Hornby Announce Peckett W4 0-4-0ST

[Stanley Melrose]

Going off at something of a tangent, I recall the reaction when as a 26 year-old head office chappie (from BL's Berkeley Square HQ) I arrived at Rover's Solihull Plant to meet the Management.  One of my questions was about the Land Rover, "What plans do you have for the replacement model?"  Smug faces all round as I was informed that there was a 4 year waiting list for the current product so why on earth should they consider designing and developing a replacement?

 

The truth of the matter was simply that potential customers who desperately wanted a Land Rover placed orders at several dealerships in the hope of getting one from one of them.  Once Toyota started destroying the Land Rover market, it rapidly became apparent that the 4 year waiting list was a mirage.  The real waiting list turned out to be a few weeks.

 

Later, when I worked for another multinational company, the standard issue for directors was a top of the range Jaguar saloon.  The guy responsible for the company car fleet would place orders at several dealers with the promise to those entitled to a Jag that he would see to it that they got theirs asap.  After some time when no one got a Jag, it was discovered that every time one of his orders was fulfilled, he had an arrangement with the dealer that they could sell the one he had ordered, usually for a premium, provided he got the premium.  When this practice became known, he was fired.

 

Best of all was the scam surrounding the company car scheme at Ford.  None of those administering the scheme was on the pay grade that entitled them to a company car.  At some stage, one of the smarter admin folk had the idea of setting up false records for the staff running the scheme that would entitle them to a company car.  When that was eventually discovered, the management found that it had been in existence for years and covered several generations of admin staff.

 

Apologies to those looking for information about Peckett locos but as someone has already pointed out, the fact that a few potential purchasers of Pecketts missed out is unlikely to cause Hornby management to lose sleep.

 

Stan

[davefromacrossthepond]

Has anyone approached any of the hobby shops to commission a run of whichever Pecketts "are in demand" from Hornby?  It would seem to me that if there really was such demand for any given model that Hornby would be incompetent in not putting its own money up, then that would leave an opening for someone else to make a tidy profit.

[Stanley Melrose]

Has anyone approached any of the hobby shops to commission a run of whichever Pecketts "are in demand" from Hornby?  It would seem to me that if there really was such demand for any given model that Hornby would be incompetent in not putting its own money up, then that would leave an opening for someone else to make a tidy profit.

See my post #2359!

 

Stan

[davefromacrossthepond]

Stan,

 

We must have been typing at the same time, of course you beat me to the "post" button. lol

 

Dave

[Steamport Southport]

It's alright. There was only 140 of them built. They haven't ran out of prototypes yet.

 

 

I think you'll get one or two a year for the next few years without any need for repetition. A bit like what is happening with the Sentinels.

 

 

If anyone is really desperate for one then how about preordering from one of the many retailers that are still taking orders? You can always cancel or sell it on if you don't want it.

 

 

 

Jason

[Caledonian]

For what it's worth, I think Hornby would be mad to simply re-run the previous three. Additional runs of the same liveries but with different identities is of course a suitable solution. However, I hope they will wait until after they've done 'George Jennings'...

 

I'd be very interested to know whether they have the tooling for George Jennings because it had a completely different cab from both the three produced so far and the promised Lilleshall one. 

[adb968008]

I'm still not convinced it is fake, My mother grew up to Naylors Yard at Warrington on the MSC and remembers several grotty locos of different colours but has no idea what make they were.

We know MSC locos worked into that yard at times from photos.

 

Not necessarily disagreeing with you, but I have seen almost a dozen pictures of 11 and 12 over a 50 year period, none of them look like that.

indeed they were rebuilt but as built 11 & 12 were initially delivered looking as Dodo.

I can see that 11 had several "paint jobs" over the years, post war it looked progressively rougher, I'd doubt there was time, effort, expense to give it a "lined" paint job by that stage, but in it's glamour years it was definitely "Peckett factory finish". Not seen any c1935-c1947 pictures.. maybe it was lined out at some stage then following it's mid20's rebuild (it was plain at it's rebuild) ?

 

I recently acquired a couple of Peckett factory publications (inc a sales brochure with 80 pages of drawings and accompanying pictures) which have many interesting pictures and liveries -  I do hope they do a rendition of Peckett Factory scheme with the company address details on the running plate !

Edited April 11, 2017 by adb968008

[PaulRhB]

Not necessarily disagreeing with you, but I have seen almost a dozen pictures of 11 and 12 over a 50 year period, none of them look like that.

indeed they were rebuilt, 11 & 12 were initially delivered looking as Dodo.

I can see that 11 had several "paint jobs" over the years, post war it looked progressively rougher.

 

 

We know they all were originally built with the Salter valves and that many were rebuilt in various versions later. The photos I have in the MSC book show it rebuilt like the Hornby model with MSC p116 lettering and post MSC p66 ownership looking the same so do these other photos suggest 11 or 12 was rebuilt twice?

The livery may be speculation but is based on a known livery applied but there doesn't appear to be anything contradicting it so far

If these catalogues show otherwise and are out of copyright can you share a review of them?

[adb968008]

We know they all were originally built with the Salter valves and that many were rebuilt in various versions later. The photos I have in the MSC book show it rebuilt like the Hornby model with MSC p116 lettering and post MSC p66 ownership looking the same so do these other photos suggest 11 or 12 was rebuilt twice?

The livery may be speculation but is based on a known livery applied but there doesn't appear to be anything contradicting it so far

If these catalogues show otherwise and are out of copyright can you share a review of them?

 

12 was sold off, and disappeared, the same year that a W6 was purchased.

I haven't found (though I was more looking at Pecketts than the MSC) any MSC loco's with Single lined yellow on green, apart from Gothenburg in preservation, which was actually a rendition based on Hudswell Clarke factory finish (although 32 didn't carry it, number 70 did.. but that was painted Black with single yellow line, and thats a HC Official picture).

Most pictures of HC tanks on the MSC are Black or plain green (much like 11), though the MSC wasnt exactly one for a uniform corporate image, 100 years ago those docks must have been a colourful place !

 

So far I've not seen anything to suggest Hornby's MSC 11 is anything other than what Hornby said..

https://www.Hornby.com/us-en/news/the-engine-shed/the-peckett-w4-liveries-are-here/

 

 

However due to the lack of reliable photographs of the Peckett in this livery, one has to suspend one’s disbelief somewhat and assume some historical and artistic licence.

it's an approximation, someone somewhere chose to add the yellow lining, my guess would be based on the many pictures of 32 Gothenburg in preservation out there.

I have seen at least one picture of Hornby's 11 with the lining removed.. looks great too and i'm guessing not a hard job to remove it.

 

The Peckett factory booklet does show a W4 (and others) in plain green, but it could be anybodies, it's a sales brochure, though theres tons of great images, including several other W4s, even a low height narrow gauge loco built standard gauge width !! . (some of the pictures in there are in the NRM archive online) so I'd assume NRM owns copyright ?

Edited April 11, 2017 by adb968008

[Ian J.]

I'd be very interested to know whether they have the tooling for George Jennings because it had a completely different cab from both the three produced so far and the promised Lilleshall one. 

 

I wouldn't have said it's completely different, but I can see differences in the curve of the top half of the side of the cab, and the positioning of the front spectacle plate. It appears it's on more than one of the W4s, so I would hope Hornby could produce a tool or have already produced a tool for it.

[Islesy]

I wouldn't have said it's completely different, but I can see differences in the curve of the top half of the side of the cab, and the positioning of the front spectacle plate. It appears it's on more than one of the W4s, so I would hope Hornby could produce a tool or have already produced a tool for it.

 

The differences go much deeper than that. George Jennings is a late type W4, if you look, the cab sits further back and is deeper than the early versions. The buffer beams form an L shape because of this, as opposed to the T shape of the early versions. The running plate sits higher and the cylinders are angled down further to compensate for this, all of which means that the boiler sits higher (and is a slightly different profile from memory). From a manufacturing point of view you have a second engine; with changes to the chassis, cab and boiler...

[Caledonian]

I wouldn't have said it's completely different, but I can see differences in the curve of the top half of the side of the cab, and the positioning of the front spectacle plate. It appears it's on more than one of the W4s, so I would hope Hornby could produce a tool or have already produced a tool for it.

 

Leaving aside Islesy's observations, the really big visual giveaway is at the back of the cab. Those produced so far have stanchions rising the full height of the cab with the back wall effectively suspended between them [and a suspicion that the upper half was removeable], but George Jennings - and other late W4s, for example the Ayr Harbour Board/G&SWR/LMS one - have proper corners and handrails to the back of the cab.

 

See the photies in posts #2302 and #2310 on page 93 of this thread 

[Caledonian]

12 was sold off, and disappeared, the same year that a W6 was purchased.

I haven't found (though I was more looking at Pecketts than the MSC) any MSC loco's with Single lined yellow on green, apart from Gothenburg in preservation, which was actually a rendition based on Hudswell Clarke factory finish (although 32 didn't carry it, number 70 did.. but that was painted Black with single yellow line, and thats a HC Official picture).

Most pictures of HC tanks on the MSC are Black or plain green (much like 11), though the MSC wasnt exactly one for a uniform corporate image, 100 years ago those docks must have been a colourful place !

 

So far I've not seen anything to suggest Hornby's MSC 11 is anything other than what Hornby said..

https://www.Hornby.com/us-en/news/the-engine-shed/the-peckett-w4-liveries-are-here/

it's an approximation, someone somewhere chose to add the yellow lining, my guess would be based on the many pictures of 32 Gothenburg in preservation out there.

I have seen at least one picture of Hornby's 11 with the lining removed.. looks great too and i'm guessing not a hard job to remove it.

 

The Peckett factory booklet does show a W4 (and others) in plain green, but it could be anybodies, it's a sales brochure, though theres tons of great images, including several other W4s, even a low height narrow gauge loco built standard gauge width !! . (some of the pictures in there are in the NRM archive online) so I'd assume NRM owns copyright ?

 

Thanks for that. It saves me combing back to the original discussion on that point. To re-iterate the forest green livery appears to have been a common Peckett livery. I would like to see it again and just hope that having labelled this first batch one as the MSC livery won't inhibit Hornby from turning out any future releases in this colour.

[Budgie]

Leaving aside Islesy's observations, the really big visual giveaway is at the back of the cab. Those produced so far have stanchions rising the full height of the cab with the back wall effectively suspended between them [and a suspicion that the upper half was removeable], but George Jennings - and other late W4s, for example the Ayr Harbour Board/G&SWR/LMS one - have proper corners and handrails to the back of the cab.

 

See the photies in posts #2302 and #2310 on page 93 of this thread

Wouldn't the later ones be given a different class designation, then, such as W4A or W4-2, if only by enthusiasts?

[Caledonian]

Wouldn't the later ones be given a different class designation, then, such as W4A or W4-2, if only by enthusiasts?

 

Not that I know of - but then again what do I know?

 

All I do know is that while many of the detail differences outlined by Islesy can be wifully ignored, bodged, or otherwise brushed under the carpet, the different cab is a big giveaway. While its encouraging that Hornby are so far offering three styles of dome and two different chimneys it looks as though the later style requires rather more than an alternative cab moulding.

[Ruston]

Wouldn't the later ones be given a different class designation, then, such as W4A or W4-2, if only by enthusiasts?

Nothing that I have ever read in all the books, and Industrial Railway Records, that I have in my collection mentions any such thing. It's only a cab back after all and I'm pretty sure that Pecketts, or any other industrial loco manufacturer, wouldn't bother with sub-classes based on such a minor change.

 

There were Pecketts built to the same class with saddletanks or sidetanks but there is no mention of them given a sub-class, nor were locos with cut down cabs etc.

[Compound2632]

Nothing that I have ever read in all the books, and Industrial Railway Records, that I have in my collection mentions any such thing. It's only a cab back after all and I'm pretty sure that Pecketts, or any other industrial loco manufacturer, wouldn't bother with sub-classes based on such a minor change.

 

There were Pecketts built to the same class with saddletanks or sidetanks but there is no mention of them given a sub-class, nor were locos with cut down cabs etc.

 

What Budgie is looking for is an enthusiasts' taxonomy - has anyone in the IRS or elsewhere categorised the variants within each Peckett class? We forget that many of the classifications we use were invented by enthusiasts - the classic case being the three 'periods' of LMS coach design, introduced by Essery & Jenkinson.

[Caledonian]

I think the issue here is that Peckett produced a locomotive with 13" and later 14" cylinders which it designated as W4.

 

As Ruston says, bits like the cab were essentially add-on extras or embellishments which didn't alter the basic mechanical specification. I suspect that the Hornby model represents an early model while the "closed" cab was a later one. So far as Pecketts and their customers were concerned whether or not it had a closed cab it was still a W4.

 

So far as enthusiasts' toxonomy goes [sounds like a dread disease] the later cab, judging by other photies, was a standard one used by most 0-4-0 Pecketts and not just W4s. If its date of introduction could be pinned down I dare say that you could refer to a W4 with [say] the 1901 cab but I'd hesitate to go anywhere beyond that.

 

Just by way of example, the only photie I've seen of Dodo shows her looking rather sorry for herself with the cab completely stove in. I would suspect that rather than try and straighten it they would simply have cut away the crumpled sheeting and replace it with a new cab - and depending on the date that could well have been a closed cab. It will still have been a W4. 

[Budgie]

Yes, but ...

 

IF (and it's a big if) Hornby go on to produce some of these variants (and I'm not saying they will, because there are plenty of other industrial locos that they could do) then wouldn't it be easier to refer to a W4A (for example) than to "A W4 with side tanks, fully-enclosed cab, this, that and the other" every time you wanted to differentiate it from some other variant?

 

Just askin'.

[PhilJ W]

Yes, but ...

 

IF (and it's a big if) Hornby go on to produce some of these variants (and I'm not saying they will, because there are plenty of other industrial locos that they could do) then wouldn't it be easier to refer to a W4A (for example) than to "A W4 with side tanks, fully-enclosed cab, this, that and the other" every time you wanted to differentiate it from some other variant?

 

Just askin'.

Or an 0-6-0?

[Compound2632]

On the other hand, sometimes the enthusiasts' taxonomy (note sp.) can get rather complicated: http://penrhos.me.uk/LewisClassification.shtml. Possibly the reason this hasn't been done for Pecketts is that each individual loco would end up with its own code!

[Steamport Southport]

There was an official phrase used for any differences. Special.

 

1935 Hornet which was built with a cut down cab was a W6-Special. Often shortened to W6S.

 

 

 

Jason

[Caledonian]

On the other hand, sometimes the enthusiasts' taxonomy (note sp.) can get rather complicated: http://penrhos.me.uk/LewisClassification.shtml. Possibly the reason this hasn't been done for Pecketts is that each individual loco would end up with its own code!

 

Quite - take a look at a couple of other Hornby ones:

 

No.11 came out of the works looking just like Dodo but with the name Alexandria. The name disappeared during WWI and at some point the dome and safety valves were changed and the lubricator mounted on the lum disappeared.

 

The forthcoming Lilleshall one also came out of the works with an early cab and presumably looked like Dodo too before acquiring a new dome which was quite different from No.11.

[Caledonian]

Yes, but ...

 

IF (and it's a big if) Hornby go on to produce some of these variants (and I'm not saying they will, because there are plenty of other industrial locos that they could do) then wouldn't it be easier to refer to a W4A (for example) than to "A W4 with side tanks, fully-enclosed cab, this, that and the other" every time you wanted to differentiate it from some other variant?

 

Just askin'.

 

So far, if we include the Lilleshall one due in September, Hornby have produced three variants without complicated descriptors. So far as marketing and acquiring them goes I think everybody is going to be happy to go for "Dodo" or "the MSC one" or "the Lilleshall one" without troubling themselves overmuch about the technical differences and are certainly far more likely to do that rather than puzzle themselves over the supposed differences between a W4A, W4B, W4C et al, especially since nobody would have a clue what you were talking about anyway. Its bad enough telling the difference between a W4 and an R2 [let alone a W4 and a W5] without introducing an artificial level of complexity  

[Ruston]

Yes, but ...

 

IF (and it's a big if) Hornby go on to produce some of these variants (and I'm not saying they will, because there are plenty of other industrial locos that they could do) then wouldn't it be easier to refer to a W4A (for example) than to "A W4 with side tanks, fully-enclosed cab, this, that and the other" every time you wanted to differentiate it from some other variant?

 

Just askin'.

They aren't variants; that is a main line railway way of thinking (and a main line enthusiast mentality) where engines of a particular class had to be sub-divided so planners could see immediately if a loco was suitable to be allocated (or not) to certain traffics, routes, braking systems, carriage heating etc. These locos were bought by individual companies to suit their own requirements.

 

As enthusiasts, referring to these locos as a W4, W4A etc. would make things more difficult rather than easier. I'd rather describe the cab type, or whatever than have to memorise, or refer to, a list, which would become very long very quickly.

 

Cab back style?

Is the cab cut down?

Does the saddletank go all the way to the front of the smokebox, or does it stop short?

Straight footplate or dropped footplate?

Dome style?

Handrail across smokebox front - straight or curved?

Number and position of holes in frames around firebox? (at least three varieties that I have noticed)

Block buffers or spring buffers?

 

That little lot are differences that I have seen in various photos of W4 Pecketts then who knows how many permutations there were of those? Who knows how many other differences there were in the locos that I haven't seen?

 

There's also no need to classify them. If Hornby produce different versions of identifiable prototypes then each will have its own identity and the prototype's works number to be able to refer to photos and know exactly what it looked like anyway.