What is this?? Mystery solved!

A total guess, but it almost looks like a bracket for a hard drive for a computer.  Most newer laptops that use the smaller drives have a slide in bracket that keeps the drive in place. 

@GG1 4877 posted:

A total guess, but it almost looks like a bracket for a hard drive for a computer.  Most newer laptops that use the smaller drives have a slide in bracket that keeps the drive in place.

As good a guess as any, but I doubt that it would have a wire clip like that on it if it were for a laptop drive.

Looks like an American Flyer operating car contact.  They had the contact sticking out of the trucks for the cattle and milk car.  You can see the cutouts on the ends of the corners for the truck contacts to climb up.  I'd pull out mine to verufy, but it's buried under other train stuff in the basement.

It is an AF operating car contact, it clipped on to the track the pickup on the car made contact.

This looks like it, but not exactly.  The tabs must go under the tie, if on the rail it would short it out.

https://youtu.be/1CO-zqT4Th8

It looks very similar in function to an American Flyer #712 track trip (scroll down to this one in link below), but cheaper to manufacture because it is not mounted on a fiber base.

http://www.thegilbertgallery.o...ck_Accessories2.html

Does the length of the mounting arms correspond to the length of an American Flyer metal tie?

I knew I could count on you guys for an answer. Yes, it is an American Flyer operating car contact - thanks, mystery solved.

I'm glad this mystery got solved. I had American Flyer when I was a kid, and this track accessory definitely has an "American Flyer" feel to it, although it is not as fancy as the one from around 1950 with a fiber base and a cam with a little handle for the lock-on. My dad thought S-scale/gauge was the perfect size and so he helped me build the AF layout, but these days I operate 2-rail O gauge.