locoholic

At £200 a go, that is a self-fulfilling prophesy. And I disagree that there would be hardly any market for a centre coach. I'm not saying it should only be sold separately. I just get the impression that Bachmann haven't exactly fallen over themselves to get this project moving, and therefore Kernow don't feel confident about throwing even more money at it to get the centre car tooling done. I suppose we should be grateful that at least they managed to get Bachmann to use the right shade of green, unlike the recent issues of Southern region Bullied and Mk1 coaching stock.

So a 2 car Hampshire unit costs £200, whereas a 2 car Class 101 can be had for £127 or thereabouts. This means Bachmann is charging 50% more for a commissioned model. From this, it seems that Bachmann aren't really interested in any further business of this nature, which is their prerogative, of course. However, as someone who would love to see some of the more obscure DMUs in RTR form, I find this rather disappointing, especially as Bachmann chose to duplicate the Class 101 rather than go for another unit not yet done in OO, such as a Class 120. The "problem" of the middle car for the Hampshire unit is particularly odd - surely Bachmann can see that a 3H would sell well, and would try to expedite matters for Kernow? If cost of a 3H is now a deterent, why could the centre car not be sold separately so that the those of us who forked out for a 2H could upgrade to a 3H, rather than having to buy another whole unit?

Latest Facebook posting from Kernow is particularly cryptic, accompanied by a photo of a P class and the H class double-heading on the Bluebell Railway.

I used to commute from Kelvedon into Liverpool Street in BR days, and it was pretty awful then. Sounds even worse now. The population growth in the region means the Ely to Norwich line needs to be wired, and rather than HS2, a new line should be built from Thetford through Bury St Edmunds, Haverhill and Dunmow to ease the pressure on the existing East Anglian main lines. And the whole franchising system shouldbe scrapped, as it demonstrably doesn't deliver the service it was meant to.

I went to Steam at Swindon last Saturday (sorry - I couldn't face the drive up the M5 and the M42 to Coverntry) and looked in vain for any mention of a commisioned King from Hornby. Did I miss it, or were those rumours just ill-informed?

Top marks to Hornby for choosing to produce a model that seems to have made many of us impulse-buy, breaking our loco selection rules in the process. Lots of Hornby models in the shops now. RRP being charged by box shifters for main range Cock o' the North. Retailers and Hornby's cashflow must be looking healthier. Good news! Long may it continue.

"Pre-groping"??? Surely that is a BBC term for the days of Lord Reith, before such practices became widespread? I notice that all three varieties of Coal Tanks are currently shown as "in stock" on the Bachmann website.

I think there were some people at a museum in Swindon who were rather hoping that Hornby would produce a new King model, for when Lode Star is sold out.

Excellent news about the Coal Tank, but I also agree about the lack of pre-grouping stock. I was really surprised when the Bachmann catalogue came out and there were no SECR wagons. The ones they did for their Collectors Club sold out very quickly, so I expect a second batch with different running numbers would have been popular with the modelling public. I know they weren't accurate models, but what precentage of Bachmann customers are experts on pre-grouping freight stock? I was also surprised that SECR and GCR (and now LNWR) brake vans haven't been announced. Given the apparent readiness for manufacturers to commit to producing ever more obscure locomotives, something to go at the other end of the train would seem a logical commercial move. they certainly aren't squeamish about producing nice colourful pre-1923 private-owner wagons. There is a precedent for all this: It is possible to buy an extensive range of pre WW1 German trains, mostly Bavarian, complete with HO scale period figures, including King Ludwig and his entourage.

Of course, Hornby could have done Railroad versions of both 1361 and 1366 types a couple of years ago, using the chassis from the Electrotren 0-6-0 tank engine, but that would have been far too design clever. i'm getting a bit cynical about these sporadic bouts of 4mm RTR claim-staking, which are generally followed by years and years of waiting. Anyone for a 3-car Hampshire DEMU, for instance? Or even a 2-car BR blue one? In fact, I shall use this opportunity to announce the formation of my own company, Brigadoon Models, and hereby stake my claim to the Fell Diesel, GT3 and a Webb Greater Britain 2-2-2-2 compound, with separate DCC motors so that the driving wheels can rotate in opposite directions simultaneously.

I suppose it's just foolish to think that Dave Jones and Heljan could co-operate, thus reducing tooling costs, so that us modellers could pay a little less for the models. Maybe they might sell a few more as a result?

Railroad P2 was on the counter at Hereford Models this afternoon - the gap between the driving wheel flanges is tiny - the proverbial cigarette paper would have trouble squeezing in between. Nice looking model - can't wait for the up-market version.

I hereby stake my claim for the title of Pedant of the Week - the Stirling Single doesn't have a dome - the shiny bit is the safety valve cover: but you knew that, didn't you? I still can't decide whether to go for the GNR or LNER Atlantic. Somehow the idea of pretending the GNR version was hauling railtours in the 1950s is spoiled by the story of its poor steaming due to the removal of the superheater, which is presumably why Henry Oakley has steamed in my lifetime, but never 251.

I just can't believe that no-one has commented on the camera-shy ICI POO. There must be a brick out-houseful of puns and mirth on that subject. If only they had made Carry On Trainspotting.

Thanks for that, Andy. I still think it's a bit odd that the 1F isn't even on their website as an item due in the next 60 days, so the three variants just won't show up on the "radar" at all - perhaps they should market them as ghost trains?

Another vote here for the Bagnall - also using a standard Bachmann controller, it runs very smoothly at slow speeds, and copes well with dead frog points. It's also a lot heavier than I was expecting. I was thinking of fitting the body to a Bachmann class 03 chassis - not sure I'll bother now, although I think it would look a bit better, bearing a passing resemblance to the 6 wheeler in this old advert:

Is it me, or have the 1Fs disappeared completely from the Bachmann website? I hope it's just a mistake following the new catalogue release, and they haven't gone for a Burton (Hall) like the budget sound locos.

Is there any connection between this and the O gauge version that Ixion made?

I always assumed that the presence of MR No. 1000 in the Thames Clyde Express set indicated that the NRM MR compound hadn't sold as well as hoped, and there were a lot of surplus models to sell.

Yet another example of a manufacturer issuing a new model in a less popular livery, so that we get carried away by the excitement of a new release and buy models in a livery we didn't really want, and later buy a second lot in the livery we did want, thus doubling sales figures. Clever business psychology, but I'm sure no manufacturer would admit to it.

Having read through the last few pages of this thread, I'm amazed than any manufacturer even tries to make RTR models, given that it seems hardly any two engines in the same class were identical, and details on the same loco changed from year to year. Luckily, it also appears that I'm ignorant enough to not notice all but the most glaring errors, so I can enjoy my purchases, so long as I don't read RMweb too much!

Another question for the RMweb infinite knowledge resource. I'm assuming that R6615 is a model of a real prototype... If that's the case, does anyone know when the wagons were used, what they carried and on which routes they were seen?

Perhaps Network Rail could persuade James May to build a new Dawlish sea wall out of Lego? Seriously, though, erosion of the coast means that the alignment of the railway gets more exposed every year, and climate change has speeded this up, so every time this happens it's going to get more expensive to fix. Sooner or later the alignment will have to be moved, even if it's just a few metres inland, to give the engineers a chance to get a firm foundation that's accessible by something other than a submarine.

How about using some of the HS2 money to build a nice straight 125 mph railway from Exeter to Newton Abbot?

And a Merry Christmas to you, too, Coachmann! Are you having a laugh, or hasn't the turkey and sprouts agreed with you?Wombatofludham is entitled to state an opinion without being labelled naive and immature, however badly spelled. I also agree with Wombat about the presentation of some layouts as rather rose-tinted representations of the steam era, but as I was also at primary school in the late sixties, perhaps I should just keep quiet...