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Hornby 2021 - Hornby Dublo 2 rail


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The original streamlined form of Sir William Stanier’s Princess Coronation class arose from tests by the London Midland Scottish Railway’s Research Department on Stanier’s development of the Princess Royal class locomotives. Stanier was said to be ambivalent about the economic value of streamlining but was aware of the publicity value of such a design. When the opportunity to produce five conventional versions of the Coronation Pacific as a comparison to the streamlined version arose, Stanier was quoted as saying, “They can have their streamliners if they want them, but we will also build them five proper ones”.


Those first five conventional locomotives were 6230 Duchess of Buccleuch to 6234 Duchess of Abercorn and colloquially they were known as Duchesses, after the first of this sub-class. Appearing in 1938 with a single chimney and without smoke deflectors, it is this form that many purists regard as the finest Pacific locomotive produced. The next four Duchesses to appear were 6249-6252 in 1944 and they emerged from works with a double chimney. Originally ordered as streamlined, the demands of maintaining the streamlined form exceeded the cost savings in coal and so they emerged from works without the casing, but with streamlined tenders (which had been completed before that decision was taken). In 1946 the next three Duchesses, 6253-6255, differed in appearance again, this time the curved fall plate at the front was replaced by a split platform and smoke deflectors were fitted. The final ‘as new’ produced Duchesses were 6256 and 46257 (as City of Salford entered service straight into British Railways’ ownership) and these were designs modified by H.G Ivatt, featuring a different cab, pony truck, reversing gear and roller bearings.


The process of de-streamlining (or ‘defrocking’ as the fitters referred to it) the remaining engines began with 6235 City of Birmingham in April 1946 and finished with 6243 City of Lancaster in May 1949. Because the smokeboxes were angled down between the chimney and door to accommodate the sweep of the streamlined casing, upon defrocking they retained this look, being referred to as semi-streamlined by enthusiasts of the time. Eventually the raked smokeboxes were replaced with conventional smokeboxes, so that by late 1958 the majority of the fleet showed a similar appearance, although all the defrocked locomotives had the split platform ‘utility’ front end.


Withdrawal of the class commenced in December 1962 and by October 1964 all had been withdrawn. Fortunately, three locomotives were saved for preservation; 6229 Duchess of Hamilton, 6233 Duchess of Sutherland and 6235 City of Birmingham.


46252 City of Leicester was built at Crewe and entered service at the end of June 1944, the locomotive being built to Stanier’s conventional design with a double chimney, although the smoke deflectors were not fitted until March 1945, and it was one of the ‘Duchesses’ that were briefly coupled with streamlined tenders from new. On 18 November 1951 the locomotive was involved in a major crash at Polesworth, near Tamworth, when owing to the failure of a signal at another box, the train had to be diverted from the fast line to the slow line. The driver did not notice the signals set to ‘Caution’ and was too late in applying the brakes, resulting in eight coaches being derailed and the locomotive being badly damaged.

 

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Conceived in 1937 when Bulleid became CME of the Southern Railway, his vision was for a 4-6-2 fast mixed traffic engine, with quick acceleration and equally capable of hauling services such as the Golden Arrow and Atlantic Coast Expresses, or freight workings, to a speed of around 75mph. Mainly designed from the Brighton Works, under C.S Cocks, Bulleid ensured that the best design practices of the time were applied, though this did not stop him making many alterations as the plans developed, sometimes within hours of agreeing a phase of the design and which led to each batch of engines incorporating modifications which were then applied to the previous batch.

 

Opting for a very high pressure boiler, Bulleid was able to make the 3 equally sized cylinders smaller, at 18” and better balanced, resulting in his newly designed Bulleid Firth Brown 6’ 2” driving wheels, which in turn reduced hammer blow to the rails. In 1934, Bulleid had opposed the use of streamlining, but for the Merchant Navy design it suited his purposes, being easy to clean mechanically and hiding the boiler’s external pipes, which in turn meant they could be run for function, rather than aesthetics.

 

Despite the onset of war in 1939, Bulleid’s design was accepted by the wartime Railway’s Executive Committee and production commenced through November 1940 at Eastleigh Works, the first loco, 21C1 Channel Packet, being named on March 10, 1941.

 

21C16 was built by Southern Railway in 1945. ‘Elders Fyffes’ was named after the UK banana importer Elders & Fyffes limited who had a fleet of specially designed boats used to transport bananas across the Atlantic while keeping them fresh. At the formation of British Rail, the locomotive was renumbered 35016. The locomotive was rebuilt at Eastleigh in April 1957 and continued to serve BR until August 1965.

 

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Officially, the Merchant Navy locomotives were constructed in three batches: 1068 which covered 21C1 to 21C10, 1189 which covered 21C11 to 21C20 and 3393 which covered 21C21 to 21C30, but 21C2 incorporated lessons learnt from 21C1, which in turn meant 21C3-10 incorporated lessons learnt from running the first two.

 

21C11 ‘General Steam Navigation’ entered service in December 1944 in wartime black livery. The naming ceremony took place in February 1945 at Waterloo Station where she was named by the Chairman of the General Steam Navigation Company. 21C11 was initially allocated to the Nine Elms shed but was also allocated to Bournemouth and Exmouth Junction.

 

Upon nationalisation, ‘General Steam Navigation’ was re-numbered to 35011. As with all members of the class, in 1959 35011 was rebuilt without air-smoothed casing and with conventional valve gear among the many changes made, remaining in service until 1966 before being sold to Woodhams Brothers in Barry in March 1967. 

 

In 1983 No. 35011 left Barry having been saved for preservation, being stored in various locations before being transferred to the General Steam Navigation Locomotive Restoration Society in 2016 who aim to restore the locomotive to an original air-smoothed condition. 
 

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Oh dear I wasn’t going to buy anymore Princess Coronation unless the King George V or City of Leicester was produced. there goes my savings 

Edited by farren
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42 minutes ago, Black Marlin said:

Is there an explanation somewhere of what differentiates the Hornby Dublo range from the main Hornby range?

Limited Edition in a Hornby Dublo box.

The loco body is diecast, rather than plastic.

 

The Duchess made last year was fully detailed, a fantastic model, and a bit heavier than the average. The paint finish on metal looks more authentic to the eye than plastic.

 

 

Edited by adb968008
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Can I wish list the bath tub duchess in blue for 2022 to go with the coronation coaches :-)

 

its all too much for Derails website today, so ive emailed him my pre-order for these in... 

 

Edited by adb968008
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Well I thought Die cast would appear in some form . Didn't consider a Merchant Navy though , I thought Castle , A4, 8F more likely as true Hornby Dublo models .  I'm still puzzled by only 500 of each though . Admittedly thats now 1000 Duchesses , taking into account the Abercorn and 1000 MNs as there are two types , but the economics are fascinating that they can make money on such limited runs of diecast . I know its only the loco body , and that the chassis tender etc is standard model , but even so its interesting . 

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Ace Trains, purveyors of coarse-scale 0 having been making the economics of diecast locos work on very small batch-sizes for c20 years now. I’m not sure how, but I believe the Chinese have technology that brings diecasting tooling costs down dramatically compared with the past. 
 

Here’s my Ace ‘Hurricane’, which is c10 years old now. Giant Hornby Dublo!

 

 

6417120C-4F51-4D52-BE25-F73C804C3518.jpeg

Edited by Nearholmer
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I am ridiculously tempted by City of Leicester and the Bulleid MN, given that I don't have a 4mm layout. I don't know whether it's fondness for the prototype or nostalgia for the Hornby-Dublo boxes that is doing this to me. 

Edited by Poggy1165
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18 minutes ago, Nearholmer said:

Yes, Dublo deserves that tribute. Does make the way they trampled the Bassett Lowke name last year seem even more crass than it did at the time though, if that's possible.

Noticeable that “Bassett Lowke” “steampunk” doesn’t seem to appear anywhere in the 2021 plans (unless the news is buried somewhere?). Looks like that initiative may not have taken off.

 

RT

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Pity Hornby aren't doing GSN in slightly later condition with the cut-down 5100g tender used on some of their rebuilt MNs. I have a spare tender body, but the loco's a bit expensive for a repainting project.

 

Dunno, though, there's not much else I'll be splashing out on....

 

John

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4 hours ago, Legend said:

Well I thought Die cast would appear in some form . Didn't consider a Merchant Navy though , I thought Castle , A4, 8F more likely as true Hornby Dublo models .  I'm still puzzled by only 500 of each though . Admittedly thats now 1000 Duchesses , taking into account the Abercorn and 1000 MNs as there are two types , but the economics are fascinating that they can make money on such limited runs of diecast . I know its only the loco body , and that the chassis tender etc is standard model , but even so its interesting . 

According to 'World of Railways' these have an RRP of £264.99 each so that might make the economics a good bit better on a run of 500.  if we assume a trade discount of 20% for retailers that means that Hornby is getting c.£212 through its door for every one it sells via the retail trade and of course a percentage of them will in any event be sold direct.  Even after you deduct the VAT you are looking at something around £170 in gross revenue per loco so c.£85,000 in gross earnings.  For the MNs the tooling cost is spread of 1,000 models if there are 500 of each and the Duchess uses tooling previously developed.

 

So overall they should bring in something over a quarter of a million £s from sales.  That will look good in the accounts assuming the market will take all of them at that sort of price.  But what we don't know is how much they will have cost to tool.  However as highly detail die casting of small components for the automotive industry is now apparently commonplace in China (Kader, among others, have a factory in that market area) perhaps any additional tooling cost for diecast might not be much of an imposotion?   And in the case of these models there is effectively no wider R&D cost because that bit had been done previously for earlier models.

 

Presumably Hornby think they will be able to sell these and of course they succeeded last year with the 'Duchess' but that was very definitely a nostalgia trip.    I grew up with Hornby Dublo and my first loco was a 'Duchess of Atholl' but I wasn't even tempted to buy one of those last year, and I'm no more tempted to buy one of these this year - but Hornby obviously think other folk will be.   With these new models, particularly the two MNs we are not looking at Hornby Dublo nostalgia in the same way as last year so do they have enough, at the asking price, to develop what appears to be a premium brand label?   Only time, and Hornby's Annual Report, will answer that.  

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28 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

Just a thought, shouldn't the Malachite MN still have the fairings in front of the cylinders?

 

John

If you watch the YouTube video in Andy's original post, they seem to miraculously appear at about 2:00 in...

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4 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

I’m not sure how, but I believe the Chinese have technology that brings diecasting tooling costs down dramatically compared with the past.

I believe that Ace Trains and Darstaed primarily manufacture in the Czech Republic and Thailand. Also judging by the prices their way of making back the tooling costs is just to jack up the unit price - an approach that Hornby seems to be taking here. Of course Hornby can reduce the price further if these are like the anniversary Atholl and just have a newly tooled bodyshell, with chassis, detailing, and tender reusing the tooling from the standard range model.

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Ace now manufacture in China for the bigger locos containing large diecast components, and use ETS in the Czech Repulic for smaller locos, which are largely sheet-metal, with a few smaller cast components.

 

As to their unit prices, they are on a par with makers of mass-produced fine-scale 0, for a different product (all metal, rather than at least partly plastic; a lot less separate detailing), and their batch sizes tend to be very small (its a small market), so maybe 25 (I didn't miss any zeros off) locos in a particular livery, and maybe 200 overall of a particular loco type, often with things like tender and cab variants within that. So "jacking up" isn't really an appropriate term in that context - there simply aren't many units to spread the costs over. 

 

If you want to get you head round it, compare the Ace and Heljan 43XX moguls - chalk and cheese, but pretty much the same price. The customers for one would never buy the other, because they value different things.

 

 

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