Eheim is a very old company, some data suggests a manufacturing history back into the 1890's of farm implements. In the 1950's Eheim was a toy manufacturer, their specialty was model trains- I actually own a small collection of Eheim trains and they are very neat. They had fiberoptic lighting for the headlamps and windows of the cars. They were european styled trains powered by overhead electrical lines which they followed. The pump Norbert repaired was a pump for a train set fountain for waterfalls and train dioramas, he had an aquarium in his repair shop and this where he tested it. Eheim entered the aquarium hobby in 1965-67, I am not certain, I have it filed away somewhere. Eheim has a pretty amazing history- they were NASA's only supplier for some years and made the CEBAS mini module which was a fully contained aquarium used on the US space station. They made pumps for dialysis machines and I have seen an Eheim dialysis pump, my dad is a urologist and some of the older machines in the nephrollogy clinic he makes rounds in and I worked in as a a teenager were Eheim. They also made industrial pumps for everything from diamond cutters to bottling Coca Cola. I have one of the diamond cutting pumps and it is pretty slick, it has rubber blades to withstand the slurry. Now, Eheim is a different company, they are becoming a giant like Hagen. The family is more focused on the commercial airline operation they own and they don't make the industrial equipment anymore. Marineland won the NASA contract some years ago.
