Oxford Rail announces - OO gauge Mk3 coaches

[60006]

2 rakes worth of ScotRail versions on order with Hatton's. Be interesting to see how they match up to the Bachmann ScotRail blue. And then even more interesting to see if the DBSO matches either.

[James90012]

2 rakes worth of ScotRail versions on order with Hatton's. Be interesting to see how they match up to the Bachmann ScotRail blue. And then even more interesting to see if the DBSO matches either.

 

I've pre-ordered 4 Scotrail MK3s and 8 Virgin MK3s. Very good price if it stays that way!

[tractor_37260]

I wonder why the 'Future' ones are a fiver cheaper than the ones already announced?

 

ROB

 

Yes strange indeed ! - but I don't think anyone will actually expect to get them for £25 - £29 each once they actually arrive................more like £45+ each .......especially if lighting is fitted....

[darrel]

Just pre ordered 5 scotrail ones from hattons the DBSO was already pre ordered.

[VXDH92]

Great news! Have ordered:

 

3 x Virgin FO

2 x Virgin RFM

5 x Virgin TSO

 

It appears from the Oxford Rail site that all MK3s will have an RRP of £34.95, so I'm not sure why Hattons have varying prices. However, I am not complaining at £25 a carriage!

 

Some coloured renderings are appearing on MRD... looking very good, but no tinted glazing in the images yet.

 

https://www.modelrailwaysdirect.co.uk/rolling-stock-passenger/oxford-rail-or763to002-mk3a-coach-tourist-second-open-tso-br-intercity-swallow-12007/

[60006]

Just had an email from Hatton's to say that Oxford had priced the new Mk3s incorrectly. 

Checked the email announcement from Oxford yesterday and they were showing them as £29.95 instead of £34.95.

Looks like they're now priced at £29, same as the first announcements from last year.

 

 

Bit of a shame but still a decent price for what looks like is going to be a great model.

[Revolution Mike B]

Cheap as chips considering the excellent detail.

 

No good to me though because I need about 40 MK3Bs

Edited January 25, 2017 by scoobyra

[Mike at C&M]

To clarify the prices:

 

It would appear that announcement yesterday had the coaches at the wrong price, £5 less than the coaches that had already been announced. This error has now been rectified.

 

The recommended price for the Oxford Rail Mark 3 coaches is £34.95 each.

[njee20]

Cheap as chips considering the excellent detail.

 

No good to me though because I need about 40 MK3Bs

Forgive my ignorance, what's a Mk3B? I'm familiar with all the variants of Mk2, but not Mk3.

[jonathan452]

Forgive my ignorance, what's a Mk3B? I'm familiar with all the variants of Mk2, but not Mk3.

41 loco hauled (WCML) Mk3's built in the mid eighties (38 FO, 3 BFO). Partly to replace the Manchester Pullman Mk2 coaches.

[wombatofludham]

There's an image of an Intercity Mk3 TSO with lights on the Oxford Diecast Collectors Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1185558358229042&set=gm.10154979823221468&type=3

[Rhydgaled]

 

Forgive my ignorance, what's a Mk3B? I'm familiar with all the variants of Mk2, but not Mk3.

41 loco hauled (WCML) Mk3's built in the mid eighties (38 FO, 3 BFO). Partly to replace the Manchester Pullman Mk2 coaches.

 

If the first batch of LHCS Mrk3s are Mrk3a, and the second batch Mrk3b, does that make the prototypes Mrk3c and the bufferless IC125 ones Mrk3d? (and I thought Oxford were planning to do the latter as well as the Mrk3a models, have they dropped the idea to minimise tooling costs?) The first batch of LHCS being mrk3a doesn't make sense to me as surely at least the prototypes (which I think I read somewhere had buffers and conventional ETS) came before that (unless the prototypes are mrk3a as well, but still surely the IC125 came before the Mrk3b at least). Edited January 25, 2017 by Rhydgaled

[MJI]

Prototypes had different window frames

 

HST are Mark 3.

 

Better to start with LHCS because it is many years wince Joueff was around. The Hornby HST trailers are OK so not so desperate to replace

[MrB]

If the first batch of LHCS Mrk3s are Mrk3a, and the second batch Mrk3b, does that make the prototypes Mrk3c and the bufferless IC125 ones Mrk3d? (and I thought Oxford were planning to do the latter as well as the Mrk3a models, have they dropped the idea to minimise tooling costs?) The first batch of LHCS being mrk3a doesn't make sense to me as surely at least the prototypes (which I think I read somewhere had buffers and conventional ETS) came before that (unless the prototypes are mrk3a as well, but still surely the IC125 came before the Mrk3b at least).

According to Wikipedia the Mk3s are the Prototypes and the HST coaches

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Mark_3

 

Regards

 

Roy

[Revolution Mike B]

Some nice clarification on the variants in the above posts - I've always referred to the MK3bs as west coast LHCS. I also need about 50 HST MK3s too so I hope Oxford hurry up!     

[Roy Langridge]

Some nice clarification on the variants in the above posts - I've always referred to the MK3bs as west coast LHCS. I also need about 50 HST MK3s too so I hope Oxford hurry up!

I bet your bank account has other ideas!

 

Roy

[Rhydgaled]

Better to start with LHCS because it is many years wince Joueff was around. The Hornby HST trailers are OK so not so desperate to replace

I understand why they would do mrk3a first, but I read somewhere (fairly sure it was the advertising matterial Hattons distributed with my most recent order from them) that Oxford would be moving on to produce IC125 coaches later in 2017. But we have now had the range anouncement and there is no such model, so I am left wondering whether Oxford have decided to drop the IC125 variants.

 

According to Wikipedia the Mk3s are the Prototypes and the HST coaches

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_Rail_Mark_3

 

Regards

 

Roy

Ah, thanks for the clarification; so the letter before 'a' is '<null>'. I was thinking 'Mark 3' was the generic term for any variant, with each variant having a letter code. Similarly with mark 2s, when the first variant came along after the originals I would have assumed they would be mrk2b with the original batch being mrk2a, but now I guess it goes mrk2<null>, mrk2a, mrk2b, etc.

So, the coaches with 3-phase ETS and no buffers are Mrk3<null>, regardless of whether they have the 'different window frames' that MJI informs me the prototypes had (thanks for pointing out that difference, by the way).

 

The prototype coaches were ordered as loco hauled stock for the ER & MR before the power cars. Some later converted to HST trailers/royal train. I suppose you could call them Mk3z.

I'm confused again (doesn't take much), were the prototypes 3-phase ETS or single phase? Wikipedia says the class 41s had 3-phase ETS supply at the time, but that the preserved one has single-phase now (so I assume the three coaches the 125 group have now are mrk3a and not the actual prototype coaches). But if the prototypes were 3-phase, they couldn't have been ordered as LHCS first.

 

The Mk3 are the HST coaches which are in effect MU trailers and are numbered as such.

I'm not familiar with the vehicle numbering on longer MUs, such as Pendolinos, but with sprinters the last three digits of each vehicle match the unit number, so would I be correct in assuming class 253 set 253001 would have had all coaches numbered xx001? The power car numbering suggests not (as does Wikipedia's article on the prototype set), but if that's the case what makes them MU-style numbers and not just numbers as the LHCS would have? Edited January 26, 2017 by Rhydgaled

[rembrow]

I understand why they would do mrk3a first, but I read somewhere (fairly sure it was the advertising matterial Hattons distributed with my most recent order from them) that Oxford would be moving on to produce IC125 coaches later in 2017. But we have now had the range anouncement and there is no such model, so I am left wondering whether Oxford have decided to drop the IC125 variants.

 

 

Oxford Rail are not following the other producers with one main annual announcement. They seem to be following the system used by Oxford Diecast, the other main range within the group, which has announcements of new items in a revised catalogue every 4 months. Oxford Rail announced new items last year, in May and September and now Jan 2017, so seem to be following that system. So there are probably 2 more announcements to be made in 2017, however any new items will probably be schemed as 2018 early to mid year releases.

[YesTor]

I understand why they would do mrk3a first, but I read somewhere (fairly sure it was the advertising matterial Hattons distributed with my most recent order from them) that Oxford would be moving on to produce IC125 coaches later in 2017. But we have now had the range anouncement and there is no such model, so I am left wondering whether Oxford have decided to drop the IC125 variants.

 

No manufacturer can produce everything at once, so I'd guess that Oxford have announced alternative numbered examples of already announced types for any number of reasons including perhaps:

 

1. Assisting modellers build up a full train of one type fairly quickly
2. Capitalizing on what might be encouraging pre-sales figures on the initially announced batch
3. And I'd guess it would be much easier and cost-saving to tag-on additional runs of existing variants to current production runs before switching production to other types.

 

All above are speculation only of course, but it seems a logical train of thought to my mind...

Edited January 27, 2017 by YesTor

[VXDH92]

Just a little update; I've had a response from OR to say that they are still undecided about interior lighting. I personally hope they do fit it, even if it means bumping the price up a couple of £. The pre-production examples look really good with lighting.

 

Hoping the mk3 will really help them branch out in the market; I think it's an excellent product to produce, especially given the price.

[ThaneofFife]

this is like the new class 87 and 85 and 90 and mk2fs.....if theyre going to produce stonking models for this generation then they might as well look at offering the option of lighting rather than just not catering for it at all.  maybe like Dapol fit every coach with bogies that have the pick ups pre-fitted then models with pre-fitted lights or non fitted so people can buy the cheaper coach then upgrade later with a lighting kit or DIY lighting.  so long as getting inside the coaches is easy enough the hardest part would be effective pick ups so if they cover that base it would be good.

 

ive seen those samples pics with lighting too and it looks very authentic with its strip effect right down the coach roof.

 

however i bet most people would place greater emphasis on the coaches having realistic tinted glazing more than lighting ( clear on the door drop lights and gangway port holes) . 

the coaches will not have a premium look to them with clear glazing and that will let them down and make them appear less model like and more toy like.  please Oxford Rail if you do anything you have to get the tinting right......

Edited January 27, 2017 by ThaneofFife

[lekkie lad]

Can anyone confirm (or deny), but I believe (from photos) that the LHCS TSOs didn't have the rainstrip above the external doors. On the OR website they have a pic of an I/C liveried TSO with this rainstrip. However, I'm not 100% sure about whether t he FOs had them. Certainly the HST Mk3s all appear to have a rainstrip.

 

Ian S

[Roy Langridge]

Can anyone confirm (or deny), but I believe (from photos) that the LHCS TSOs didn't have the rainstrip above the external doors. On the OR website they have a pic of an I/C liveried TSO with this rainstrip. However, I'm not 100% sure about whether t he FOs had them. Certainly the HST Mk3s all appear to have a rainstrip.

 

Ian S

Some images seem to show that some LHCS Mk3s did have them and some didn't. Was it a modification during build or have they been removed / added? Interesting point you have made.

 

Roy

[Roy Langridge]

Given that the planned release of these is not that far away, I too wish Oxford would confirm the specification. Will they have clear or tinted glass, provision for lighting, be lit or have none?

 

I like lighting and would prefer there to be some provision for it but if they don't have it I will add if. The tinting is, however, a deal breaker. Until that is confirmed I will not be ordering any.

 

Roy

[Hilux5972]

Given that the planned release of these is not that far away, I too wish Oxford would confirm the specification. Will they have clear or tinted glass, provision for lighting, be lit or have none?

 

I like lighting and would prefer there to be some provision for it but if they don't have it I will add if. The tinting is, however, a deal breaker. Until that is confirmed I will not be ordering any.

 

Roy

Looking at images on this page,

 

http://oxfordrail.com/76/OR76MK3.htm

 

It suggests there is no tinting at all. I hope this is incorrect as it will look awful having clear windows. Fingers crossed they are not finalised!