hornby 2020 Hornby A2/2 and A2/3 (2020 Range)

[gordon s]

Interesting development.....

 

Received my Sun Castle early this afternoon and it's been running in for three hours or so. All went well, so started to fit a decoder. Once I had detached the tender, something heavy was clearly loose inside and this is what greeted me....

 

There is a heavy cast weight in the tender, but either the fixing holes in the tender spigots were oversize or the threads had been stripped and the whole lot had come loose in transit. 

 

Seemed strange and then I saw a tiny spring poking out of one of the holes. Because the holes were oversize or perhaps stripped, someone had a inserted a small spring into each of the holes to hold the screws....but they had failed in transit and the weight was free to move about. The tender drawbar screw was almost locked into its brass insert, so I suspect over tightening screws is probably likely.

 

OK, not the end of the world and I can fix it, but sadly again it raises a question about quality control on these new models. Shame of it is I was singing the praises of Hornby yesterday as their J15 and J36 are outstanding. Probably the best running locos I have ever seen from a RTR manufacturer. I just wish they could have done the same with these new locos which have had numerous irritating assembly faults. Nothing that can't be fixed, but we shouldn't have to correct simple assembly faults.

 

Lining and colour are the same as the A2.

 

Edited March 10, 2021 by gordon s

[D9001]

As an alternative to going at the numberplate with a knife, is the smokebox front removable so it can replaced by the later version from Sun Castle? 

Edited March 10, 2021 by D9001

[gordon s]

Something else worth checking. I use a multi meter to check continuity on all wheels as good running quality requires good pick ups. Whist the tender was apart I checked all the pick ups and was surprised that only two wheels were picking up and even they were intermittent. Took off the keeper plate and saw the pick ups were not making contact with the wheels, so gently tweaked them as that usually fixes any issues. Put it all back together and still not 100%, so took another look.

 

The tender wheels are a metal tyre with a plastic insulating insert. It would appear that the plastic insert is actually standing proud of the tyre and in some cases, preventing the pick up strip touching the metal rim by holding it away from metal to metal contact. Very hard to photograph, but to try and solve the problem, I have taken a scalpel and removed the protruding plastic on one wheel and that has completely resolved the issue.

 

If you really want good running, it may be worth putting a meter across all the tender wheels and just check that each wheel down each side are connected. If not, you may have the same problem. It appears easy to solve, but I will let you know how it went once all wheels are done.

 

I must have really been naughty in a previous life.....

 

 

[31A]

3 hours ago, Ray Flintoft said:

One error on " Steady Aim " is that the A,W.S. battery box is present under the cab . Luckily that suits me fine as she will become no. 60514 "Chamossaire " as running in 1959/1960 .

 

The AWS battery box looks as if it's a separate part, so it might ping off quite easily of you don't want it?  Handy things to have in the spares box ....

 

[Dominion]

2 hours ago, gordon s said:

Interesting development.....

 

Received my Sun Castle early this afternoon and it's been running in for three hours or so. All went well, so started to fit a decoder. Once I had detached the tender, something heavy was clearly loose inside and this is what greeted me....

 

There is a heavy cast weight in the tender, but either the fixing holes in the tender spigots were oversize or the threads had been stripped and the whole lot had come loose in transit. 

 

Seemed strange and then I saw a tiny spring poking out of one of the holes. Because the holes were oversize or perhaps stripped, someone had a inserted a small spring into each of the holes to hold the screws....but they had failed in transit and the weight was free to move about. The tender drawbar screw was almost locked into its brass insert, so I suspect over tightening screws is probably likely.

 

OK, not the end of the world and I can fix it, but sadly again it raises a question about quality control on these new models. Shame of it is I was singing the praises of Hornby yesterday as their J15 and J36 are outstanding. Probably the best running locos I have ever seen from a RTR manufacturer. I just wish they could have done the same with these new locos which have had numerous irritating assembly faults. Nothing that can't be fixed, but we shouldn't have to correct simple assembly faults.

 

Lining and colour are the same as the A2.

 

 

The same person must have assembled my 60505 tender, as it had both those issues, though on only one of the weight fixing threads. Gordon, might the "spring" you saw have been the stripped plastic thread from the hole ?  The rest of my 60505 was reasonably good though.

Edited March 10, 2021 by Dominion
specificity

[landscapes]

2 hours ago, Ray Flintoft said:

The lining & numbers look fine to me , David , but the green is still not right . I'll see what I can do but it may be that I will follow your lead & give them a good weathering before entering traffic .

   Your no. 60501 looks exactly as I remember her as a youngster at York . She was so common that I got fed up of seeing her , wish I could now !

                           Best wishes ,

                                       Ray .

Hi Ray

 

I would have loved to have been able to see any of the A2/2’s but they were all scrapped a year or two before I started train spotting in 1962.

 

If you are happy with the colour of the numbers and linings perhaps a coat or two of Johnson’s Klear on the green livery may be a good starting point and take it from there.

 

That’s what I did and just kept going as I just wasn’t satisfied with my efforts to hide the Hornby green, that is until I almost completed covered it.

 

I must say when I first finished the weathering yesterday my initial thoughts were Oh god what have I done but a day later I am now very happy with 60501 it sits nicely with the other Brunswick Green Pacific’s.

 

A nice contrast to the lovely clean gleaming Haymarket Pacific’s.

 

Regards

 

David 

[landscapes]

2 hours ago, D9001 said:

As an alternative to going at the numberplate with a knife, is the smokebox front removable so it can replaced by the later version from Sun Castle? 

Hi

 

The smokebox door should come away from the smokebox as they are only glued in,  it it depends on just how much glue was applied.

 

I managed to remove the plain stove chimney on my A2/2 but the smokebox door is well and truly stuck on so I am just going to leave it in place.

 

Some others have complained that there model arrived with the smokebox door having fallen off.

 

Good luck.

 

Regards

 

David

[zr2498]

1 hour ago, gordon s said:

Something else worth checking. I use a multi meter to check continuity on all wheels as good running quality requires good pick ups. Whist the tender was apart I checked all the pick ups and was surprised that only two wheels were picking up and even they were intermittent. Took off the keeper plate and saw the pick ups were not making contact with the wheels, so gently tweaked them as that usually fixes any issues. Put it all back together and still not 100%, so took another look.

 

The tender wheels are a metal tyre with a plastic insulating insert. It would appear that the plastic insert is actually standing proud of the tyre and in some cases, preventing the pick up strip touching the metal rim by holding it away from metal to metal contact. Very hard to photograph, but to try and solve the problem, I have taken a scalpel and removed the protruding plastic on one wheel and that has completely resolved the issue.

 

If you really want good running, it may be worth putting a meter across all the tender wheels and just check that each wheel down each side are connected. If not, you may have the same problem. It appears easy to solve, but I will let you know how it went once all wheels are done.

 

I must have really been naughty in a previous life.....

 

 

All good information and things to check out when Sun Castle arrives soon. Might be worth going back to the A2/2 to see if that has a similar issue

[locoman462]

2 hours ago, Dominion said:

 

The same person must have assembled my 60505 tender, as it had both those issues, though on only one of the weight fixing threads. Gordon, might the "spring" you saw have been the stripped plastic thread from the hole ?  The rest of my 60505 was reasonably good though.

Sounds like a similar problem I found with my ToF when trying to select the short tender drawbar position. The drawbar needs to be turned round so as the alternative position is at the forward / loco end to avoid fouling  the power connector plug under the tender. The screw holding the drawbar under the loco was incredibly tight and took time to remove. When out, I observed that the thread was damaged / mis-shaped and had stripped the corresponding thread on the loco, pulling out a spring like coil. I had to Loctite the screw back into the chassis after selecting the shorter drawbar position. The screw should never have been used in the first place given its damaged condition.

Peter.

[D9001]

Very disappointed to have received an email from a well known Liverpool based retailer this morning saying that my money has been refunded for my Sun Castle because they are sold out; I must have been one of the first to order with them, immediately following the announcement of the Hornby A2/3 so how can they be sold out of it?  I have emailed back my disappointment but Has anyone else received such an email? 

[45568]

24 minutes ago, D9001 said:

Very disappointed to have received an email from a well known Liverpool based retailer this morning saying that my money has been refunded for my Sun Castle because they are sold out; I must have been one of the first to order with them, immediately following the announcement of the Hornby A2/3 so how can they be sold out of it?  I have emailed back my disappointment but Has anyone else received such an email? 

If you are quick Kernow are showing 6 in stock. I had a pre-order with Hattons which I cancelled on Sunday when I saw Kernow had received theirs and ordered one. I too feared the refund email having already had Hornby 2021 items I pre-ordered on the first day possible cancelled!

Good luck!

Cheers from Oz,

Peter C.

[zr2498]

29 minutes ago, D9001 said:

Very disappointed to have received an email from a well known Liverpool based retailer this morning saying that my money has been refunded for my Sun Castle because they are sold out; I must have been one of the first to order with them, immediately following the announcement of the Hornby A2/3 so how can they be sold out of it?  I have emailed back my disappointment but Has anyone else received such an email? 

8 currently in stock at TMC if no luck with Kernow

[Helmdon]

32 minutes ago, D9001 said:

Very disappointed to have received an email from a well known Liverpool based retailer this morning saying that my money has been refunded for my Sun Castle because they are sold out; I must have been one of the first to order with them, immediately following the announcement of the Hornby A2/3 so how can they be sold out of it?  I have emailed back my disappointment but Has anyone else received such an email? 

Not yet, they took the money for Steady Aim over the weekend, but I suppose they can still give it back....

[scots region]

33 minutes ago, D9001 said:

Very disappointed to have received an email from a well known Liverpool based retailer this morning saying that my money has been refunded for my Sun Castle because they are sold out; I must have been one of the first to order with them, immediately following the announcement of the Hornby A2/3 so how can they be sold out of it?  I have emailed back my disappointment but Has anyone else received such an email? 

Me as well, I am now rather worried about the Dublo and APT that I’ve also got on with them. 

[rembrow]

34 minutes ago, D9001 said:

Very disappointed to have received an email from a well known Liverpool based retailer this morning saying that my money has been refunded for my Sun Castle because they are sold out; I must have been one of the first to order with them, immediately following the announcement of the Hornby A2/3 so how can they be sold out of it?  I have emailed back my disappointment but Has anyone else received such an email? 

I cancelled with this retailer after a similar issue I had with Thane of Fife and BR 4/6 wheel carriages. Re ordered only a month ago with Bure Valley Models and received Sun Castle today. I have cancelled my Hornby orders with the Liverpool retailer as I no longer have faith in their pre order system.

Bure Valley have since sold out of Sun Castle but have 9 Steady Aim in stock.

[Helmdon]

I’ve had a new variation on the theme where my pre-order has just been set back to pre-order in case they get any more, and the money they took the other day refunded...

 

Cancelled it and diverted (some of) the money to Derails for a couple of L&B coaches.

Edited March 11, 2021 by Helmdon

[B10M]

Hi all, 

 

I have an interesting addition to the saga... I pre-ordered mine with Colletts models and from what I understand, they had 22 of the a2/2's in from Hornby. I alerted them to the warping issues etc etc and so they decided to embark on checking them all out. A staggering 18 out of 22 of them were bad!

 

I'm very pleased to say that an almost perfect example arrived yesterday, the only issue that I can see is the scoop fitted the wrong way round. The running boards are straight and true, no hideous cab / firebox gap or missing / detached parts.

 

 

What I will say is that it initially run well but soon became very inconsistent. The pick-ups were swimming with oil yet the motor worm and gears were dry as a bone. All greased up now and running properly. 

 

 

 

 

 

I'll live with the milky green for now but sense a full repaint looming in the future. At this stage I'm toying with the idea of removing the smokebox dart for a brass one and removing the numberplate to pop one on the door strap instead... sadly part of the dart is moulded on the door so like the numberplate, it will need careful scribing.

[Daddyman]

36 minutes ago, B10M said:

Hi all, 

 

I have an interesting addition to the saga... I pre-ordered mine with Colletts models and from what I understand, they had 22 of the a2/2's in from Hornby. I alerted them to the warping issues etc etc and so they decided to embark on checking them all out. A staggering 18 out of 22 of them were bad!

 

I'm very pleased to say that an almost perfect example arrived yesterday, the only issue that I can see is the scoop fitted the wrong way round. The running boards are straight and true, no hideous cab / firebox gap or missing / detached parts.

 

 

What I will say is that it initially run well but soon became very inconsistent. The pick-ups were swimming with oil yet the motor worm and gears were dry as a bone. All greased up now and running properly. 

 

 

 

 

 

I'll live with the milky green for now but sense a full repaint looming in the future. At this stage I'm toying with the idea of removing the smokebox dart for a brass one and removing the numberplate to pop one on the door strap instead... sadly part of the dart is moulded on the door so like the numberplate, it will need careful scribing.

Well done for alerting them and well done to Collett's for sending them back - the more people tell Hornby this is unacceptable the better. I could buy one and repaint it but that would send Hornby the wrong message on what is acceptable for £170. My money has gone to PDK instead - and it's an A2/1, which is far prettier than the variants offered by Hornby anyway.  

[gordon s]

Anyone fitted a decoder into Sun Castle yet?

 

Of course it may be me, but I seem to have some spurious connections from the loco via the tender to the decoder. It worked perfectly well on DC, but there seems to be a crossover somewhere between the motor connections and the track connections. I have removed all the gubbins in the tender and hard wired the decoder to the miniature plug leads.

 

Just off the check it all again, but something appears to be awry somewhere in the wiring connections.

 

Wondered if anyone else had come across similar problems.

 

[Dominion]

Not fitted yet, but did test tender sockets (for both chip and  loco plug) and that wiring was all as I would expect on my A2/2s. Did not test the  wiring within the locos yet. The body comes on and off easily though.

[gordon s]

Thanks for that Dominion.

 

I think I have my first duff Zimo decoder....:-)

 

I've always used Zimo but having tested it on my ESU tester, it seems unable to recognise a DCC decoder is there. It's not blown as all the work has been done on the programming track. Not an issue as I can return it for replacement, but that should solve the issue.

 

I'm sure you saw it, but be careful removing the body as there is a speedo connection between the two.

[Silver Sidelines]

The sun is shining!  I wish the wind wasn't so cold.

 

Some pictures of Sun Castle.  It runs well and appears to be glued correctly - although I do wonder about the seam along the top of the boiler.

 

As to Thane of Fife, an interesting combination of screws and glue.  The footplate can be manipulated into a better shape and in my case the reversing rod benefited from straightening.  The rod should lie on top of the linkage and not be jammed behind as the case when delivered.

 

 

Cheers  Ray

 

Edited March 14, 2021 by Silver Sidelines

[D9001]

19 hours ago, landscapes said:

Hi

 

The smokebox door should come away from the smokebox as they are only glued in,  it it depends on just how much glue was applied.

 

I managed to remove the plain stove chimney on my A2/2 but the smokebox door is well and truly stuck on so I am just going to leave it in place.

 

Some others have complained that there model arrived with the smokebox door having fallen off.

 

Good luck.

 

Regards

 

David

Many thanks

[60027Merlin]

For those who will alter/add things beware that the glue Hornby use is not too strong.

 

If changing the bit of plastic on the buffer beam for a finer screw coupling even giving it a very gentle tug ends up with this!

 

This also happened on 60501 last month however a little run of super glue does the trick. The tender is the same and of course is more important if using the screw coupling for pulling rather than the Hornby one. The A3 and A4 locos certainly did not have this feature!

 

 

Edited March 11, 2021 by 60027Merlin

[Keith Turbutt]

I know the discussion has moved on to the A2/3s but I would like to share some good news. Having mentioned here that my A2/2 CoN was missing its fall plate, I contacted Hornby customer services to see if they could supply the missing part. I was not at all hopeful, but I got a prompt reply to say that they were awaiting spare parts and would be able to send me one in a few days.  The missing part arrived today. Well done Hornby!