GordonC

I'd noticed these on sale and am tempted for a second rake at that price. Surprised the Intercity Swallow ones ended up discounted, I thought that would have been one of the more popular releases unless they over-estimated quantities

Did the RLOs not have loose seating rather than a normal 2+1 interior?

How about diversions that way from WCML engineering works? ... you could get all kinds of things passing by in that case

can you not order online with someone like Shapeways and get it delivered to you?

have they both got the same catalogue number #2543A? are they sold as a pair?

I presume its just standard in case its to be used as loco hauled stock

To be fair, I do think you've got a point here - to have 2 locos in stock for 3 months and not gotten through pre-orders for those in that time it does seem very odd. There must be a fair amount of money paid out to the factory for production that will need collecting in on dispatch. If it's taking this long I do wonder if they've taken on more than they can manage as a small team and potentially part time (I don't know if it's a full time job for them or not). Maybe distribution could do with being outsourced. There's no doubting the product quality is outstanding and will be worth waiting for, but it's frustrating when I'm waiting for more than these first two and looking forward to several pre-orders

That Class 81 looks great, how did you build that one? Was it a kit or a conversion?

I hope it wont be eventually, thats one thing that frustrates me with the models picked for production - the everyday that there was hundreds of getting overlooked for random niche or celebrity liveries.

Its bound to come out at some point, they will certainly have the tooling for it, but you could never be sure when. Keep an eye on the quarterly updates

think you've got that the wrong way round - 444 cars are almost the same length as 185, 450 vehicles are much shorter

Pretty much one of each ... Hornby released a rake

It was just a standard Mk4 set same as the Class 91s

what was the grid under the bufferbeam for?

There was a Mk2F FO which was a spare for the Edinburgh-Glasgow push-pulls in Scotrail livery. I think that would sell well, Scotrail liveried stuff normally does

a Gridski?????? were plans stolen from those build in Romania and thats the result?

I did buy one initally purely because its my favourite livery combination on the 87s, but I did think the red stripe mistake was shockingly poor and while Hornby offered to 'correct' it, I expect they would have gone darker where I think the bright red looked better and intended fixing it myself at a later date.

There's an absolute ton of livery variations that could be possible even just within intercity livery the early IC Executive variation with yellow cabsides to the cab windows and nameplates centrally on the bodyside on the stripes (e.g. 87012/87018) The Later IC Executive with the cabsides split between dark grey and yellow but yellow front up to the bottom of the cab windscreens Intercity Mainline with the livery coming right to the cab front and full yellow front But I suspect Hornby would be wanting to sell them for a higher price than the market will allow. I'd really have thought the 87009 would fly off the shelves even at full price, but a dodgy livery application and possibly jumper/MW box configuration may have limited that.

where would smoke from the low level have been visible at the high level?

I'd be pretty certain you'll struggle to find a Bachmann Class 90 much cheaper anywhere

That looks magnificent!! Really well done!!

The SNCF one is definitely my favourite of those liveries and I'd much rather have seen that than the DB and Belgian ones

and potentially ruin a beautiful model ... no thanks

I'm struggling to think of any RTR locos that have had salmons on the side since Lima days .... Very much overlooked!! 😔

But the thing is, if faster services are not possible, then what exactly are we getting for the vast cost of HS2. We're told its for capacity more than speed, but its being built for 225mph services and thats increased the cost of needing tunnels everywhere to keep it out of sight of local residents ... but why engineer it for that and all the tunnels if the trains aren't actually going to get there significantly faster than the existing 125mph tilting ones do? 15-20 mins quicker to Manchester or Liverpool isn't going to blow many folks socks off if it takes longer to get to the more limited stations that they stop at and you can guarantee tickets are going to cost extra ... for a 'premium' service that saves a handful of minutes. Alternatively, if it had been built as a 125mph or even 140mph railway, would it still have needed so many tunnels and cost so much? While physically building for 225mph and 125mph might not cost much difference, but if 225mph means more needs to be done to approve the planning then thats greatly increasing the cost. If we need capacity for freight then would a 75mph railway have been fast enough and either the new line used for expresses or leave them where they are on the WCML.