The Thamshavn Line (Norwegian: Thamshavnbanen) was Norway's first electric railway, running from 1908 to 1974 in what is now Trøndelag county.

In the early 1880s Wilhelm's grandson, Christian Thams returned from Switzerland and took over the running of the mining company.

He also understood that it would then be feasible to build an electric railway between the mine and the port at Thamshavn were the pyrites were shipped out, primarily to Germany.

This caused some problems since he needed to get permission from the Ministry of the Interior and was not allowed to operate passenger traffic all the way to Løkken before 1910.

Since the railway was the first to be electrified in Norway there was no standard of electric current and so Thams chose the somewhat unusual 6.6 kV 25 Hz AC, while the rest of the Norwegian (and some other Northern European) railway networks chose 15 kV  16.7 Hz AC.

Thams was venturing into an innovative area, since Benjamin G. Lamme had invented the alternating current electric locomotive in 1902 and there was no experience operating the system.

[5] The export of pyrites was a gigantic success for Orkla, with both production and prices exceeding the estimates.

During the 1920s Salvesen & Thams established Trondhjem-Orkladal Billag and started operating a bus route from Thamshavn to Trondheim.

This was not enough for the Deinboll, and an attempt to hijack a train at Klingliene and blow up part of the rail at the same stop failed, killing the saboteur Odd Nilsen.

[7] In the spring of 1944 the saboteurs returned and on 9 May blew up a train at Hongslomælen and again on 31 May at the same place when the last rail car was blown up.

In response to this the Germans acquired two steam engines from Germany with the right gauge, but the saboteurs didn't succeed at blowing them up.

[8] The first part of the closing of the line was the attempt to get rid of the requirement to operate passenger trains.

By then the company had managed to convince the authorities that a bus route would be more suitable on the stretch between Orkanger and Løkken.

Part of the reason was the need for new locomotives, but the small production at the mine couldn't defend the necessary investments.

No reopening occurred, and in 1983 the Orkla Industrial Museum Archived 2012-06-08 at the Wayback Machine and local enthusiasts opened the heritage railway, at first between Løkken and Svorkmo.

After 2006, it has been possible to ride the train down to Bårdshaug, and the current length of the railway is approximately 22 kilometres (14 mi).

In 1918 it was attempted to sell the locomotive to the Trondheim Tramway, the only other metre gauge railway in Scandinavia, but it is not known if the sale was successful.