Disappointing Hornby LMS 'Refridgerator Van'

[The Johnster]

Thanks for this info, Bernard; it seems particularly bonkers that a better chassis was fitted two years after the model was first introduced, but then the original rubbish one re-instated.  But that's Hornby for you.  It does seem that, once a mistake has been established, it is very hard to winkle it out of future production for H, and this goes back to Rovex days when a 'standard' Black Princess chassis block was used for pretty much everything steam excpect Nellie for the next 20 years; even the Jinty preserved it's axle spacing to use standard coupling rods, and there are fairly recent examples of 6-coupled chassis still using this axle spacing.  Similarly, shorty clerestories still have B1 bogies, for thus it is written...

 

Anyway, I've separated the body from the chassis, which will have the wheelsets salvaged and be given an exciting opporutnity of a new career in the landfill industry, and will probably remove the ice hatches (shame, they're nicely moulded with the chains well represented) and give it an undercoat of something brownish later today.

[petethemole]

The 'wooden' underframe that came with this van in some issues was a bit chunky, but correct for the van, with clasp brakes and a vacuum cylinder.  It was made of a soft plastic and came in two parts.  It was later used totally inappropriately, on some PO mineral wagons.

[BernardTPM]

37 minutes ago, Steamport Southport said:

Available before then though.

ISTR this one from 1982. 

 

http://www.hornbyguide.com/item_details.asp?itemid=201

 

https://www.hattons.co.uk/415486/hornby_r015canterbury_po_canterbury_lamb_van_pre_owned_imperfect_box/stockdetail.aspx

 

Jason

Oh, that's very odd! Looking back in the catalogues it was available in no less than three fictional Private Owner' liveries* before the authentic version appeared in 1984.

 

* Canterbury Lamb & Golden Shred 1982 and Wimpy 1983.

[Steamport Southport]

Yes. They came out after I had grown out of the garish Branded wagons and vans, and gone onto proper wagons from Mainline and Airfix*.

 

Still got a few older Hornby ones such as the KitKat, Weetabix, McVities, Kelloggs, etc. though. Wasn't just Hornby, I've got a handful of Lima ones such as Typhoo Tea.

 

At some point I might pick up some of the others just for fun. You can normally find them cheap at exhibitions.

 

 

*Yes, I know there are some inaccuracies

 

 

 

Jason

[Wickham Green too]

On 09/10/2021 at 17:42, 31A said:

..... I don't know how long  .....

Speaking of which, I seem to recall that there's an issue with length - I think they should only be 16'6'' long rather than 17'6'' .......  unfortunately the relevant volume of Tatlow has gone into hiding !

[The Johnster]

O lor, this is just getting worse and worse, now it's too long.  Whatever, I've got an undercoat, and topcoat of something not too far off the reddish LNER bauxite, on, and the ice doors have been removed from the roof, so the body is now awaiting transfers and a Parkside chassis before weathering and entering service.

 

[2750Papyrus]

17'.

 

I think I have one of these tucked away out of use because it looked too toy-like, but with a decent underframe I could live with a 2mm discrepancy.

[jwealleans]

I run mine on Grantham and no-one has ever commented on the extra length.

[1466]

I bought one of these 40 odd years ago and it came in a fictitious livery

I may be wrong , but I identified it as an ex Hull and Barnsley railway refrigerator van . My source was “ Historic Wagon Drawings in 4 mm Scale drawn by Mr. F. J. Roche “ published by Ian Allen . Mr. Roche’s drawings should be approached with some caution .

I substituted a 3H wooden under frame and bodged  some detailing  but it was 40 years ago!

The chassis was so sweet running that I used the van instead of a spirit level !

[Steamport Southport]

6 minutes ago, 1466 said:

I bought one of these 40 odd years ago and it came in a fictitious livery

I may be wrong , but I identified it as an ex Hull and Barnsley railway refrigerator van . My source was “ Historic Wagon Drawings in 4 mm Scale drawn by Mr. F. J. Roche “ published by Ian Allen . Mr. Roche’s drawings should be approached with some caution .

I substituted a 3H wooden under frame and bodged  some detailing  but it was 40 years ago!

The chassis was so sweet running that I used the van instead of a spirit level !

 

That's the other van they do. Normally with liveries such as KitKat, Weetabix and Prime Pork.

 

Previous thread here (and I think there are others)

 

 

 

Jason

[MyRule1]

On 09/10/2021 at 19:51, The Johnster said:

it seems that very few of these vans survived in the original form

This reply comes from memory as I cannot locate my original notes.

 

While doing some research, at what was then the Public Records Office,  into the railway served large cold stores built during WW2 I came across a government paper written in 1938/39 about food supplies when war came. It stated that nearly all the railways had modified their refrigerated vans as most frozen food that came into the country was consumed close to the docks or could be transported while still fresh. If war came and the convoy system of shipping was introduced, rather than ships arrived one by one in London etc, they would all arrive in Liverpool / Glasgow at the same time,. Thus frozen food for a month or more would need to be sent to the new cold stores. The paper then gave tables of the number of refrigerated vans in use and the number needed.  So it appears most vans in use after 1945 would have been modified in some way,

[micklner]

Have a look here

 

https://www.lner.info/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=2443&hilit=Hornby+hull+barnsley&start=690

[1466]

1 hour ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

That's the other van they do. Normally with liveries such as KitKat, Weetabix and Prime Pork.

 

Previous thread here (and I think there are others)

 

 

 

Jason

Thank you . I’ve read  the thread and it’s instructive ! 
ken 

[The Johnster]

Hornby make two LNER vans that are pretty toy-like, this NER van and a Hull and Barnsley looking version, ventilated but not TTBOMK refrigerated, the 'KitKat'.  Neither has much in the way of scale credentials and both suffer from generic, and poor, underframes.  The difference is easy to spot, even if you don't know which ficticious liveries each appeared in, as the NER van has end ladders and roof hatches for the ice, and the H & B has iron frames around the doors.

 

The proposed 10' Parkside chassis will not do as supplied, as the end stanchions will not fit over the buffer beams (discovered by lining up the NER van body against a Baccy LNER sliding door van, though I could probably remove a section from the middle of the solebars to reduce it's length.  I have a Baccy mineral wagon chassis knocking around spare that might be ok as a temporary measure, but is not really LNER/NER enough in appearance to cut the mustard.  Think I'll engage 'stoical patience' mode and wait for the Parky chassis, or investigate the possibility of a Hornby or Oxford wooden solebar donor chassis.  I doubt if I'll be happy with a steel solebar van long term...

[Wickham Green too]

1 hour ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

That's the other van they do. Normally with liveries such as KitKat, Weetabix and Prime Pork. .......

Mine was 'Fine Fish' - almost plausible for a Hull-based vehicle ....... but the pale blue plastic is now well hidden by body infils and paint ( Though I've yet to complete the refrigerator-white-showing-through-oxide weathering ).

[micklner]

Another one of mine, the modified H&BR version  .

 

[Black 5 Bear]

The 3 axle Palethorpes van has got to be in line  for a serious revamp to modern standards in the near future.

 

[Wickham Green too]

3 hours ago, Black 5 Bear said:

The 3 axle Palethorpes van has got to be in line  for a serious revamp to modern standards in the near future.

The prototype had the same chassis as a 'Stove R'  ........................ cue Dapol ! 

[2750Papyrus]

41 minutes ago, Wickham Green too said:

The prototype had the same chassis as a 'Stove R'  ........................ cue Dapol ! 

which is seriously in need of a revamp to help it round curves

[The Johnster]

In the meantime, there is the pending Five79 (Chivers) release of the chassis of their 6-wheeled LMS fish van as a separate kit.  I have one of these and am very happy with it, but the chassis is a cheat, a 4-wheeler with dummy centre wheels and no axle.  It is an acceptable cheat under most viewing situations, and needs close inspection to see that the dummy wheels are not real in practice.

 

Or Rue d'Etropal's 3D print under his Shapeways 'Recreation 21' label, just needs wheels and couplings (and paint, lining, transfers).  No idea how well this runs, but I'm thinking of buying one, in which case I'll use the Five79 dummy centre wheels dodge.

 

Anyway, back to the NER van, it is for the present sitting on a spare and somewhat modified Bachmann mineral wagon chassis, which it fits perfectly.  As a layout model, this is acceptable, but I'll be on the lookout for an upgrade as well.  Will be checking what I have suitable in the transfer box for it later.

[jwealleans]

I should see whether you can get a sight of the 3D print before you commit.  I was given one recently (an ECJS 6 wheel brake) and the finish was awful.  

 

Material and printing may have improved, I can't say, but if I'd paid for this (and Shapeways' criminal postage charges on top) I'd have been very disappointed.

 

I did away with the dummy centre wheel on my Chivers fish van and put an axle in a tube floating on the end of a piece of .45 wire.   It's worked well on exhibition layouts for years.

[The Stationmaster]

On 09/10/2021 at 16:27, John M Upton said:

Upwards of fifteen sheets for that pile of rubbish?

 

I have two 1980's vintage ones in a dusty box somewhere, one claims to be an SR van, the other a Wimpy - Home of the Hamburger promo example.

 

I am astounded this model is still being churned out...

Churned out for the simple reason that folk will buy it.  With many Hornby wagons it's a good idea to first check out their history before opening the wallet as they havea right mixture ranging from excellent modern tooling through ex Airfix to 'old Hornby' some of the latter being very nearly of Triang vintage at least in part.

[Wickham Green too]

1 hour ago, jwealleans said:

I should see whether you can get a sight of the 3D print before you commit.  I was given one recently (an ECJS 6 wheel brake) and the finish was awful.  

I bought a couple of coach bodies recently .............. the finish would be perfect for something that had been grounded as a bungalow and pebble-dashed ! 

( Some 3D printing offers you a choice of finishes - but not all ! )

[No Decorum]

48 minutes ago, Wickham Green too said:

I bought a couple of coach bodies recently .............. the finish would be perfect for something that had been grounded as a bungalow and pebble-dashed ! 

( Some 3D printing offers you a choice of finishes - but not all ! )

I’m veering to the view that 3D printing at its current stage of development fits the saying, “The miracle is not that it is done well but that it is done at all.”

[The Johnster]

4 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

With many Hornby wagons it's a good idea to first check out their history before opening the wallet

Preaching to the (recently) converted, Mike; being burned once is unfortunate but allowing oneself to be burned twice would be stupid, even by my standards!  I got burned with a Bachmann cattle wagon as well, a firm I think of as reliable when it comes to detail and scale...

 

I believe I am correct in saying that nobody makes an accurate RTR GW 5 plank wagon other than china clay hoods, which I find astonishing!  Hornby and Dapol still have wagons with moulded handbrake levers and brake blocks out of line with the wheels, toolings that are 40 or 50 years old, and the shortie clerestories, don't get me started...

 

4 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

I bought a couple of coach bodies recently .............. the finish would be perfect for something that had been grounded as a bungalow and pebble-dashed ! 

( Some 3D printing offers you a choice of finishes - but not all ! )

 

You have a very good point, sir, and Shapeways' marketing, which is the only game in town that is an alternative to buying direct from the printer like Modelu, is not helping, rather it is IMHO holding the cause back.  When 3D printing first came on the  scene it was touted as a method by which we would all be able to buy a home printer for about the price of a washing machine and produce free accurate finescale components on it at will.  This never happened; there are domestic machines but they are only capable of small items with questionable finishes.  You get the finish that the designer specifies, and in some cases as has been noted you can order different grades of finish at different prices, the finer the finish the higher the price because more material is used and the process takes longer.

 

I am very happy with the finish of items I have had from Modelu, lamps, loco details, drivers, firemen, and also have some coach bogies from Stafford Road Works on Shapeways.  These are fine for my purposes, and paint up well as bogies in service and covered in muck, but the finish is not good enough for finescale modelling of items in ex-works or museum condition.  I've also had, via Shapeways, some instanter couplings from Sam's Trains, not the video guy but a designer in the US, and these are excellent, a very fine finish and including the 'horns' that are there to enable the shunter to change the coupling from long to short position or vice versa with a shunting pole.  They fit into NEM  pockets and look superb, but are only available in the short position, but are a little brittle and I would not advise them for layouts with sharp curvature; he also does 3-link.

 

This is hardly a comprehensive review of 3D printed model railway items, but even with my limited exposure to the products it is easy to see that the there is very considerable variety in the quality of the finish and the material actually used.  I have no actual experience of items as big as coach bodies, but am thinking about getting one of Simon Dawson's (Rue d'Etropal of this very parish as ever was) Recreation 21 Stove Rs.  3D prints are not cheap, especially if they come via Shapeways, which is a good idea in principle but is in practice mired in a morass of uncompetitively priced items made more expensive still by Brexit and the use of arguably the worst, least efficient, slowest, and most overpriced delivery service on the planet, the one with the brown windsor soup liveried vans.

 

If you've got nothing better to do with your time, and if this is the case your life needs serious examination, trawling through Shapeways website for railway items will show a huge amount and variety of stuff out there.  A lot of it is frankly rubbish IMHO, though harmless, generic or freestyle/ficticious/freelance, 'old tyme' coaches, 'mini' versions of deisel locos that look as if they are the febrile imaginings of a narrow gauge railway that wanted to build cut down version of standard gauge locos to appease the tourists. 

 

I wonder how much of this catalogue has ever actually been produced, ever, anywhere...  Sometimes you get a photo of a finished and painted model, but the bulk of the stuff is shown as a drawing of what the designer hopes it would look like if it were ever printed up, and this can be rotated with your mouse to show different aspects of the product.  I like Simon's approach; he goes for left field niche products such as Bermudian Railways which is what I think 3D printing is ideal for, short 'to order' production runs that cannot be sourced elsewhere, and stuff which he probably sees as demand not catered for by RTR, like Class 120 dmu bodyshells or LSWR corridor stock.  Another strength of 3D printing is that it can be produced in any scale you like so long as the printer is physically big enough, though Shapeways manage turn this into a weakness on  their already inpenetrable website by listing products in all scales separately, which is confusing.

 

And it isn't cheap.  I'm pretty sure Simon, for example, isn't on the verge of millionairedom for his efforts, but a bogie coach bodyshell comes in at around £60-80, some more expensive; the Stove R we have been discussing is £47 IIRC.  These are bare bodyshells, sides, ends, and roof, including panelling where appropriate, buffers, and roofs and ventilators, but they are scratchbuilding aids not complete models, and a fair bit of expense and work is involved in finishing one off.  You need and underframe, wheels, couplings of your choice, paint, a floor, interior detail, handrails, door handles, grab rails, hinges, and glazing, so the actual cost of a bogie coach after the Brexit tax and delivery are factored in is probably far enough north of £100 for you to see polar bears.  The Stove R has underframe detail incorporated so is slightly better value, but I reckon £60-70 to complete.

 

That's a shame, and even if the stuff was printed and sold direct like Modelus',  it is not really competitve price wise with RTR or with the likes of Comet or Roxey kits.  This cost factor and it's worsening by Shapeways is holding development of the technology as applied to model railways back, and it has it's value in providing items not available in any other form.