Dapol non-corridor suburban coaches

[GWR-fan]

I recently took advantage of an offer from a store on a set of three of these coaches.  I added a  fourth car to the order.  This is not a reflection on the dealer as the goods were expertly packaged.  If you ignore the pathetically inadequate manufacturer packaging,  the  loose broken off vents and couplers in the box and the loose wheels floating around in the box then these are actually quite a nice coach.  Even the stock Dapol plastic wheels are too narrow for the bogies at the non-coupler end and were either loose in the packaging or fell off as soon as the coach was removed from the packaging.   I purchased a BR carmine pack and really do like them, setting aside the damage caused by the poor manufacturer packaging.   Considering the vintage of the tooling  the carmine livery does look quite stunning on these coaches.  Now if only Dapol took a little more care in the packaging design.

 

As regards replacement wheels,  I gently squeezed the bogie sideframes at the non-coupler end axleboxes taking care not to break the stretcher that connects the sideframes.  Bachmann metal wheels were then inserted.  The cars were then tested and ran very well.

[GWR_Modeller]

Hi,

I am an n gauge modeller and in my experience I found the packageing used by Dapol, Farish and Peco on their n gauge locos, coaches and wagons to be more than adequate.  Dapol coaches in this scale are very tightly packed and care is required to remove them from the foam surround.  In some cases the packageing seems excessively robust and perhaps contributes too much to the cost of cheaper models.  On the other hand I do see that for some customers models will have to travel several thousand miles in various postal systems so the manufacturers have to take that into account.

[GWR-fan]

I can assure you that the non-corridor coach packaging on the OO scale coaches is totally inadequate,  consisting of an ill fitting piece of thin cardboard inside a very flimsy outer packaging.