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Buying Hornby Spares What Magic is Required Please?


robmcg
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Dear All,

 

I have recently purchased quite a few Hornby engines both UK and International and one recent purchase, a Jouef 141R is superb but had one front buffer loose in the packaging and one missing.

 

I know * it was missing because I open these things slowly over clean surfaces and floor, and often there are loose bits in the packaging as received, a small price for the great detail.

 

I don't want to return the model for replacement, NZ to UK plus customs and freight,  even if the model is still available (HR2185 SNCF 141R.995).

 

The service sheet shows the front buffer assembly as a separate spare part, HR2185/12, so I 'googled' this and came up with a Cornwall shop which listed it at £3.85.    Great!   They even do web sales!  Even better!

 

But after paying for it via PayPal I was told by reply that it was not currently in stock but they expected that Hornby would supply it in the next few days.

 

Actually it is bit more complicated...   the HR2185/12 part was not in stock for sale, but the similar front buffer pack HR2147/12 (for a 241P) was available on the website, and was the one I bought on line by PayPal. (Well, I bought two buffer packs actually to get over their minimum purchase block)

 

This morning I received a long Email from the shop apologising for their inability to supply HR2185/12 and suggested that I try buying the part from Hornby Spares directly.

 

I am an experienced user of websites and searches but the Hornby website does not so far as I can tell offer such as spares for Jouef engines.

 

Clearly I am missing something, a magic chant, prayer, or arrangement of pig entrails , and am in fact as much amused as annoyed, given the great effort put in by the shop to sell a £3.85 item (Lendons of Cardiff, take a bow).

 

I have tried Peters Spares, went through 315 results for 'buffers' but nothing suitable.

 

So how does one actually buy from Hornby Spares?  I am registered with Hornby's website but searches for buffers or such as parts listed in their service sheets appear to have rather random results.

 

Does anyone out there have the secret recipe?

 

Thanks in advance,  and cheers.

 

*  subject to laws governing small parts which go missing, having never actually been seen in the first place, in spite of multiple grid searches, prayer, and other devices of hope. 

 

 

 

The image below is my edited photo of the engine with missing front buffer, except I edited one of them on. You can see it is quite a nice model!   Very apropos to the recent D-Day celebrations since 1340 of these were built in 1945-7 for the SNCF 17 lost as sea, a big part of the reconstruction of France.

 

141R_995_portrait70_2abc_r1500.jpg.36bd8cdcc0d344454e4709f70125af9b.jpg

 

 

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Ah, no, ...   Is that the correct method?

 

edit, I had thought their web site might include such directions...  maybe I didn't look hard enough.  Thanks.

Edited by robmcg
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Update,

 

Within 30 minutes of posting the original message, and sitting in the sun with winter sunshine illuminating the area of the desk and floor where the Jouef model was opened six days ago, ... a friend was idly looking at the desk and said, 'what's that on the floor?'

(nobody had mentioned to missing buffer for days after the grid search)

 

I said in humour, 'oh it's probably a small black buffer, like the one we couldn't find...'.  I absolutely was joking.

 

It was. The buffer 

 

The tile floor hadn't bee washed or vacuumed and the part was about 3 inches from the desk, IN FULL VIEW.

 

There is a grey cat at the door. This MAY explain some things... :)

 

But seriously, this is the second or third time this has happened in my life, a car part, a Fiat 128 rear brake cylinder bolt, once fell to the ground and went 'clonk' ... clear concrete, it had fallen about 20 inches onto clean clear flat concrete. 12 foot x 12 foot  grid searches by multiple people failed to find the part. It went missing just as the only emporium which sold them closed for Easter.  Eventually I bought a new one and fitted it.

Fully a month later, I was driving into the yard on the said concrete and saw a glint of light in the middle of the concrete area.   A Fiat 128 rear brake cylinder hydraulic line bolt.  There had been countless cars, wind events, rain and any number of other things  but there it was, in the middle of the clear concrete just where multiple people had searched.  This remains beyond my understanding. 

 

Equally, the Jouef front buffer was literally, to two pairs of eyes, not visible .... until today. The searches were done in goo light and COVERED THE AREA where it turned up today.

 

Back to Hornby parts, I suppose Emailing customer services at Hornby is the only way?  Do they answer quickly?  (Not that I need them now, but for interest and information).

Edited by robmcg
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I'd just taken delivery of the Hornby Club H class loco and opened it very carefully to find that the rear left buffer was detatched and rattling around in the packaging. So I picked it out and after lifting the loco out, refitted it.  No drama.  Then I noticed that the little slidey ventilator in the cab roof was missing, leaving an eye-catching-once -you-know-its-missing-hole-in-the-roof.  Definitely not fallen out of the packaging. After the great Heljan loco confetti tree affair, things get opened on a bare table on a sheet of A2 paper which shows up any separated objects and, as I could see the buffer in the packaging, I slid the cradle from the transparent sleeve of the inner packaging out flat on the paper, and the buffer was the only loose object contained within.  Definitely no pinging room for other tiny things!

 

Anyhow, I emailed Hornby Customer Services. They were very helpful but (perhaps naturally) didn't have the little slider so it was either keep the loco and bodge up the scrap of plastic or return it for replacement. Anyhow I returned it and got a new loco with the cab roof ventilator, a very fragile piece of plastic, in place.

 

However, this time the FRONT left buffer was floating around in the packaging...

 

Contacting Hornby customer services is probably a good move and they do respond fairly quickly.

Edited by Hroth
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Indeed it seems that an Email to Hornby Customer Services is the best way to buy spare parts which are unobtainable elsewhere.

 

It didn't occur to me that Hornby might have stocks of Jouef model buffers sitting awaiting buyers... or indeed that their spare part inventory was any more comprehensive than a web site search on their public website, which in my experience gives results largely unrelated to key words entered.

 

Your A2 sheet of paper  method for opening new models is similar to mine, except I do mine on a tray on my lap, on a clean tile floor, and my feeling is that the errant buffer was stuck between plastic shroud sleeve and foam insert in the box, and removing the plastic assembly from the foam allowed the part to be projected unseen about three feet to its resting place near the nearest furniture.

 

I try not to lie awake at night...  <g>

 

edit;  there are some who are inclined to dismiss box-openers.   What little they know!

Edited by robmcg
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Many years ago I lost a pair  of H0  driving wheels for a brass USRA light mike as it happens,a relative of the 141 I believe.Couldnt find them for years ,luckily I managed to get a replacement pair from Sunset .One day  years later my wife was rummaging around down the bottom of our garden and found them .We believe our Springer took them.No other explanation .

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I think the magic touch required is patience and persistence in your searches ... 

 

It all depends which parts of course.

 

I've been after brake rods for Hornby rebuilt MN's and they've appeared at a sensible price - thanks to Clive of AC Models ...

 

There have been other parts which just aren't appearing anywhere, but just keep looking ..  never know!!

 

Glad the buffer turned up - had similar experiences in my garage when 'parts have pinged'.

 

Al.

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I have two occasions o see lookingfor spares for locomotives that are still being made.

I contacted Hornby customer services for both parts required, one being a replacement pantograph for the new class 87. Although very polite and suggested I try Peters Spares or AC Models, it is very clear you cannot purchase body parts as spares (other item I was after was a of grill for a class 60).

Disappointing really as even normally available spares are in very short supply at the two vendors mentioned above.

Same a string to get Heljan replacement wheel sets for class 47 or 58.

Time these manufactures considered the spares angle for their products.

john

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Thanks all for the replies, it is in after-view quite amusing the way lost parts can turn up.

 

I had a recent box-opening 'loss' of a small Hornby part, something hard to replicate or create from junk, I forget what it was, it turned up in the middle of the bedroom floor several rooms away, well away from the box opening and subsequent search.  Presumably stuck in clothing until I went to bed, but it wasn't found until about five days later ...  

 

I agree with atom3624 that parts can ultimately be found, sometimes, from any of several suppliers, with patience and dedication.

 

I can recommend Lendons of Cardiff for great politeness and patience with me in my search for a Jouef front buffers, after all my wasting of their time they are giving me refund!  I can also recommend Peters Spares who are unfailingly good in my experience.

 

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On 20/06/2019 at 07:09, atom3624 said:

I think the magic touch required is patience and persistence in your searches ... 

 

It all depends which parts of course.

 

I've been after brake rods for Hornby rebuilt MN's and they've appeared at a sensible price - thanks to Clive of AC Models ...

 

There have been other parts which just aren't appearing anywhere, but just keep looking ..  never know!!

 

Glad the buffer turned up - had similar experiences in my garage when 'parts have pinged'.

 

Al.

How much patience is required ?

 

ive been looking for a Trix BR52 smokebox door assembly for the USSR version (catalog number 22515) since 1999...  thats the entire 21st century so far.

Edited by adb968008
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We are indeed fortunate in Cardiff to have 2 very good model shops and an Antics.

 

I suspect that Rob has been a victim of the Space Elves from the planet Zarg; I have had a lot of trouble with these little chaps.  They are mischievous rather than malign, but are able with their highly advanced space technology to remove items such as single socks, remote controls, or a single of the only pair of earrings that the squeeze can possibly wear with the outfit she wants to go up the pub tonight in, beam them to their reconstruction facility on Zarg, and then return them in the form of wire coat hangers, dead AA batteries (in the small drawer you keep only new ones), or hair clips.  Another common trick is to 'borrow' an item such as a buffer and hide it until they know you've bought a new one, at which point they return it to some position you've already checked countless times directly in your line of vision; I swear I can hear the little b*uggers sniggering sometimes.  Grey cats and Springer spaniels are probably innocent; the Zargian Elves know that they will escape the blame but we only have a guinea pig who is supervised at all times when he's out of his enclosure (and mostly nuzzling ears for attention) so he's innocent.  Of this, anyway; he's more than capable of all sorts of other shenannigans.  Has to be Elves.

 

There is absolutely nothing you or anyone can do about this, and one must accept it philosophically as a wonderful aspect of a varied and fascinating universe.  Space elves are not like the terrestrial ones that live in Iceland and can be placated with offerings.

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Thankyou Johnster for that explanation.  My friend and co-searcher is a rational being, and is disinclined to put much weight on the 'Elven Theory'.

 

I offered the idea that with the engine in transit after manufacture the buffer had worked its way from the front of the engine to the outside corner of the plastic sleeve assembly, and that when I removed the rectangular plastic, sleeve intact, from the foam surround, the part had been flicked into the air and landed unseen on the desk about 3 feet away.  Thus evading detection.  After all, how could it have fallen sideways from my adjacent clear tray?  Days after the fruitless grid search said female friend had picked up scissors which were also on the desk, and her hand had brushed the buffer and it fell in the adjacent floor...

 

See?  Females have knowledge and logic.  I mean, I have experienced times when I have dropped Hornby engine boxes on the floor and they have landed and stayed 'end-on'.  Try doing that on purpose.

 

Similarly, flicking a front buffer which has travelled from the buffer beam to the outside of a plastic sleeve assembly three feet onto a desktop, simple basic physics.  

 

Why is that cat stretching and looking innocently at nothing in particular?

 

Note; Nearly all Hornby plastic-sleeve packed models have the odd part or piece of cotton somewhere in the folds, also Heljan 47XXs are a bit prone...

 

cheers

 

here is one which arrived completely intact...

 

241P_1_Dijon_portrait11_2abc_r1500.jpg.ab170f4de906aadb5c8df3be93171cbb.jpg

 

acknowledgements to Railpictures and Frabrice Lanoue for some of the background.

 

or here, 

 

241P_showimage_4a_r1500.jpg.f26344ffda3b61fd52b4b48136461820.jpg

 

both pics edited but very little changed on these Hornby International Jouef H0 models at all.  I don't know how they manage to get all the driving wheels so close to scale and still have brakes etc and they run well too.

 

Here just to be sensible is an unedited pic of a sister 241P engine ... amazing that they arrive in one piece, generally!

 

241p_IMG_2928a_r1500.jpg.d94022cea7fa68218e24e91913b5ada0.jpg

 

Quelle dommage!   And Hornby make 52XXs too! :)

 

I personally blame a very pretty French teacher at high school when I was 13 yrs old.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I must admit I'm warming to it a bit - always preferred 'the British way' of hiding everything under the air-smoothed casing but it does have a certain je ne sais quoi about it - could be all of the detailing and 8 coupled drivers ...

Cylinders are pretty big but appear well positioned to not block bogie movement.

 

Al.

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