LGB 'Nicki Frank S', G gauge - LGB 20261

Lightly used LGB Nicki Frank S tender locomotive, finished in the attractive red and blue livery. The model features working lights and a motor in both the tender and the locomotive. It is in excellent condition apart from two missing poles on the rear of the tender and supplied within its original box.
 
Prototype Information
 
"Nicki+Frank S" Narrow Gauge Locomotive with a Tender Type HF 110 C wet steam narrow gauge locomotives were developed by Jung and Henschel for the army field railroads in World War II. They could be used on 600 mm / 24" as well as on 750 mm / 30" gauge track since these units could be re-gauged. These simple, sturdy three-axle units were equipped with outboard frames, cylinders with piston slide valves, and Heusinger valve gear. They could be run as so-called half tank locomotives or with a supplemental tender. These locomotives had a limited range without the tender, because usually all of the fuel and water was carried in the tender. During the war and the postwar period, the firms of Henschel, Jung, Krenau, and CKD built over 130 units of the type HF 110 C. Those units surviving the war played a much larger, more important role in the peacetime that followed. In the Seventies and Eighties, the Bielefeld shirt manufacturer and steam locomotive fan Walter Seidensticker acquired three of these interesting steam locomotives of which today's "Nicki+Frank S" has had an extremely interesting career. The type HF 100 C with the builder's number Henschel 25982/1941 gave service until 1945 on the practice narrow gauge railroad Rehagen-Klausdorf in the area of Berlin. At the start of 1945, it was stored in Mittersill, Austria, where it was assigned after the end of the war to Zell am See and was stored there until 1948. In September of 1948, it was transferred to the Bregenz Forest Railroad in the Vorarlberg area, where it was overhauled, and where it was in service as ÖBB road number 798.101 from November of 1948 until February of 1952. Its career on the ÖBB was actually ended again at this point. In fact, in 1955 it came to Waidhofen/Ybbs, remained in storage, and finally ended up in 1958 at the narrow gauge cemetery in in Ober-Grafendorf. It was retired officially in 1972 was then sold to the Hamburg construction company Spranger & Büll. They wanted to set up the locomotive at a children's playground. This did not happen however, and Walter Seidensticker acquired the locomotive in 1980 and had it transferred to the Mühlenstroth Small Steam Railroad near Gütersloh where it was stored and on display to be admired until 1983. The main shops at the Teutoburg Forest Railroad took over its overhaul that lasted until 1984. After then being christened with the name "Nicki S", it pulled steam-powered museum trains on the Jagsttal Railroad until 1986. Boiler damage and the closing down of the Jagsttal Railroad at the end of 1988 delayed it being put back into service until 1990, when it found a new "old" home at the Bregenz Forest Railroad until 1992 pulling museum trains. An extensive overhaul at the maintenance facility in Görlitz with a new boiler, welded water tanks, and a welded tender by 1993 gave it a new life and a new, blue paint scheme. Then it ran as "Nicki+Frank S" on the Racing Roland on Rügen pulling special trains. This guest role lasted until the end of June in 2008. After 25 years and being re-gauged from 750 to 600 mm, the "Nicki+Frank S" returned to the Mühlenstroth Small Steam Railroad again. The locomotive has been technically adapted to the times and it has been overhauled in its appearance.