of the Utz SBB cars still in their green paint behind a red Roco BVZ loco is not only colorful, but prototypical !

The FO also picked up a few of the Brünig cars;  Roco didn't do them, but AlpinLine, their successor, did;  photo 12 shows one of them [ they did a couple of different variations, but this is the only one I have ]  and a Roco FO baggage car trailing a Utz HGe 4/4.

SZ

On January 1, 2003, the Furka Oberalp and Brig Visp Zermatt, which had for many years been closely connected, were merged into the Matterhorn Gotthard Bahn, or MGB.  Alpin Line did the appropriate rolling stock in the new MGB graphics, and I have a few of them.  Of course for a number of years rolling stock in the colors of all three companies remained, so photos 13 and 14 show three MGB cars behind a BVZ HGe.

One car I forgot to illustrate in the RhB posts was the restaurant car that Fama announced and Utz and successors produced,photo 15.  Photo 16 is the RhB Gem4/4, but in the newer all red livery.

T

The history of the restaurant car is interesting.  There were two of them, built for the Bernina Bahn, then an independent railway, in 1928.  They were strictly 'table' cars, like Pullmans [ in the European sense ];  the kitchen facilities were in an adjoining van.  After the BB was taken over by the RhB during the war, kitchen facilities were added to the two cars, which became 3813-14.  Probably because of their lighter weight compared to the three ex-Mitropa cars the RhB had,  they were often used on the Glacier Express, though they did not usually operate the full length of the run.  They were also later fitted with the cog wheels for braking on one truck.  So while they may not have been the best choice for an RhB modeler, they certainly were for an FO one.

Best regards, SZ