acourtrail

5554 was an early build MK2c with the MK2b style toilet windows. The only later build MK2c TSO that carried either Trans - Pennine or Regional Railways liveries was 5614 (it carried both liveries).

While those Royal 47s do look nice, there will be a slight inaccuracy with 47799 - the model doesn't look like it will have a flush front at the No2 end which the real locomotive has.

That one was VERY lucky to make it into the 1950s, never mind blue & grey and later preservation. According to the MoT report into the Penmanshiel Tunnel train fire in 1949 - 9124 (the report has conflicting numbers for the restaurant car - a floorplan diagram states it as 9184, but 9124 is quoted in the written part of the report at least twice) was the 11th coach it the train, and right next to the two Thompson coaches that were burned out. The fire did spread into the seating end of 9124, but it was uncoupled from the burning coaches, and the fire in 9124 was put out before the coach was too badly damaged.

Yes, I am sure they would have. They also got pinched a lot by the Southern and Western Regions during the summers.

I would rather buy my stuff from a proper model shop, but I have to use eBay because there are no good model shops sensibly near enough to me. Cheltenham Model centre is my nearest I can just about get to (but that entails paying about £40 worth of train fares for me, and takes all day), so its eBay for me sadly.

The Thompson coaches didn't take long to hit the shops - they are starting to appear brand new on a famous online auction site!

The diagram 24 RB/RBR (1644 - 1760 number series) would be the easiest to do, because the windows and doors stayed the same throughout their lives (at least until the modern day charter operators got their hands on some of them). They carried maroon, Southern Region green, chocolate and cream, blue and grey, the three main intercity liveries (executive, swallow and white roof). Some later on got blood and custard, LNWR and pullman liveries when they ran in charter trains, but even those could be done using the standard version tooling because when they had the saloons converted into storage space, the unwanted windows were just painted white.

More than I expected this quarter, given that we had a VERY big batch of nice coaches last quarter. While there isn't much I would like this time round, I might be tempted by a maroon Thompson or two (they did sometimes get onto the Southern and Western regions) - and with some of the coaches from last quarter starting to come out, I need some time to get all of those ones first! I am not surprised the ex NGS Thompson BG is now in the Farish range proper - but I already have two NGS ones, even though I am not a member of the NGS (they turn up on eBay quite often, so I was able to get a lined maroon one and a blue one).

Just need Dapol to do this in N! Did these saloons carry any other liveries apart from the ones already being done?

There were two Intercity liveried TSOs used on the Waterloo - Exeter route in the early 1990s, one was a MK2d and one was a MK2e. If you were to customise a MK2f TSO, you could do the M2e fairly easily. I agree, some more green MK1s would have been nice (and some more Bulleids in 1960s green too) - maybe next year. Best do that OT quick if you are after the MK2s, because I suspect the blue & grey TSOs and all the Intercity swift and Virgin ones will soon be gone for a burton if they aren't already! I wonder how long the maroon TSOs and SKs will last too - mind you, there can't be too many people after a maroon SK at the moment, because I managed to get a £33 "buy it now" one off eBay that had been on there for nearly a week.

Nice lot of MK1s being done there! The RMBs in blood & custard and chocolate & cream liveries should appeal to the people doing charter trains and preserved railway themes (for those who don't already know - RMBs never wore those liveries in BR service, so they are actually era 8 onwards). I only hope the SKs don't all sell out before they hit the shops, because I might want some of those (with 3 SKs and 1 TSO in chocolate & cream already in my fleet, I really don't need any more, but no doubt I will find a home for some more!).

I agree, 25 years ago is hardly actual modern image (given how much has changed in that time), but people often have their own definition of what modern image is, a lot of people I know would define anything post steam as modern image! Personally, I consider anything post privatisation as modern image, but I know that most people will say I am stretching that term a bit!

Yes, and I have bought some. Trouble is, my fleet of chocolate & cream MK1s are used to represent several different named trains as I feel like on the day, so they need to stay on BR1 bogies (bar the FO, which I put on B4 bogies years ago, because W3085 was like that in real life) to be accurate for most of those trains. Those spare bogies are useful, I have used some under my fleet of maroon "charter train" MK1s.

Yes - set 525 became a 6 set later on. Farish did do both of the TSOs for that set (and I have both of those), but as you said, they didn't do CK 15915. I am not too worried about not having the extra CK (I run my set 525 as a 3 set, so don't need the second CK, and I use the 2 TSOs for when I am having a preserved railway day). Yes, a diagram 24 RB/RBR would be nice, I would want one in green (so that I could represent a (Warship hauled) Brighton - Plymouth train, by adding the 2 TSOs and RB to my set 525 to get the Brighton portion (ignoring the fact that 525 wasn't one of the two actual sets), and using my Bulleid L set 830 for the Portsmouth portion). While I have a chocolate & cream RU, an RB would also be nice (plus another FK), then I could represent the Bristolian (ignoring the fact that the set of coaches used on that train had B4 bogies).

They would be nice, and they would sell, but everyone will have different needs in terms of what they want/need in each set. An obvious set would be 4x Regional Railways MK2a for the North Wales Coast. That would be a complete train (just add a class 37). While not something I would want, plenty of other people who do modern image would snap those up! Farish have done 2x pairs of MK1s in the West Highland Line green & cream livery. Those are a bit of a niche thing really to be fair (and they need to do another pair of TSOs, so that people could then make the full six coach train). Sets of MK1s in B.R Southern Region green would work, because a lot of their MK1s ran in fixed sets. I wanted to make a K set (BSK+CK+BSK), but while Farish made all the correct coaches to form set 525 (BSK 34641 + CK 15567 + BSK 34642), they were released separately, and it took me ages to find them all!

While I don't model OO scale (so, by default there isn't going to be anything I fancy in the Hornby range), I still take an interest in what Hornby are doing each year, because it gives me a good idea what might be done in the future by Dapol/ Farish etc. in N scale (a lot of N scalers will see something come out in OO scale, and then clamour for it in N). Regarding the prices, I am not surprised at them, in fact I expected them to be even higher than they are. The real problem with people being able to afford the models, is that the average incomes are not going up (and incomes are even going down, in many peoples cases). One big contributory factor of these price rises, is that the manufacturers seem to be in an “arms race” to outdo each other by stuffing each new model full of gimmicks of questionable necessity (which, needless to say makes the models harder (and more expensive) to make, and much easier to damage due to the increasingly delicate extra parts). Obviously things that most people want and also improve the operation of the models (like DCC sockets) are musts, but how many of you hand on heart REALLY want the “gimmicky” features like opening cab doors, rotating fans etc.? Yes there is uproar when a new model doesn't have those kinds of features, but that is because most models have them nowadays, and therefore people have been weaned into expecting them. If none of the manufacturers had bothered putting those “gimmicky” features in any of their models in the first place, would you have been less likely to buy the models? Regarding the specific models Hornby are doing, I suspect they have stopped catering for the average modeller, and are now targeting the collectors. While I am sure that there will be a few people (and more likely clubs) who will buy those lovely new Coronation coaches for their layouts (assuming they model the East Coast Main Line in the late – 1930s, and they have space for the whole train), most of those coaches will get bought by collectors who will just display them in a glass cabinet. As to the quality control issues, I wouldn't be surprised if the problems are worse than people realise. Take the “Hush Hush” for example. From what I gather, a lot of people (at least the few people who managed to get one!) have had all sorts of trouble with them, but I suspect that there will be even more people out there who have a bad “Hush Hush”, and will never know (because they will have put their “Hush Hush” in their “self awarded trophy cabinet” and will never dare run it “because then it won't be mint boxed”).

Those do sound like good ideas. Without meaning to nit pick, AFAIK, the 1938 never ran on the "main line" Central Line. The only times that 1938 stock was seen on the Central, was one 3 car set (and the flat fronted 1935 prototypes) working the Epping - Ongar section. Later on, one spare 1938 trailer was put into each of the 1960 stock sets to replace the two standard stock trailers in those sets. The 1960 stock was used on the Fairlop Loop and Epping - Ongar, but I don't think they ever saw use on the "main line" services. As an interesting aside, the Fairlop Loop was used to test and develop the Automatic Train Operation used on the Victoria Line when that was first built, and until 1984, the Victoria Line didn't have all of its allocation of 1967 stock at the same time, because there was always at least one 4 car 1967 set being used on the Fairlop Loop.

The two HSTs are a little bit notable. Both of them are in unusual formations (they are the normal 2+7s of the time, but oddly each has had a second TGS added to the London end). Also, both of the power cars of the second HST would come to sad ends (the front one 43173 was written off at Southall in 1997, while the back one 43140 was written of at Stonehaven in 2020).

If this set is the one I think it is, then the set would have been all FKs and BFKs (with a GUV on the end) the FKs would have been a mixture of MK2a, MK2b and early MK2c (the ones with the MK2b toilet windows), with either a MK2a or MK2c BFK in the middle.

I'm still waiting for someone to do the Bulleid 13 car fully articulated sets that were specially built for the Atlantic Coast Express!

OK, so only a few things being done this time, but maybe there will be a few more nice things in 3 months time. The class 66 isn't suitable for me, but the mineral wagon is, so not all bad. I "might" have a use for the restaurant car, but I would rather I don't find a use for it (while I have got most of the coaches I "need" for my railway (all the 1960s green Bulleids and nearly all of the more practical MK1s for a Southern Region branch line), I keep "finding a use for" other ones that are not really appropriate!).

Re class 205s getting to Cardiff - if they were banned from the Severn Tunnel because they had no gangways, one unit could still have gone through there. That unit was 205101, which was the experimental refurbished unit done around 1979. It was given a new interior and gangways within the unit. It didn't have any 1st class after refurbishment, so it was mostly kept on Hastings to Ashford duties. While I don't know much about the unit and which routes it was used on, it was an oddball in the fleet, and would no doubt have been the unit foisted off to other depots when they needed to borrow a unit. Maybe it could have been borrowed by Salisbury depot, and maybe it could have been put onto a Cardiff run? While the "Hastings" class 201, 202, 203 units were more common west of Yeovil Junction (they worked the Saturdays only Brighton - Exeter service for a while in the 1970s), class 205s did occasionally get to Exeter St David's. On the 6 March 1991, there was shortage of locomotives, so Network Southeast liveried 205033 worked the 07.45 Basingstoke - Exeter St David's and the 12.20 Exeter St David's - London Waterloo (as far as Salisbury). A near exact repeat of this happened on the 5 April 1993, with the ill fated celebrity green liveried 205029 being used.

My start with model railways was when I was six (and my family felt I was "grown up enough" to have trains) in 1988. Childhood was spent firmly in OO gauge territory with plenty of 2nd hand Hornby stuff from the 1970s and 1980s, and later on in teenage years the Hornby stuff was bolstered with some Bachmann, Lima and Replica Railways products. Fast forward to adult life in 2003 (and my own home), and the OO gauge is too big. So, I took myself off on a trip to the much missed Hendford Halt model shop in Yeovil to investigate (and begin my first flirtation with) British N gauge. There wasn't much N in stock (Bachmann was only just getting the Farish products back into production), but among the 2nd hand stuff was a Farish class 33 (33025 Sultan in 1990s civil engineer's "dutch" livery) as well as some Farish "Poole era" MK2s in Network Southeast livery. While the class 33 and MK2s were nice, I didn't stick with British N gauge (eventually going for American N gauge for a few years). Fast forward to 2008, and I visited a model shop in Bristol to find that Farish had started doing Warships......

There seems to have been some variation with the shade Farish have used for the carmine over the years. Your MK1 there is from about ten years ago, and was one of the earlier runs Fraish did, which used a brighter shade for the carmine. More recent batches of the MK1s have used the darker shade like that on your Thompson. I am not sure which shade is the right one.

I agree, indeed, I read somewhere that the Cresta was only made for one year (1965, I think) and that (apart from a small number that slipped through the net) the Rambler was almost entirely allocated to the export markets. Most of the Austin 1800s that Minix made were exported to Australia (although, they do turn up in the UK fairly often). The Minix car I see the most often where I am (Somerset) is the Vauxhall Viva HA, with the Ford Anglia the next easiest to find. I used to see Triumph 2000s (usually the 1982 - 1990 black base ones) all the time, but they have become as rare as hen's teeth where I am (the full size "Trummies" were popular with banger racers, so perhaps the 1.76 scale people have banger raced them!!). Having said that, I have a mint but unboxed red Triumph 2000 (it actually came in a sealed but crushed and torn beyond repair box, but the car inside was 100% OK) that I bought last year.