Now that I have a growing assortment of mid '20's Flyer and Flyer-based tinplate I wanted a steam engine to pull the freight cars. Knowing that American Flyer did not build steamers in the mid 1920's I looked at the older cast iron engines from Flyer and Ives. But they didn't look right to me with the 8 wheel 6.5" cars the Flyer and Ives (and Dorfan) made back then. Don't know if it's OCD or having come from the scale end of model railroading, but those early cast iron locos look too small to me. So I decided to roll my own "prewar cast iron" locomotive. 
I started with a Marx 999 of all things. Chopped off some stuff and added new stuff until it began to look like a vintage toy train engine to me. Some construction photos have been posted in weekend picture threads. I decided to use some Ives styling queues such as the arched cab windows and the headlight above the smoke box front. Power is a prewar Marx motor. I also employed weathering skills learned in my On30 phase to make the shiny new engine look more age appropriate for my cars. Still needs some weathering on the drivers. I know the tender is 1930's Flyer, but it works well with the loco and cars. I removed the journals to "backdate" the trucks and help them blend with the older cars trucks. Couldn't bring myself to paint the tender or the trucks as they have a cool vintage patina that looks way better than what I can do with paint!
Sort of a before and after photo with the new engine meeting an original 999...
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