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Falcon Brassworks - a warning!


cctransuk
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6 hours ago, cctransuk said:

Given the family connection, how about Dart Castings / MJT Components, etc.? Has anyone placed an order lately? If so, what was the service like?

Over the last couple of years, the most recent experience being in 2020, I can only consider the service from Dart Castings to be exemplary.

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14 hours ago, cctransuk said:

I can see that holding stock of expensive etches would not be viable, but I would have thought that it would be possible to offer the range on an expression of interest basis. Once sufficient prospective orders were received for a particular subject to make it viable to order the etches, a 50% deposit could be taken, with the balance payable when the kits were ready for despatch. This has been done by other kit producers.

 

 

Adding more administrative burden  to a business that is failing to meet customers expectations due to (according to the owner) lack of time, doesn't seem to offer much hope of improvement to me.

 

Jon

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1 hour ago, jonhall said:

 

Adding more administrative burden  to a business that is failing to meet customers expectations due to (according to the owner) lack of time, doesn't seem to offer much hope of improvement to me.

 

Jon

Exactly one of the problems .

 

 

Another problem which some people seem to ignore, or dont know about or have Rose Tinted Spectacles is that the kits in general are poor at best. Handrawn etches and ropy castings where the standard of most.

 

Some people may also not realise in reality, they are renamed kits, they are the even older Jidenco kits, in some cases "slightly" improved if you are very lucky.

 

I built their LNER F8 which was basically rubbish, wrong sizes and poor etches ,and castings 90% of which went straight in the bin. Jidenco wagons are even poorer in some cases.

 

 

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55 minutes ago, micklner said:

Exactly one of the problems .

 

 

Another problem which some people seem to ignore, or dont know about or have Rose Tinted Spectacles is that the kits in general are poor at best. Handrawn etches and ropy castings where the standard of most.

 

Some people may also not realise in reality, they are renamed kits, they are the even older Jidenco kits, in some cases "slightly" improved if you are very lucky.

 

I built their LNER F8 which was basically rubbish, wrong sizes and poor etches ,and castings 90% of which went straight in the bin. Jidenco wagons are even poorer in some cases.

 

 

 

 

I think you have hit the nail on the head about the quality of these kits and their buildability, The one thing everyone likes is the shear range of locos and stock they covered. which totally obscures the fact that the design of parts were far from builder friendly in some cases unbuildable. Plus unless you have a stock of spare castings and turnings a considerable sum may be needed on parts.

 

Fast track to modern well designed kits, where the design of the components is far better with locating tabs and in some cases thicker material used. I have a part built (by someone else) LSWR well tank, the builder replaced the frames with Gibsons and seems to have given up trying to solder ill fitting parts together. I bought it for the challenge and was cheapish when the wheels motor and new chassis was taken into consideration

 

The real fact is and I guess many would echo, whilst there are a couple of locos I fancy, would I buy one new as an etch only. NO or certainly not at the price they will have to retail at to make a profit

 

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2 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

 

 

 

Fast track to modern well designed kits, where the design of the components is far better with locating tabs and in some cases thicker material used. I have a part built (by someone else) LSWR well tank, the builder replaced the frames with Gibsons and seems to have given up trying to solder ill fitting parts together. I bought it for the challenge and was cheapish when the wheels motor and new chassis was taken into consideration

 

 

 

I believe it was Ian Rice who wrote an article on building one of these in MRJ, From memory there were compromises around the splasher area that caused him a spot of bother. I think you have set your self quite a challenge.

Bernard

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33 minutes ago, hayfield said:

 

 

I think you have hit the nail on the head about the quality of these kits and their buildability, The one thing everyone likes is the shear range of locos and stock they covered. which totally obscures the fact that the design of parts were far from builder friendly in some cases unbuildable. Plus unless you have a stock of spare castings and turnings a considerable sum may be needed on parts.

 

Fast track to modern well designed kits, where the design of the components is far better with locating tabs and in some cases thicker material used. I have a part built (by someone else) LSWR well tank, the builder replaced the frames with Gibsons and seems to have given up trying to solder ill fitting parts together. I bought it for the challenge and was cheapish when the wheels motor and new chassis was taken into consideration

 

The real fact is and I guess many would echo, whilst there are a couple of locos I fancy, would I buy one new as an etch only. NO or certainly not at the price they will have to retail at to make a profit

 

 

I have built a number of Jidenco wagon kits, and I have several Falcon Brass ones still to do.

 

My experience is that the kits are of their time - buildable with care; not overly detailed but capable of improvement, and produce an unusual and perfectly acceptable model if assembled with thought and care.

 

For instance; I built the LNWR chemical pan trolley, which just needed some minor detailing; and the LMS cement hopper, which checked out very well against the original LMS drawings; (and I mean drawings, not diagram); and produced a most unusual wagon; (which was also used as PO by, I seem to recall, Stanton & Staveley).

 

These kits are not for the 'shake the box' brigade, but are ideal for those with some soldering and forming skills, and certainly add variety to freight wagon rakes.

 

John Isherwood.

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2 minutes ago, micklner said:

I look forward to seeing photos of these builds .

 

Mick,

 

I will see if I can dig out the chemical pan trolley and the cement hopper - they were built in Jidenco days.

 

The Falcon Brass ones are not high on the 'to build' list, but I seem to recall a (GWR or SR) ballast plough brake, and an LMS ballast hopper, being amongst them.

 

Regards,

John Isherwood.

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I bought a Midland brake van from the Dart stand at a show about two years ago. When I got it home I found that it's dimensionally accurate but the designer got some of the panelling lines on the wrong side. Never mind.

I do wonder if there might be a market for some of their models if they started again with a clean sheet.

Cheers

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6 minutes ago, PenrithBeacon said:

I bought a Midland brake van from the Dart stand at a show about two years ago. When I got it home I found that it's dimensionally accurate but the designer got some of the panelling lines on the wrong side. Never mind.

I do wonder if there might be a market for some of their models if they started again with a clean sheet.

Cheers

 

I think that there is a market for their products as they stand - yes, you do get the odd error, but usually nothing that can't be corrected.

 

Panelling lines on the wrong side? Fill them with solder and scribe them on the correct side!

 

John Isherwood.

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9 hours ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

One man's unbuildable is another man's challenge!

 

Mike.

 

Mike

 

You do find a few threads with some extraordinary building exploits which go to extraordinary lengths to  get it to fit. This makes for a good read but must put others off. From my limited experience the wagons are far harder to build than locos as I get stuck when I get to the solebars 

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15 hours ago, cctransuk said:

 

In what way - are you saying that these kits are ludicrous? My photos above prove otherwise!

 

John Isherwood.

Many of the wagons are buildable with some experience and care. The locomotives are another matter all together. They range from reasonable (for their day) through to a waste of metal. The Claughton is a prime example of the latter. More than 50% of the body components need to be replaced if one is to get a reasonable model out of the kit. And the underpinnings are just as bad.

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This is the NE 12T box van kit. Strangely the instructions suggested it could be used for an LMS van as well ! The roof profile was closer to LNER though. Too wide, had to be squeezed, and even then it can only represent the smaller batch that was wider. No outside framing supplied for the door, turned buffers that were completely wrong, solebar channel much too deep, and the underframe parts so poor that they all had to go. I also made a new brass roof, not trusting the thin and ancient plasticard in the kit. The end corrugations are a little sharp too. Despite all this intervention required, or perhaps because of it, I found it immensely enjoyable to build and it has become one of my favourite wagons. I still keep an eye out for their Aspinall rapid shunting tank kit but in reality it would probably be easier to scratchbuild...

 

WP_20141026_16_37_02_Pro.jpg.6fbd5a741ae50ddc21f3f4b62671196b.jpg

 

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8 minutes ago, Enterprisingwestern said:

 

Reading through, it would seem the kits are best described as scratch aids?

It was fighting a Jidenco SR ballast wagon, simple you would have thought, that sent me down the road of scratchbuilding wagons!

 

Mike.

 

In some cases, even the term Scratch aid might be considered optimistic. 

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28 minutes ago, Denbridge said:

Many of the wagons are buildable with some experience and care. The locomotives are another matter all together. They range from reasonable (for their day) through to a waste of metal. The Claughton is a prime example of the latter. More than 50% of the body components need to be replaced if one is to get a reasonable model out of the kit. And the underpinnings are just as bad.

 The 1970`s and very fond memories of Jidenco 4mm loco kits.   I was in my LSWR modelling mode back then and Jidenco had a good range of relevant kits.

Some had not been researched well enough (LSWR K10) but many others were very good for their day. You were required to do some modelling and work hard at getting them  to  look good and work well and be prepared to accept  compromises.   Here are some of my efforts   from way back.....

 

1974628224_Lifetimeofmodelling1.jpg.02c535ab036cf6b74bcec99da7340dc8.jpg

 

 

1797951732_Lifetimeofmodelling.jpg.b8fe90bdf82bd1201c95b334371756b1.jpg

 

 

 

1308370504_Lifetimeofmodelling4.jpg.3b4ef7ddaa7121e99ec0ec451b2a79cb.jpg

 

 

1114129808_Lifetimeofmodelling3.jpg.5566a3944b93d052a05cd277d2e4ecf2.jpg

 

 

The pay back of course was  learning how to solder and bend metal parts , such a great way to learn ....thankyou GB......

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My very first attempt at an etched kit was a Falcon Brass ex-Cambrian guards van.  When I finally plucked up the courage to tackle it I found the kit itself was actually rather better than the instructions had led me to expect.  The only real problem was that some of the fold lines were in the wrong place, and even that wasnt a major problem because they were so far from where they ought to have been the error was obvious even to a novice.

I've since built a couple more of their wagon kits and in both cases found the instructions were by far their biggest shortcoming.

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