New OO gauge Class 73

[Derekstuart]

Hello Jim

 

You make some interesting comments, which I agree with.

 

I know that the 24/25 from Bachmann has errors in it- and when these are pointed out, they are quite substantial. However, they don't really bother me as such as they look like how I remember them. The same applies to Lima's much derided 37- I know this to be technically even less accurate, but aside from the easily cured ride height, they look how I remember them.

 

I am much less forgiving over Bachmann's 47 and Hornby's HST's as these are classes that I am more familiar with- raised mould lines are just not right on a model costing well over £200.

 

I regularly get criticised for saying it, but with older models what they lack in high definition parts, they make up for in getting the basic shape right. Though I agree with you that this 73 looks pretty good to me- certainly no more errors than Bachmann or Hornby.

[martin_l_jones]

So, summarising to date, ignoring the lemon yellow warning panels which are relatively easy to fix, the green JA and the GBRF JB models seem to be the best for accuracy, livery-wise. All would appear to have the faulty PCB design, though.

 

I would add that on my early blue example, I also noted that the warning panels seem to be a little too wide and go right to the front corners of the cab, where they should stop a millimetre or so inboard of the corners - see the photo I posted against the Lima model earlier. Again, I can live with the livery errors on this particular model as they re not too obvious, but I have heard absolutely nothing from Dapol regarding fixing the PCB design under warranty (it is a manufacturing defect, after all), in spite of two emails direct to them through their website.

 

Come on Dapol, if any of your representatives read this forum, get your act together and communicate with us ... properly.

 

 

This is what came back when i asked the question:-

 

Unfortunately the problem hasn't been rectified. All have a major fault when converted to DCC. The DCC socket is upside down so when fitted with a chip the lights are on the wrong end and the loco runs the wrong way. To fix this you need to swap the wires running to the motor but this only works for DC, if you do this and convert it back to analogue it will run backwards with the lights on the back.

There is a fix where you need to change the addresses on your controller, the instructions to change these should be in the instruction manual.

Standard decoders:

CV49 from 0 to 16

CV50 from 16 to 0

ESU sound decoders:

This needs to be done via a lokprogrammer and computer under the following options:

Read the decoder (red arrow) > Decoder > Function mapping > Change “front light 1” to “Rear light 1”, “Rear light 1” to “Front light 1” > Write changes to the decoder (green arrow)

 

I don't have any worries about doing this, however you would think for customer satisfaction the models would be withheld and corrected first...

My question is do you need to do both, or just correct the CV's if running in DCC ?

Edited January 1, 2016 by martin_l_jones

[JSpencer]

This is what came back when i asked the question:-

 

Unfortunately the problem hasn't been rectified. All have a major fault when converted to DCC. The DCC socket is upside down so when fitted with a chip the lights are on the wrong end and the loco runs the wrong way. To fix this you need to swap the wires running to the motor but this only works for DC, if you do this and convert it back to analogue it will run backwards with the lights on the back.

There is a fix where you need to change the addresses on your controller, the instructions to change these should be in the instruction manual.

Standard decoders:

CV49 from 0 to 16

CV50 from 16 to 0

ESU sound decoders:

This needs to be done via a lokprogrammer and computer under the following options:

Read the decoder (red arrow) > Decoder > Function mapping > Change “front light 1” to “Rear light 1”, “Rear light 1” to “Front light 1” > Write changes to the decoder (green arrow)

 

I don't have any worries about doing this, however you would think for customer satisfaction the models would be withheld and corrected first...

My question is do you need to do both, or just correct the CV's if running in DCC ?

It is easier and quicker to switch over some values rather than me sending the entire loco back, them stripping the model apart and redoing all the PCB boards.

[Butler Henderson]

Hattons have listed

OLIV001 Dapol Class 73 207 In Gatwick Express Livery - Olivia’s Exclusive £140 More than 10 in stock

OLIV002 Dapol Class 73 205 “Jeanette” In GBRf Livery - Olivia’s Exclusive £140 More than 10 in stock

OLIV003 Dapol Class 73 141 “Charlotte” In First GBRf Livery - Olivia’s Exclusive £140 More than 10 in stock

[newbryford]

 

Hattons have listed

OLIV001 Dapol Class 73 207 In Gatwick Express Livery - Olivia’s Exclusive £140 More than 10 in stock

OLIV002 Dapol Class 73 205 “Jeanette” In GBRf Livery - Olivia’s Exclusive £140 More than 10 in stock

OLIV003 Dapol Class 73 141 “Charlotte” In First GBRf Livery - Olivia’s Exclusive £140 More than 10 in stock

 

 

So an Olivia's Exclusive isn't actually exclusive to Olivia's......?

 

Cheers,

Mick

[37081LochLong]

So an Olivia's Exclusive isn't actually exclusive to Olivia's......?

 

Cheers,

Mick

Olivias, Hattons and R3Sprays seem to have a deal to sell each other's commission colour ways (Hattons sound locos are fitted with olivias sound) Edited January 2, 2016 by 37081LochLong

[Gwiwer]

Such things do happen.

 

An "Exclusive" commission is commissioned exclusively by one source, usually a retailer, and often only available from them.  But commercial arrangements do sometimes exist for those items to be made available elsewhere for reasons we are not privy to here.

 

As further recent examples let's recall that Kernow MRC commissioned the Beattie well-tanks (also available in small numbers from the Bodmin & Wenford Railways shop) and the Adams O2 (also available from the IOWSR shop at Havenstreet).  It doesn't take a lot of thinking to understand why in those cases.

[Oldddudders]

He he...!

.except when the compressor kicked in, waking me up!

 

Jim

Was that the shrill sound of the high-speed exhauster?

[Tony Walker]

Mark, I agree with you on this (Mark201 comment 751). I've got civil 73138 and GBRF 73206 and messed around yesterday with both, using Lenz Silver decoders. Whatever I did I couldn't get either of them to run properly. In the end I swapped over both decoders for Hornby Sapphire and it fixed the problem. Both Silver decoder are running Ok in the locos I swapped them with, so it's not the decoders that are at fault. Tony.

Edited January 2, 2016 by Tony Walker

[Ian Hargrave]

Such things do happen.

 

An "Exclusive" commission is commissioned exclusively by one source, usually a retailer, and often only available from them.  But commercial arrangements do sometimes exist for those items to be made available elsewhere for reasons we are not privy to here.

 

As further recent examples let's recall that Kernow MRC commissioned the Beattie well-tanks (also available in small numbers from the Bodmin & Wenford Railways shop) and the Adams O2 (also available from the IOWSR shop at Havenstreet).  It doesn't take a lot of thinking to understand why in those cases.

A similar case of mutually beneficial arrangements occurred with the Hattons Heljan Beyer-G model. Olivia's were selling these some time back.I believe that is no longer the case due to certain recurring "problems" with that model.

[dibber25]

Has anyone fitted the tension-lock couplers supplied with this model? I'd be interested in your comments. (CJL)

[Tim Hall]

A similar case of mutually beneficial arrangements occurred with the Hattons Heljan Beyer-G model. Olivia's were selling these some time back.I believe that is no longer the case due to certain recurring "problems" with that model.

Lord and Butler were also selling BGs for a while. Don't know if they sold them all or stopped for any other reason though.

[3rd Rail Exile]

Has anyone fitted the tension-lock couplers supplied with this model? I'd be interested in your comments. (CJL)

 

First thing I had to do (as mentioned by others earlier in the thread) was remove the coupling hook and re-fit it from the correct side. 

 

Once I'd done that and actually fitted the couplings into the NEM pockets I didn't think they quite clicked "home" positively (bogie frame prevents them going any further back) and they look to protrude an awfully long way forward...  Couplings with shorter mountings might be an idea if I can find some... 

 

And whilst investigating this, I just happened to notice the plating flaking off of the tread of one of the wheels - looks horribly brass-like underneath...

[47606odin]

First thing I had to do (as mentioned by others earlier in the thread) was remove the coupling hook and re-fit it from the correct side. 

 

Once I'd done that and actually fitted the couplings into the NEM pockets I didn't think they quite clicked "home" positively (bogie frame prevents them going any further back) and they look to protrude an awfully long way forward...  Couplings with shorter mountings might be an idea if I can find some... 

 

And whilst investigating this, I just happened to notice the plating flaking off of the tread of one of the wheels - looks horribly brass-like underneath...

oh no, not something else to worry about!

[black and decker boy]

I'm taking heart from this. My budget has been hit hard with an SLW 24, a Bachmann blue 40 and other items. The 73 was high on my list but I can now relax, wait for batch 2 or 3 or 4 when problems are sorted and then buy.

Maybe I need to remember a rule from a colleague 20 years ago to avoid buying the first batch of any new car model as they were always plagued with faults.

Not sure what that does for Dapol going forward mind.

Edited January 3, 2016 by Andy Y
Removal of reference to other party as irrelevant

[ChrisB]

First thing I had to do (as mentioned by others earlier in the thread) was remove the coupling hook and re-fit it from the correct side. 

 

Once I'd done that and actually fitted the couplings into the NEM pockets I didn't think they quite clicked "home" positively (bogie frame prevents them going any further back) and they look to protrude an awfully long way forward...  Couplings with shorter mountings might be an idea if I can find some... 

 

And whilst investigating this, I just happened to notice the plating flaking off of the tread of one of the wheels - looks horribly brass-like underneath...

 

....and they sit too low.

[Andrew F]

....and they sit too low.

 

Someone questioned this earlier in the thread.

 

Having a mess on someones layout with Hornby/Lima 73's; they seemed tiny, almost HO scale compared to the stock.   Just how low are 73's?

[James90012]

Hmm

 

I concede my devil's advocate comment from earlier - we should really now vote with our feet and not accept the Dapol 73 as supplied. If you're willing to do work that's great but I don't want to buy a £140 sub par model when both Hornby and Bachmann retail less than that.

[Gwiwer]

Has anyone fitted the tension-lock couplers supplied with this model? I'd be interested in your comments. (CJL)

 

As I mentioned somewhat earlier I discovered my couplers had been wrongly assembled.  They plug in just fine and stay in when hauling a train but the arms dropped off because the loop unit was upside down!  A QC / assembly issue also reported by others.

 

I didn't faff about refitting the arms; I removed Dapol's couplers and fitted a pair of spare Hornby ones from stock.  They work.  They are assembled correctly.  And they sit about 1mm higher than the supplied ones therefore don't need the vertical part of the arm trimmed with Xuron cutters when it's found to foul cross-rails and other objects in the four-foot.  That latter problem afflicts other Dapol items as well notably the "silver bullet" wagons all of which required the coupler bar clipped by the tiniest possible amount to avoid fouling due to hanging low.

 

With the tension-locks fitted the pipework and dummy coupler cannot be used.  The coupler fouls everything.  I managed to fit the outer half of the low-level MU control jumpers and prove they were clear of coupler swing only for them to clip something else at some point and be torn out.  Without damage, it must be said, but frustrating all the same.

 

I have had no problems with swing, buffer locking or drag-offs but have not attempted a closer coupling method.

[47606odin]

Someone questioned this earlier in the thread.

 

Having a mess on someones layout with Hornby/Lima 73's; they seemed tiny, almost HO scale compared to the stock.   Just how low are 73's?

i think its the coupling that is too low is the point

[Phil Mc]

Got the GBRf one yesterday, it ran worse than the Blue one I already have !! Not only stalling on pointwork but randomly on curves too.

I cleaned the chemical blackening off the wheels (with track cleaner on cotton buds,) a spot of electrolube in each wheel bearing, and away she went.

Got consistently better during the running-in period too. :)

(Now all I've got to do is renumber it, one of them has got the same name as my Mrs!)

 

Cheers,

Phil.

[JSpencer]

So, summarising to date, ignoring the lemon yellow warning panels which are relatively easy to fix, the green JA and the GBRF JB models seem to be the best for accuracy, livery-wise. All would appear to have the faulty PCB design, though.

I would add that on my early blue example, I also noted that the warning panels seem to be a little too wide and go right to the front corners of the cab, where they should stop a millimetre or so inboard of the corners - see the photo I posted against the Lima model earlier. Again, I can live with the livery errors on this particular model as they re not too obvious, but I have heard absolutely nothing from Dapol regarding fixing the PCB design under warranty (it is a manufacturing defect, after all), in spite of two emails direct to them through their website.

Come on Dapol, if any of your representatives read this forum, get your act together and communicate with us ... properly.

 

FWIW the green JA does not have yellow warning panels.

[St. Simon]

Hi,

 

I cancelled my preorder for the GBRF one last Sunday because of the comments on here, and I have to say now that I'm regretting that decision.

 

For me, the livery errors don't concern me what so ever, it'll probably be weathered anyway, nor are the bits falling off, they are easily fixed back on and the buffers can be straightened.

 

The reason for my decision, the running issues that some have experienced (not the DCC socket issues), although reading through the past couple of days, I've noticed that there seem to be two main problems for these issues, firstly, the use of Lens Decoders in the locos, whilst the other seems to be th chemical blackening on the wheels, does this seem to corolate to people's experiences?

 

If so, it seems that these can be easily fixed and I'm willing to order again to get beautifully detailed loco. After all, prices on the Hornby ones are growing on EBay, so you'll have to pay a lot to get a 73 anyway.

 

Simon

Edited January 3, 2016 by St. Simon

[griffgriff]

When do these things start developing chassis rot

[DRS Crewe On A Mission]

From reading previous pages I can see that Dapol have not responded to there emails regarding the Class 73 models.

 

I have also experienced this when asking a few questions about the Class 68s which are due for release soon. I sent an email and had no reply whatsoever.

 

From my point of view that is not good business practice.

 

I was only asking what lighting the Class 68s are going to have fitted. If it will be directional lighting only or cab lighting as well. Due to the lack of response I don't know what lighting they are going to have fitted so I can't share with anyone else.

 

When you are planning on buying at least four of the new Dapol Class 68s out of the six available which totals up to nearly £500 a quick email back would be appreciated.

 

This tells me that it's not just Dapol's practice in the factory and the manufacturing process that needs to be improved but also the customer service towards there customers.

 

Just a comparison when you email Bachmann you receive a reply back within one to two working days which answers all of your questions asked and everyone is more than helpful.