N gauge steam - looking at a few, not sure what to go with

[Crumplezone]

Hello folks,

I'm looking for some opinions from owners which are alittle more uptodate than some of the topics on them in the forums and elsewhere. I've read quite a few threads both here and what has popped up on google searches but I'm still not quite sure on what to pick as a choice of another steam loco.

I know they are numerous issues with some locos available from Dapol, but also some people have had good ones aswell.

Out of the steam locos I've have a pannier 57xx in br black number No. 3702, its a x-mas present but was able to give it a full run in before returning it to the person who will wrap it. Looking from the threads about the pannier people have had issues but again mine seems to be relatively ok.

I am interested in the following locos:

9F - I have seen quite a few complaints about the 9F ranging from bad running to rods falling off the wheels and issues with spur not removed from the shaft which runs to the loco causing it not to navigate curves properly. I am put off getting one, however the lure of a 9F is equally as big as the amount of being put off, some people had noted the later batches were better, which ones would these be number wise?

Hall - Hall seems to have reasonable reviews and from youtube videos looks pretty good for running and noise level.

Manor - The Manor my friend has and he noted he can't stand the sound it makes anything above a scale running speed of 30mph, there was also the odd mention of issues of derailment and the front bogies.

Grange - Grange, a new model on the market, some people have mentioned issues with the bogie aswell.

Q1 - The Q1 I have read has issues with pickup if the wires in the tender haven't been soldered properly and problems with its connection between tender and front part of the loco and wires snapping, its look nice but abit offputting

Brit - Brit, I haven't seen to many complaints about this one and the later one with hex screws on the rods seems to look better.

A4 pacific (Mallard in BR early crest blue to be precise) - A4 pacifics I have seen mention of issues with noise and having abit of a grind/click to, but overall seem ok and  videos on youtube where you can hear and see it run seem to be favourable.



So are the observations above still standing with the models or are later batches, especially with the ones which have been out awhile, now ok? Or are the few mentions of issues just a few grumbles from a few duffs?

As you can see I'm not to fussed on which region the loco is from but any other suggestions for steam locos from Dapol would be welcome.

Also to note I have quite a few graham farish steam locos so the option of "you should go with GF" is abit limited as only about 3 locos left I'm interested in from their range at the moment.

I'd like to keep the open mind of that not all locos coming from Dapol are shoddy or bad runners or are going to break, case in point with the pannier which has a fairly length thread in places, but works just fine for me. So if any of the above are know to be more favourable runners than the other I would probably go with one of those before choosing ones which are known to have issues quite quickly.

I welcome any opinions, bad or good, but lets keep it civil on bad opinions and I hope some of you folks can share your experiences with said locos.

Thanks.
 

[Black Sheep]

Ive got a loco from Dapol that was a poor runner, 8 years on and it's started behaving itself

 

Every time I get the opportunity to run locos I give it a drop of oil and a run before getting annoyed with it and boxing it back up.

 

I think the reason behind it is, most people know they should run a loco in before putting it on a train, not many read the instructions which, for Dapol, say to lube first to help thin the grease in the gears which is something other manufacturers don't seem to do.

 

My A4 (not the loco above) is a bit more noisy than my farish locos but I assumed this is due to the shaft drive

[Kris]

I have several manors, all are noisy, some more so than others. I have no derailment issues with these. 

The 2 halls that I have are both good, however I did have to return one that was poor (the replacement is good).

My grange is very noisy, I don't have issues with it derailing. 

[Les1952]

One person's "too noisy" is another's "perfectly fine.

 

Whining noise from transmission- do you intend to run your trains flat out?  Is your track going to be mounted on foam?  My trackwork is mounted flat on the baseboard and ballasted with fine chippings.  I generally run at slow speed, having a track gang working to provide an excuse.  However if I do want to run locos in at speed, the wheel noise from a six-coach train is enough to drown out any real whine.  I have 13 A3s, 6 A4s, 5 9Fs, a Q1 a Hall and two Britannias from your list.  Older 9Fs are track-sensitive, but no more so than Farish V2s.

 

One or two have given problems, but most problems have been self-inflicted. Overall I find little to choose from in reliability terms between Dapol and Farish (and Fleischmann, Minitrix, Arnold and Piko for that matter- I also run a Continental layout).

 

A  few tips.-

 

Run in at low speed for a good half- hour in each direction.  Lightly lubricate, add coaches and run for another half-hour each way, this time faster.

 

NEVER pick up by the valve gear- and the same applies to Farish.  Denis Lovatt of Bachmann told me he thought that was the main way Farish locos get broken.

 

ALWAYS pick up by holding the cab and tender front.  On Dapol locos it prevents the drive shaft popping out and protects the pickup wires.  On Farish locos it prevents damage to to the loco-tender connection wipers.

 

My last tip is to buy from a dealer who will let you see the thing run.  That applies to all locos.

 

Hope this helps

Les

[Tom J]

I've got a number of Dapol locos and will now take a lot of convincing to buy any more. Most of them are diesels, the usual problems being to do with poorly assembled or insufficiently cleansed PCBs. I've had components desoldering themselves, lights going on and off, shorting. Class 67s in particular.

 

Steam wise I have two 'Brits' and an A4. All have had at least one of the wires fail between loco and tender. Motors get hot such that you can feel it through the tender sides when left to run for a while. I also have a 9F which rides very roughly, oscillates and was the 'least poor' of a about four I tried out at a well known retailer on Merseyside.

 

I take great care of our locos, they don't get thrashed or run on dodgy track. Our Farish locos, in the main (diesels with split gears, sometimes poor quartering and the poor adhesion of the 'A1' aside) do the business without fuss.

 

Everyone has their own view, but I am now leaving Dapol locos, especially steam locos, alone. A great shame because I would love to have a Hall and a couple of Manors.

[ParkeNd]

Of the locos you list the Hall is quiet, detailed, and a great runner - so I have two. The Manor by comparison runs well but the noise is so pod, harsh, and obtrusive mine is relegated permanently to its box - it's offensive

 

One you don't mention is Dapol's Flying Scotsman - it's great.

 

Dapol A4 - derailed on the straights. Sent back.

[Crumplezone]

Thank you folks for your responses, it does give a decent view on the models so far.

From looking at replies it looks like Hall, A4 and the A3s as a option (though I'm not a great lover of the german smoke deflectors).

Les: Track is mostly flexi all on either woodland scenics N guage trackbed or their sheets of foam depending on the area of the layout, so noise from actual track running is quite minimal in that respect and its about as level as its going to be and its on a 9mm plywood base with full support so derailment from track being up and down etc shouldn't be a issue.

Noise wise I'm looking at something which is bearable to the ear, I had a Dapol 22 which I could walk out the room, close the door, go downstairs and have a tv on in the front room and still HEAR the motor whine, suffice to say that one went back. On the other hand the pannier when I ran it didn't make much more noise than a graham farish 08 and most time you could just hear the clicking the rods going around the track. I do have a Dapol Class 52 western aswell and that has been also a good runner and noise level was about on par with the newer graham farish class 37 I have to.

My friends manor though was horrible, after 30mph scale speed the sound actually grates on your ear drums, the whine is so loud to be just unbearable to contend with for anymore than 5mins at most at the higher speed, which is a shame really as it did look nice.

I think handling wise of the locos I'm pretty good with my method, I have one of the peco re-railers so the locos actual handling time is merely getting out of box and then onto the railer and a finger push onto the rails, plus it makes loading 10 mk1s or 40 wagons alot easier to get onto the track and you don't have the issue of wheels not being where they shouldn't be.

I'll have a think over the above 3 locos I mentioned, the A4s are in stock and A3s are to, the hall isn't in stock in BR colours so might have to ask them to order one.  Do keep posting replies however, I won't be making a purchase for atleast another week at earliest.

Once again thank you everyone for your comments.


 

[daftbovine]

I have a noisy pannier, a good but rather speedy early Q1, a speedy M7, a good 45xx, a litter of four Terriers and a good new 9F.

 

I think the 9F is superb detail wise but it has to be handled very carefully, I'm glad you don't handle locos by the running gear. I personally think that some of the locos have a bit too much detail and for that reason are not very practical.

 

I think it will be interesting to see how many will be left in say ten years time.

 

I don't think you should worry too much about buying them because Dapol locos have a two year guarantee although it might be a good idea to try and weed out the noisy ones by testing them before you buy them.

[Les1952]

One other thing worth saying.  Dapol are inspecting things at Chirk.  This is borne out by the number of recent locos being offered to Club members at the open days the last two years.  Some of these were rough or noisy runners, the rest minor paint errors.

 

I was told by Graham Hubbard that Farish are doing the same.  However, if so, whoever inspected my third A2 put it back roughly enough for detail parts to be loose in the bottom of the box yet got the tissue back round it so immaculately one would have thought it had been ironed......

 

One thing about the 9F.  My latest one is a bit light in the tender and isn't happy about turning right through small radii.

 

On A3s, none have been made for a couple of years.  I suggested to Joel at the Open day it was time for some new ones.  On the other hand those still unsold tend to be without deflectors as these models were less popular, having the early emblem on the tender.

 

All the very best

Les

[Crumplezone]

I have decided to go with the Mallard in BR dark blue with the early crest as it came back into stock lastnight, which was nice since its a really nice livery finish from the photos available of it, something about the dark black over the partial valances and the deep blue which makes me like it more over Mallard in her working day colours in BR era.

The shop is going to give it a run before posting it via parcelforce courier(normal 1st class royal mail is now 4days behind in this area, its crazy ) on monday so fingers crossed should be able to give a verdict come tuesday.

In regards to the Hall in BR era colours the shop has said they can still order it in so I'll be doing a order with them for that in Jan sometime after x-mas and year new is over, since a few have noted its a good runner and not to noisy.

The A3 pacific is Colorado which I'm looking at which is early crest BR era with the different tender with coal guards around the tops, I think it looks quite nice and it will sit in well with what I laready have loco wise and the rolling stock.

You might be wondering why I put a order in instead in another week, well with the post being a issue and the A4 pacific not to be restocked to end of Jan I thought it would be better to grab it while I can instead of waiting a fair amount of time

It'll be one of the first Dapol locos with the gear shaft system I've owned so it'll be interesting to see how it all works, most of my farish ones are either tender or loco drive, so be interesting to see its capacity also. I will take above advice in mind when lifting it via cab and front of tender to ensure the shaft doesn't pop out, which I've read can be abit of a sod to get back into position from what people have wrote on the A4s, but hopefully won't come to that.

Its been encouraging to see the different opinions and a fair few positive and some negative comments about some of the Dapol locos, I had been put off quite awhile by purchasing Dapol's steam locos which is a shame since Dapol does cover a fair few nice locos which farish don't do anymore or do at all and the models do look to be nicely done in most cases from what I have seen.

Les if you don't mind me asking, how are the A2s running wise and are they loco or tender drive ones? I must admit slightly put off by the price right now so might be a purchases for a few months down the line but they do look very nice, but again not quite alot of videos on them which is quite common across the board when I've been hunting for visual and audioable evidence of the locos to see how they perform/sound.

Thanks folks, appreciate the help given.

 

[Karhedron]

One you haven't mentioned is the Dapol GWR 2884. This seems to be one of their better steamers and runs without fuss on 1st radius curves.

[Les1952]

The Farish A2 is tender drive, sharing a mechanism with the A1.  They are quiet runners.

 

My two (of three) A2s are running well enough.  The third went back to Farish after shedding part of its valve gear straight from the box.  Farish service dept were adamant they were not prepared to repair it but that I must send it via the dealer.  He in turn sent it back marked "for refund only", so Farish now have a dud on their hands.  Their problem.

 

Neither of them will pull anything near the amount my A3s and A4s (or for that matter my 9Fs) can.  One struggles with six bogies. I'm going to change the traction tyred wheelset on this for a different one after Christmas when Hawthorn Dene is erected again.  The other handles the parcels train quite happily so I've no need to test its pulling power.  I did get an admission that some of the grooves on Farish tyred wheelsets are milled too deeply with the result the tyres don't grip.  My weak A2 has one of those wheelsets...

 

It is a shame they are a bit weak.  There was a period when 9Fs were struggling with a heavy braked oil train that had been given a fast East Coast Main Line timing.  The solution was to substitute A2s, which were not only faster but stronger.  It would be nice to put an A2 on a heavy oil train, even though the A2s used on the real thing were the Thompson variety....

 

The train will run with a 9F or an A3 on the front instead....

 

Les

[Tom J]

That explanation about the wheel sets makes complete sense regarding my A1 now, but unfortunately it's out of guarantee. Not sure what I can do about that!

[Les1952]

I don't know if anyone else has made this connection.

 

2mm finescale layout "Kingswear"- article in the current (Jan) BRM.  This is a layout not exactly famous for good running.

 

It appears to say their best performing locos are a pair of Dapol Halls and a Dapol 57xx (with wheels moved outwards by 0.42 mm.) 

 

Les

[johnlambert]

I have the following Dapol locos from your list:

 

Hall - Hall seems to have reasonable reviews and from youtube videos looks pretty good for running and noise level.

 

I have two Halls.  One was bought recently in used condition from my local shop.  Once I replaced the traction tyres and cleaned the excess oil applied by the previous owner it ran (and runs) very well.  If anything it is better than the one I bought new.  The new one required a little tweaking to the drive shaft to ensure it could cope with second radius curves.

Manor - The Manor my friend has and he noted he can't stand the sound it makes anything above a scale running speed of 30mph, there was also the odd mention of issues of derailment and the front bogies.

 

I have an Ixon Manor and a Dapol Manor.  The Ixon example is very smooth and sweet running but had problems with points.  When I checked the front bogie with a back-to-back gauge the wheels were under-gauge; easy enough to fix by gently twisting and pulling the wheels on the axle.  The Dapol Manor also needed its driveshaft adjusting.

Grange - Grange, a new model on the market, some people have mentioned issues with the bogie aswell.

 

Guess what, I had to adjust the driveshaft on this one too.  In all casses it was a matter of gently pushing on the plastic 'cup' on the motor shaft to gain a vital fraction of a millimetre or two of extra articulation for the cardan shaft.  I may have had to adjust the back-to-backs on the bogie too; as a matter of routine I will check all Dapol steam locos for correct B2B before their first run.

As Karhedron said, the 2884 is another one I have; I think it is a bit noisy but it pulls well and will crawl through Peco Settrack points like it is the most normal thing in the world - not what I expected from such a long coupled wheelbase.  No need for adjustment or anything, the only complaint is that one of the wheels was only partially blackened (and you can't really tell when the loco is running).

[Crumplezone]

Well I'm happy to report that the A4 Pacific Mallard in BR dark blue turned up safely yesterday and is currently running around on my test oval which has 3rd radius curves.

At first it was getting stuck while driving forward every few inches and making a knocking sound which you could feel vibrate through the bodyshell of the front of the loco. Knocking wasn't present when going in reverse so lifted the loco back off the track and wiggled the cab and tender abit to see if the cardan shaft had come loose from either taking out the box or from factory construction. I did note when applying power to go forward the tender would lean off the rails to one side so I suspect it was the cardan shaft had come away from the socket in the loco and the knocking sound was it bouncing in the socket or not being fully engaged.

Sound wise the motor whine and the sound the loco makes is about the same level as my duchess of sutherland from the cumberland boxset, I would argue most of the sound is coming from the wheels and connection rods than the actual motor. I suspect with the addition of 4-5 mk1s behind it the motor noise probably won't really be noticable at all. I have also checked the loco on super slow speed with just the standard graham farish controller and it creeps quite nicely along the track without any juddering or wobble. The main layout uses gaugemaster controllers so I think I can probably get even smoother control out of it with them, but that will have to wait to later.

I must admit I'm alittle blown away on the quality of the actual models finish and shape, Dapol seems to have got the front part of the A4 Pacifics curved nose down to a T and the subtle curve from top of the boiler down to the sides of the cab also seems to be right on the money. The livery and lining also is incredibly well done considering just how small this locomotive is and I thought I had seen detail with the recent farish releases, its pretty much on par with each other Dapol vs farish in detail and livery application.

So I'm happy to say I'm fully impressed and pleased its worked so well out the box without issue and thank you to everyone who commented in the thread giving their experiences and opinions it has been quite helpeful.

I plan to order Cranmore Hall in the first week of Jan so will be adding that to the collection then and fingers crossed no issues with that one when it does turn up.





 

[Les1952]

Glad you got a good one.

 

One thing that needs saying over and over again is that the laws of statistics mean NOBODY gets a representative sample of good and bad locos from any manufacturer.  With over 20 Dapol pacifics I'm getting somewhere close, but I would need to double that before the statistical variations really flatten out.

 

Everyone gets a skewed perspective on which locos are better, and I do mean EVERYONE.   My experiences would suggest I wouldn't have another Farish 4MT, tender or tank, thrown at me.  Others have the same experiences with different Dapol locos, and think the sun shines out of the 4MT's every orifice.  Yet NONE of us have gone through enough locos to get a fair perspective.

 

The truth is most likely that the vast majority of locos from Dapol and Farish are fine runners with exquisite detail, as stated in the previous post.

 

All the best

Les

[Chalfytich]

I've got a 9F, Brit, Hall, Grange, 28XX and a pannier. The 9F is fine since the bogie was sorted out. The Hall and Grange are both quite noisy but other than that they are fine, while the 28XX and pannier are very quiet and nice runners and the Brit is the best of all. I have an Ixion Manor which is quieter than the Hall and Grange, despite looking like pretty well the same mechanism.  I still feel that the Grafar steam locos are the Rolls Royce of N gauge though. The Duchess, West Country, 4F and Mickey are all at least as good, and probably better, than the Brit.

 

Dave

[Crumplezone]

Hello folks,

since I was happy with the A4 pacific I looked into some of the others pacifics after someone had mentioned the A3 pacifics from Dapol aswell. I ended up ordering 60094 Colorado which is a non-german smoke deflector A3 with GNR styled tender in BR green Ecrest.

It turned up at 9 this morning via parcelforce, basically only way to gurantee it turn up before x-mas now, and I popped the box open and had a look. Abit of a raised eyebrow at first as the loco had been sent to me brand new but the gurantee in the box was filled out with another customers name, signature and order date of July 6th 2013. Contacted the shop about it and they got onto Dapol about it as it had been sent as brand new to them from Dapol. Ofcourse Dapol has no idea but they are going to try and look into it.

So with that abit of dread starting to sink in, was this a duff loco which has accidentally got through and been sent out as brand new from Dapol?

Well, happy to say no its not a duff loco. Consider the date of purchase according to the gurantee info is 2013 it runs pretty smooth after lubing the connection rods, I am going to pop off the keeper plate abit later and oil up the gears however to make sure its super happy.

There is one minor issue and I don't know if you have encountered this before Les with your A3s or not but the tender body doesn't seem to be fully engaging with the chassis of the wheels, non of the actual clips are broken from what I can tell and its not visible from normal viewing distance but it is about 2.5mm off the fram at the front of the tender body. I can only think that maybe a wire is pushing it up and its not seating properly because of that.

Otherwise its a very outstanding looking loco and a pretty good runner aswell, not more noisy than the A4 either besides the gears in the front part of the loco which seems to be the norm for these type of locos.

[Les1952]

If the tender isn't clipped in at the front then you may have a problem- this could be why Dapol got it back.  Alternately it might just not have been clipped correctly in the first place and have nothing wrong at all.

 

You may find that just standing the loco on the track, unclipping the rear then pushing the tender downwards so all four clips go home together works.  Try this first, but if it needs too much force look inside

 

To look inside, it will help to have a small pair of long-nosed pliers or strong tweezers.  Use these when disconnecting the driveshaft to make sure it comes apart at the end YOU want it to.  Carefully uncouple the drive shaft at the tender end and lift the tender body off - you will need to unclip the back end.  Look inside the body to check there is no flash then look along the tender to check there are no wires or anything else sticking out and stopping it fitting.

 

If all seems clear put the body back.  Pass the drive shaft cup through the front of the body then try  to clip all four lugs at the same time.  Finally reconnect the drive shaft - use the tweezers/pliers.  You may need to rotate either the shaft or the cup slightly before they align.

 

If it still won't clip together get Dapol to send out a new warranty card (checking they don't have any left at the factory), then contact DCC Supplies for a returns label and get them to sort it out for you.  They are very good.

 

Hope this helps.

Les

[Crumplezone]

Thanks for that detailed reply Les.

Bodyshell wouldn't sit happy on the tender at first not with any downward motion so I disconnected the driveshaft fully and also unscrewed the bar at one end which connects the loco and tender together to keep them as one piece to get abit more room to work with. Didn't find it particularly hard to get the shaft back into both cup holders so wasn't to much of a issue.

What did finally bed the bodyshell was abit of side to side movement and abit of downward pushing and it eventually went flat with the chassis bottom so no longer a gap, hurray. Surpisingly a very smooth runner considering its been in a display cabinet for a few years, when I took the keeper plate off the gears were pretty much dry aswell so I've oiled them up aswell and the gear train seems to abit quieter. Gear train seems abit noisy if you run it anti clockwise around the layout but quiet enough clockwise so I'll run it in that direction from now on.

Was surprised by its pulling power, managed 13 farish mk 1s without so much as a grunt and on a curve to.

Not bad for a second driveshaft based Dapol steam loco purchase

[Les1952]

I'm glad it sorted out easily.   You are braver than me uncoupling the tender- I find I put the pickup wires at risk if I do that, and those are a bit of a nightmare to replace.

 

I have Dapol Pacifics on the heaviest workings on Hawthorn Dene - I just wish the Farish ones were so strong.  The main bugbear is the fish train Mr Simon put together. It needs at A3 or A4 as no other locos will pull it.  Fortunately Gateshead tended to use its A4s on fast goods, and there were one or two others elsewhere that were top link workings.

 

It was a Kings Cross fast goods that Bill Hoole famously kept in front of the Elizabethan for mile after mile without holding it up, including climbing Stoke Bank with his A4 faster than the A4 on the streamliner behind him....

 

All the best

Les

[Dr Al]

That explanation about the wheel sets makes complete sense regarding my A1 now, but unfortunately it's out of guarantee. Not sure what I can do about that!

 

A1 should not be a problem - there should be a spare tyred wheelset in the box. Fit this and the existing one to the rearmost wheels of the tender (so there are 4 tyred wheels in total) and the haulage will be much improved.

 

The real issue with the A2 seems to be that Bachmann, presumably in a cost cutting measure, have not included this additional wheelset with the A2.

 

Shame.

 

Cheers,

Alan

[Graham Walters]

I've had mixed fortunes with Dapol stock, the 57xx panniers I have both ran well straight out of the box, and improved with a little oil as instructed.

However the tendered engines are totally different, some you wouldn't run with a sleeping baby in the room, others are as quiet as you would expect, like a lot of others I put a lot of the noise down to the shaft drive, and there seems no way to tone this down.

 

Becaue of this I am going to move towards Farish stock, and see if there is an improvement.

[Crumplezone]

Hello folks   

Thought I would drop in a update nearly a month on from purchase of the Dapol locos and a new addition to the fleet.

The A4 pacific which ran fine on delivery but was alittle rough at first opted to abit rough again after taking it out the box and popping it down on the track afterward. Went through the usual of checking track and power connections and also looked at the loco, no dice at first, still abit bunny hopping oocasionally and abit stubborn on running slow. Abit of investigation work and popping off the keeper plate revealed quite alot of orange-ish gunk in the gears, quite frankly it looked clogged so abit of tweezer removal of the gunk and checking if I could see anymore with a magnifying glass seem to show no more. So oiled up the gears and popped the plate back on and popped the A4 back on the track.

Whooosh, that is my imitation sound of a smooth running Dapol A4. Removing the gunk and giving it a fresh lick of oil seems to have made it very quiet and even the gear grunt you get from the gear train has gone almost whisper quiet. I would say its now no louder than my Farish Duchess which I find to abit noiser than the other coreless motor types. I can only assume while the gunk was soft it was impairing the gear pegs from engaging smoothly.

Its done about half a mile in actual running distance now and seems to just be fine.

The Pannier and A3 pacific have also been doing just fine and have clocked up the running distance alongside the A4. No real issues have popped up and they seem to favour abit of oiling every 4-5hours of running to keep them quiet and smooth.

The new Dapol loco added to the fleet is a GWR 28xx (why do they still name them 38xxs on product pages? ) in BR black Late logo numbered 3822. I had noticed it was in a Jan sale and a few had mentioned here it was a good runner, I did hmm and harr over it for abit as they also had the Brits on sale but opted for the 28xx in the end as I came across some closer up shots of the 28xx which really highlighted the wonderful detail on this model. Quite frankly the detail on the loco is pretty damn good and I would say its on par with anything Farish have released recently and it also has quite a close distance between cab and tender which doesn't effect its capacity to go around curves.

I have been able to run this on the test loop and while abit noisy at first as I ran it out the box after motion oiling the loco has become quite smooth and quiet after about 20mins around on the track and some oil on the exposed gears on the underside. I didn't find a removal keeper plate on this loco even though it has a screw where one would usually be, when I tried to move the section up which normally would be the plate the tungsten chassis was coming away with it from the bodyshell so I opted to not go further and force it open. Either way the oiling seemed to do the trick and the loco is quite happy to plod around  the track. I will keep this one running at about 1/4 on the controller when operating with the other locos as it seems to befit a slower more gradual pace with many wagons behind it.

All in all, that makes 4 Dapol locos, 3 been shaft driven and one with the motor in its body and no real fault or issue with the locos beyond the requirement to remove gunk in the gearing or extra oiling needed, but that is about the same I've had to do with Farish locos.

I don't feel offput on getting another Dapol loco in the future but I certainly think research and careful considering is still nessessary before purchase. Could say I've just been lucky with my locos, but who knows. Either way there seems to be quite a different constant between different people's experiences with the locos.

Well see what the future brings and see if I get a duff at some point