Office of Steam Forum for Model & Toy Steam Gas & Hot Air Engines

Well, I have a confession to make and it will show why I have so much interest in this roller...    If you haven’t figured it out from my hint, the roller landed at my door yesterday 

Why did I buy it? Well, when I first spotted it, the green was immediately spotted as being wrong and the wheels looked to have had a light red over a slightly darker red... I started to look closer at the pictures and spotted the decal being half painted over and remembered your post about Auckland Model Engineers. After some searching, I found your stationary with black flywheel, went back to the listing and spotted the same. I also thought I could see some dark green in a few of the spots you mentioned and had never seen a tablet fired example... I hit the BIN knowing it was from a reliable seller (Mike Cooke) and it was cheaper than my original Cranko that I bought 7 years ago. I don’t know what it is I like about these ugly little rollers, I think it’s that they are very “toyish” and toy steam is my truly favorite part of this hobby. I am not upset about it not being a “true Cranko” and I don’t know that we will ever know it’s true story, but with your knowledge, I think it’s very safe to narrow it down to an A.M.E. Engine, which to me is a very neat part of Cranko history, being it’s still a nearly 50 year old roller made from even older original Cranko parts.

I will get some more pictures, but some more interesting notes...

*There is a “Cranko diamond” on the other end of the boiler

*The tender/firebox/burner shroud, along with the chimney were originally darker green and have painted what is kind of an ugly lighter green

*The boiler/roller fork only have the new light green paint, nothing underneath, which really makes it look to have been assembled from left over pieces

*As pointed out earlier, there are only 2 boiler bands and the little clamps that hold them under the boiler are also the darker green

*The wheels/roll/pulley have been painted over a brighter red which I can only assume being they were NOS parts, already painted but with imperfections? They have also had the gray repainted

I don’t know how this affects the value, and don’t really have any concern on that end as I love the interesting variations, and to be honest you and I appear to be the only two interested in learning more about this roller anyway... maybe we should just be emailing each other about it

Anyways enough rambling, here’s the new pics (will add more detailed pics mentioned above)

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