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Farish mk2F coaches


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  • 5 months later...
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Five years later they've finally arrived in the shops - or at least the blue/grey FO and SO have.

 

They look smart, run well and come with an instruction sheet for the detailing bits. No close coupling mechanism though which is a bit disappointing.

 

Steven B.

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36 minutes ago, Steven B said:

Five years later they've finally arrived in the shops - or at least the blue/grey FO and SO have.

 

No close coupling mechanism though which is a bit disappointing.

 

Steven B.

 

The coupling is on the bogie but couples as close as a MK1. Its also approximately the same height as their Mk1 unlike the MK2a. :clapping_mini:

 

The B/G FO and TSO are ER examples, great for me running with Deltics and 47/4s but not with the upcoming BSO which only went to the LMR.

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3 minutes ago, Bomag said:

 

The coupling is on the bogie but couples as close as a MK1. Its also approximately the same height as their Mk1 unlike the MK2a. :clapping_mini:

 

The B/G FO and TSO are ER examples, great for me running with Deltics and 47/4s but not with the upcoming BSO which only went to the LMR.

Hallo,

Are you able to upload a pic or two of them coupled? Wonder how they are around curves.

Thank you in advance

es grüßt 

pc

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1 hour ago, Padishar Creel said:

Hallo,

Are you able to upload a pic or two of them coupled? Wonder how they are around curves.

Thank you in advance

es grüßt 

pc

Hi PC,

They come with very short spare NEM couplers. You can replace those fitted with the shorter couplings to bring the carriages closer together, it is possibe to have a standard and short or short and short depending upon the severity of the curves on your layout. My 7 coaches arrived today, just need some detail painting and weathering then they will be good to go.

Cheers

Duncan

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3 minutes ago, Duncan. said:

Hi PC,

They come with very short spare NEM couplers. You can replace those fitted with the shorter couplings to bring the carriages closer together, it is possibe to have a standard and short or short and short depending upon the severity of the curves on your layout. My 7 coaches arrived today, just need some detail painting and weathering then they will be good to go.

Cheers

Duncan

Thanks Duncan.

I also use SpurNeun couplings which have a length between the Farish standard and the Farish short, so can mix and match to suit.

I wonder why the decision to not have a close coupling mechanism. Seems a backward step. The MK1s really are their best.

es grüßt 

pc

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You would think that after seven years of gestation that they could manage to design them with kinematic close-coupling.... feels like a very retrograde step....

 

On the other hand, if they have sorted out the overall height issue, that is great!.... looking at the photos online, I can’t help but feel they’ve just achieved this with a rather large gap between the bogies and coach body - there is a lot of clear daylight in side-on shots (RoS photos, for example)....

 

That said, the glazing tint looks good; not too dark - I had been worried about that. Anyway, I’m only in for the blue-grey RFB (as preserved), which isn’t here yet, so I’ll reserve final judgement for when I have my hands on that!

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I've now spent a bit more time with my pair of Blue/grey SO. The extra detailing on the underframe, ends etc is very nice, the livery is well applied but to be honest, without the close coupling mechanism I don't think they're that much better than one of the Chinese produced models made using the Poole era tooling.

 

That said, they're better than Poole produced ones and so my Intercity liveried rakes will still probably get upgraded but I'll be thinking twice about it where as upgrading my Mk1 based rakes was a no-brainer.

 

Steven B.

Edited by Steven B
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1 hour ago, Steven B said:

I've now spent a bit more time with my pair of Blue/grey SO. The extra detailing on the underframe, ends etc is very nice, the livery is well applied but to be honest, without the close coupling mechanism I don't think they're that much better than one of the Chinese produced models made using the Poole era tooling.

That's quite a sad outcome - I had a rake of the Chinese versions and I remember the announcement of the new ones and thought I wonder if they really will be that great an improvement - a bit like the older Farish 31 the bodyshape and the look of the carriages was spot on, the gap between the coaches being the issue.  Even at one stage I was thinking of keeping my older Mk1s against the newer blue riband versions as side on they looked as good - it was the gap that led me to sell them and just retain the newer ones which are closer coupled.

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18 hours ago, Padishar Creel said:

Thanks Duncan.

I also use SpurNeun couplings which have a length between the Farish standard and the Farish short, so can mix and match to suit.

I wonder why the decision to not have a close coupling mechanism. Seems a backward step. The MK1s really are their best.

es grüßt 

pc

 

They do close couple, but not with a body mounted coupling - they are limited to Second Radii track. The gap between two at rest  is Mk1s is 3mm, the gap between two Mk2fs is less than 3.5mm. The gap between two Poole Mk2d/e is over 4mm. So while a body mounted solution would be nice the gap is nowhere as noticeable.

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Fitted mine with short Dapol Nemcoups--they negotiate all my curves, including short-radius Peco code 55 points. Also fitted these to a Mark 1 RU running within the rake. The BG is more fussy though--won't take the short Nemcoup but a short Easi-shunt does the trick. Both the mark 1s are fitted with B4 bogies which bring the height down to an acceptable level and is prototypical, certainly for the BG.  Would recommend a similar colour for the roofs so the small height difference doesn't stand out. A lovely product in my opinion.

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5 hours ago, Bomag said:

 

They do close couple, but not with a body mounted coupling - they are limited to Second Radii track. The gap between two at rest  is Mk1s is 3mm, the gap between two Mk2fs is less than 3.5mm. The gap between two Poole Mk2d/e is over 4mm. So while a body mounted solution would be nice the gap is nowhere as noticeable.

But given they both have bogie mounted couplers surely you could just change the old flush sided ones to shorter couplers too...?

 

Seems a glaring omission, and a real shame, as they look stunning. I know KMS had hinted at doing Caledonian Sleeper ones to match their mk3s, but that’s definitely sealed it for me - sticking with my vinyled rake.  

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I'll take a FO for declassification but not until they get discounted to a sensible price, thick end of forty sheets (nearer fifty and that is before P&P on Ebay from some sellers) is way too much.

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Have got round to comparing coach heights. I placed a Dapol mark 3a FO next to a 2f (to replicate WCML formations)  and the 3a is considerably higher. Against a Farish 2a (doubtfully prototypical) fitted with 0.5mm washers above the bogie pivots,the 3a is higher but not excessively. My conclusion is that the 2fs are probably about right, as JR_P suggests above.  I think the 3a must be too high--maybe covered elsewhere on here. See my post above regarding mark 1 heights.

As for official coach heights, the following are taken from Colin J Marsden's 'Rolling Stock Recognition'  :-- Mark 1 and Mark 2=3890mm; Mark 3=3880mm, so a full centimetre difference, which translates to 0.0067567 in British N gauge!

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On 27/09/2020 at 12:50, Steven B said:

I think they're only limited to 2nd radius because the couplings bump into the foot steps fitted to the ends of the coach. Cut the steps off and they'll run around 9" curves without any problems.

 

Steven B

I received mine today, and it is so frustrating that after the MK1s the coaches have gone downhill (do the Thompsons also have bogie mounted couplings?).

I use Farish short next to a SpurNeun short and the gap is close enough, just not as good as the MK1s.

Are the footsteps really the blockage? If so I would snip them off. It doesn't look like buffer lock.

es grüßt 

pc

Edited by Padishar Creel
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OK, so curiosity got the better of me and I bought a couple of these [TSO]. I don’t really need them but I’m itching to take a closer look and I assume I’ll be able to dispose of them easily enough on a well known auction site in a month or two once the batch has sold out....
 

As an aside, The Model Centre Is offering free postage over £60, which is pretty sweet - and they still had a few TSO left.... 

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Well my two TSO examples turned up today - these are nice enough and certainly welcome, but a) not worth a 7yr wait; and b) possibly not worth £40 quid.... I’m not really seeing any step change for the extra step up in price.

 

A few observations....

The bogie and coupling situation has been discussed above, but it occurs to me that they actually had to specially tool a new BR B4 bogie to not have kinematic close-coupling.... very bizarre design decision and perhaps even more so from a commercial perspective.... they did use the opportunity of the new tooled bogie to include the bogie-mounted steps, but honesty Bachmann, trust me when I say I would have taken kinematic close coupling over the steps....!

 

The bogies and underframe are not in black, but actually a browny-black - as most clearly evidenced by the coupler which is a standard ‘black’. Revolution did something similar with the KFA bogies but went for a dark grey-black.... not sure how I feel about this, but it is quite apparent - surprised no one else has mentioned this!

 

The underframe detail is adequate but not any better than the mk2a, for example. I’ve also noted that the a/c blower doesn’t look quite right and looks ‘shaved-off’ on the underside (albeit this does appear strictly correct). Additionally, the opposite side air tank has a cut-out on the ‘inside’ which is kind of visible from a side-on angle.

 

The glazing, having seen it in person now, is too dark which is a shame as it largely obscures the interior.

 

The height definitely feels better; insomuch as, at buffer level they align with mk1 stock, although not mk2a. At cantrail/roof level, again the mk2f matches the mk1, but I think due to the curved ends of the roof on all mk2 stock, visually it does blend OK with the mk2a. The gangway ends are taller on the mk2f than the mk2a and this was quite apparent. To me the outlier in the ‘height stakes’ always was the mk2a, but I think the mk2f confirms it. In conclusion, the mk2f visually better suits being run with mk1, but you could get away with running with mk2a if you ignored the buffer height and gangway differences.

 

Whilst I don’t doubt that the first batch will sell out, I can’t help but feel that if these had been brought to market when they should have, ie. circa 2015, we’d have been excited by them, but having them arrive late 2020, I’m just left feeling somewhat indifferent to them. I have a suspicion that the design spec probably was settled upon back in 2013-2014, but with the passage of time, the spec became outdated but wasn’t raised to a modern standard. In short, this feels like a model of five years ago, not 2021.... ho hum....

Edited by JR_P
additional observations having run them this evening!
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Nobody seems to have mentioned the roof colour yet. To me it looks a good representation of BR blue/grey used in the blue period. Think I'll skip applying the Railmatch paint and just give them a coat of matt varnish.

As to the glazing, perhaps you're right that it's too dark, but I feel it gives them a distinct 'air-conditioned' look which was more apparent on the earlier sub-divisions.

 

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