Dapol MK3 confusion

[Mike140]

Morning all.

 

After a costly error of buying a rake of loco-hauled Mk3's for my HST and a very long wait for Dapol to release their new range, I find myself utterly confused when it comes to their latest Mk3 release.

Way back when, I bought the Intercity Swallow liveried HST book set, which comes with two Mk3 coaches that have grey doors at each end of the coach, matching those of the loco units.
Now that the new releases are out, I'm seeing yellow doors at the coach ends - throwing up a red flag for me.

Other than the doors, they seem to match up in every way with the two coaches that come in the set. Are these not the HST version?

[njee20]

No buffers = HST for Dapol, they’ve not modelled any of the other differences

 

The end doors seem to be a random colour depending on who painted the coach from what I can tell, no homogeny at all.

[bigP]

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Edited January 31, 2021 by bigP
Deleted

[Mike140]

Thanks for the replies so soon.

 

Judging by eye, the colours between the coaches I have don't look off at all. The grey on both seems pretty spot-on, a nice deep grey with only a very slight, barely noticeable difference in roof colour. So I'm hoping I touched lucky and received a later version of the book set with correct colours - I bought it directly from Dapol only last year.

 

Paul, the coaches I mistakenly purchased were the Mk3 loco-hauled versions. They have buffers and a Swallow logo on each end window. An expensive reminder to not click "Buy now" after glancing at a thumbnail image  Those in the first link you share are the ones I am looking to buy now. I assumed they were new releases, or have Hattons just got a load in stock?

 

As I said, everything seems to match other than the gangway doors, so I've put the order through now.

Oddly, it seems the buffet car is missing the yellow / first class stripe above the passenger windows?

[tiger]

Just to add a couple of comments to what has already been said:

 

In real life the HST trailers had yellow gangway doors originally in blue/grey, executive and INTERCITY liveries (on the real thing it was yellow fibreglass or plastic, I can’t remember which). It was only in the post-privatisation era that they were spray painted in different colours - usually light grey. From memory though this varied depending upon the privatised operator - GNER had grey gangway doors but Virgin Trains stuck with the yellow. Loco hauled Mk 3a stock also had yellow gangway doors but Mk 3b stock (which was delivered in Executive livery) has grey doors from new. Also, (may be wrong about this but I am sure someone will be able to confirm) I think the buffet or kitchen end gangway doors of the catering vehicles (TRSB, TRUB, TRUK, TRFB, TRFK) were orangey red.

 

So the earlier Dapol releases with grey doors were wrong in any of the BR liveries, unless the loco hauled coach happened to be numbered as a Mk3b.

 

Looking at the latest release coaches in the Hattons website linked in the earlier post, it looks as if the proportions of the red and white INTERCITY stripes have now been corrected which makes the whole livery application appear more accurate, especially with the yellow gangway ends.

 

On the catering vehicles the stripe above the Windows was red above the buffet/kitchen in blue/grey, Executive and IC swallow liveries. However from about 1990 the red stripe was no longer applied and usually the stripe was executive light grey. Above the large saloon windows the stripe was yellow on First class vehicles (TRFB and TRFK) but exec light grey on second class vehicles (TRSB) or blue in original livery. The Dapol buffet car is actually a loco hauled RFM and doesn’t have the same window layout as any of the HST coaches, so it is probably ok that it doesn’t have a red or yellow stripe assuming it is numbered as a TRSB.

 

Hope this helps

 

Tom.

Edited April 15, 2018 by tiger

[woodenhead]

Having had to put up with 50 shades of grey for the roof colour on each coach in my rake, if the only issue is the colour of the gangway doors you've done well.

 

Dapol struggled to match their stock between batches, it shouldn't be hard but they made it that way.

[Mike140]

A closer look at the buffet cars seems to relate to the train's formation and length somehow.

 

After watching some videos tonight, I've noticed that the yellow strip only appears on HST formations that have two or more first class cars, usually 8-coach lengths, with the seating end of the buffet car at the first class coach end and the kitchen at the second class end. On formations with only one first class coach, 7 coach length, the buffet car lacks the yellow strip and it is 'flipped' around - seating (second class?) toward the second class coach end and the kitchen toward the first.

 

So, the Dapol buffet car is only suitable for 7-coach trains?

 

This whole HST formation thing is much more confusing than I thought. I think I prefer sticking random Mk1 coaches together in to a rake! 

Edited April 16, 2018 by Mike140

[woodenhead]

The Dapol buffet is generic - there were too many permutations for them to model them all - it caused some issue at the time but each would have been a seperate tooling and they couldn't justify it so we ended up with what we got.

 

Early formations on the East Coast ran with two catering vehicles, somone with vastly more knowledge than me will hopefully explain the variations but there was this thread in the past

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/96997-hst-buffets/ 

[Bomag]

So, the Dapol buffet car is only suitable for 7-coach trains?

 

 

As stated the Dapol buffet car is a compromise between two different HST vehicles and the loco hauled RSM/RFM (102xx). All of which have 4 passenger seating bays. To clarify one comment above the coach does not fully represent all RFM. 

 

When numbered 40000-40034 (or 40400-434) the buffet car represents a TRSB. For IC Swallow sets these were mainly used on cross country serviceswith seven trailers, one TF and the bar area mainly next to the TF (although they were seen the other way round). There was no yellow band. A couple of 404xx were also spare catering vehciles for GW services and could be seen in 8 car sets with 2xTF.

 

Several TRSB were modeified as TRB with 1st seating and yellow band. These were the normal catering vehilces on shorter distance GW routes. The seating was next to the TFs

 

The second type of HST catering coach it is suitable for is the TRUK/TRFK. By the IC Swallow period only two where in normal service as second vehicles in the EC Pullman sets. An additional one (40513) was used as an executive saloon.

 

The remaining HST IC Swallow sets (EC, MML and GW long distance 8+ car sets) had 403xx/407xx/40619 TRUB/TRFB coaches which only have 3 passenger bays (which were neraly always next to the TFs). If you don't mind the wrong number of windows then the model (without yellow band) may be suitable for early GW repainted sets as these lasted as 403xx TRUB later than the EC ones  However, my interests were elsewere in this period so cannot confirm it.

 

You don't say where you model. The 7 coach cross country sets, for which the Dapol coach is most relavent, ran along with EC, MML and GW sets. While very rare at London termi they were the most widley seen sets.

[Mike140]

 

You don't say where you model. The 7 coach cross country sets, for which the Dapol coach is most relavent, ran along with EC, MML and GW sets. While very rare at London termi they were the most widley seen sets.

 

West Highland Line ....     In my case, the HST is purely a show piece in my collection and will probably get a display case of its own - I just want the coaches to look right!

 

To narrow things down, the exact number of the buffet car is 40414. So best suited for a GW set?

[Bomag]

West Highland Line ....     In my case, the HST is purely a show piece in my collection and will probably get a display case of its own - I just want the coaches to look right!

 

To narrow things down, the exact number of the buffet car is 40414. So best suited for a GW set?

 

In 1997 40414 was in a cross country set. While it would have got to Glasgow I don't think HSTs even went on the West Highland on rail tours, though being RA5 they could have done.

Edited April 16, 2018 by Bomag