Tri-ang Railways.

[GoingUnderground]

9 hours ago, railroadbill said:

 

But the list of parts shows all the components that made up the motor bogie each with its own reference so they must have been available from triang at least to a dealer who could carry out repairs. If an armature had  a broken wire, let's say, a replacement one was available - so the item could be repaired rather than needing to be replaced.

 

Also that mechanism had quite a good sales life then.

 

I think we're talking at cross-purposes. I thought that your were saying earlier that the number of parts made it less repairable - my mistake. Sorry.

 

If you wanted spares it was very easy. You went to your local dealer and told them what you were after, usually that was a hobby shop who offered a servicing or repair service as well and would have had the Service Sheets to find out the part numbers. The small toy shops weren't too interested in ordering in spares, not worth it to them for the profit they'd make on it. The dealer would order from Margate. I can't remember how long it took, but that probably depended on how often the dealer placed orders.

 

Everything listed was available as these were models in current production in Margate and in many cases spanned several models. Also the lifespan of models was measured in years in those days, not months like today and the parts would have been needed when the next batch of a model that used them was made. Rovex fully understood the economies of scale in using as many parts as possible across the range of models even if accuracy suffered - these were toys after all.  That was how they kept the selling prices down. And it wasn't just using the parts in similar models such as carbon brushes or wheelsets. For instance the ladders on the 100 ton tank wagon, R669, were first used on the original colour light signal, RT405, and I think were also used on the TPO trackside units at one point. 

 

3 hours ago, DCB said:

That's less parts than I expected, Complete wheel sets not individual wheels axles bushes and gears for instance.  I have used shortened K's Mk 2  (5 pole)  armatures in mine on occasion, but they don't make as big a difference as they do in an X04.  Probably because the power bogie has ball bearings to control end float.

 

Look back at Service Sheets 12a and 12b and you will see the wheels and axles individually listed with S prefixes indicating an individual part, not a sub-assembly with the X prefix. There are one or two other items on the earlier sheets shown as S items but which were only shown as sub-assemblies in the later service sheet. My guess is that only the sub-assemblies were available either because that is how they were stored in Margate as made up sub-assemblies  not as the parts to make up the sub-assembly, or that they didn't receive enough orders for the individual items in the sub-assembly, or that the margin on selling the individual items was so low that it wasn't worthwhile listing the individual components.

[sagaguy]

Talking of Triang EM2s and spare parts,when i was a teenager in about 1960/61,i wrote to Triang asking about ordering an EM2 pantograph.This duly arrived and was put to one side for an aborted EMU project and there it stayed for the next 55 years until i spotted an EM2 on ebay with a damaged pantograph.Out came the spare and was fitted making an excellent model.Here it is with flanges turned down and operating from Trix Catenary.I mean 55 years to use a spare part?!.Really!.

 

                          Ray.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[kevinlms]

22 minutes ago, GoingUnderground said:

 

I think we're talking at cross-purposes. I thought that your were saying earlier that the number of parts made it less repairable - my mistake. Sorry.

 

If you wanted spares it was very easy. You went to your local dealer and told them what you were after, usually that was a hobby shop who offered a servicing or repair service as well and would have had the Service Sheets to find out the part numbers. The small toy shops weren't too interested in ordering in spares, not worth it to them for the profit they'd make on it. The dealer would order from Margate. I can't remember how long it took, but that probably depended on how often the dealer placed orders.

 

Everything listed was available as these were models in current production in Margate and in many cases spanned several models. Also the lifespan of models was measured in years in those days, not months like today and the parts would have been needed when the next batch of a model that used them was made. Rovex fully understood the economies of scale in using as many parts as possible across the range of models even if accuracy suffered - these were toys after all.  That was how they kept the selling prices down. And it wasn't just using the parts in similar models such as carbon brushes or wheelsets. For instance the ladders on the 100 ton tank wagon, R669, were first used on the original colour light signal, RT405, and I think were also used on the TPO trackside units at one point. 

 

 

Look back at Service Sheets 12a and 12b and you will see the wheels and axles individually listed with S prefixes indicating an individual part, not a sub-assembly with the X prefix. There are one or two other items on the earlier sheets shown as S items but which were only shown as sub-assemblies in the later service sheet. My guess is that only the sub-assemblies were available either because that is how they were stored in Margate as made up sub-assemblies  not as the parts to make up the sub-assembly, or that they didn't receive enough orders for the individual items in the sub-assembly, or that the margin on selling the individual items was so low that it wasn't worthwhile listing the individual components.

It's entirely a different age and what you wrote suggests that the idea of having all parts available as spares, really was uneconomic. Sub-assemblies do improve things, but still not a solution that comes close to breaking even, let alone makes money, on a retail level.

Yes common spares like motors, brushes, couplings, mail bags etc are worth stocking, but most parts probably could go years without selling one.

The modern approach like Pete's Spares, would seem to be the way to continue spares, as they have the turnover to make it worthwhile.

 

If any one doubts what I said was true and it's all about providing 'a service' - then remember the owners of Tri-ang or Hornby have gone broke more than once!

Edited May 20, 2023 by kevinlms
More info

[andyman7]

The Triang 'model' of business is a bit like the Aldenham overhaul process for London Buses - an amazing ecosystem that we can (and should) admire) whilst recognising just how much the world has moved on. You'll find plenty of disparaging comments about Triang and Margate-era Hornby elsewhere on these boards because of the habitual re-use of older tooling, wrong bogies or wheelbases on models, the raised bufferbeam height used to accommodate the tension lock coupling lifting arm, the tension lock coupling itself etc etc, but they were all features of the common parts pool and internal standards of a range that didn't look outside to others for 'standards'. Those that decry it miss the point of how it worked, but equally it wouldn't fit the current marketplace.

[DCB]

 

2 hours ago, kevinlms said:

It's entirely a different age and what you wrote suggests that the idea of having all parts available as spares, really was uneconomic. Sub-assemblies do improve things, but still not a solution that comes close to breaking even, let alone makes money, on a retail level.

Yes common spares like motors, brushes, couplings, mail bags etc are worth stocking, but most parts probably could go years without selling one.

The modern approach like Pete's Spares, would seem to be the way to continue spares, as they have the turnover to make it worthwhile.

 

If any one doubts what I said was true and it's all about providing 'a service' - then remember the owners of Tri-ang or Hornby have gone broke more than once!

 

2 hours ago, andyman7 said:

The Triang 'model' of business is a bit like the Aldenham overhaul process for London Buses - an amazing ecosystem that we can (and should) admire) whilst recognising just how much the world has moved on. You'll find plenty of disparaging comments about Triang and Margate-era Hornby elsewhere on these boards because of the habitual re-use of older tooling, wrong bogies or wheelbases on models, the raised bufferbeam height used to accommodate the tension lock coupling lifting arm, the tension lock coupling itself etc etc, but they were all features of the common parts pool and internal standards of a range that didn't look outside to others for 'standards'. Those that decry it miss the point of how it worked, but equally it wouldn't fit the current marketplace.

Its a different age and a different system.  Triang / Mecanno etc were manufacturers and any spare parts could be taken from stock intended for production and replaced with new parts, almost instantly.  Modern Hornby is a wholesaler and orders batches of models from manufacturers, obviously (?)  it can't send faulty units back to North Korea or where ever for rectification, so has to decide whether to stock spares or simply write off and replace faulty units or refund unhappy customers. (the dealer is historically Hornby's customer)   In the 2000s  new model has many new bespoke parts and even different batches of the same model have different iterations of ostensibly similar parts which often do not interchange.  The Triang  Jinty, Diesel shunter and saddle tank, shared 90% commonality and the differences were basically the body shell, fixing screw and bracket.   Later they messed it up with smoke units etc, but basically one coupling and one coupling screw covered the range.   They really didn't need many spares to cover the range, and as they were only covering current models they could get parts from production.   Modern Hornby is different, just watch the TV show.  A couple of guys bodging and cannibalising returns to get them going again.

I reckon I have more spares than Hornby,  yes its frustrating that Triang only had 4 or 5 wheelbases but its so much simpler that they all take 1/2" armatures,  Triang 00 and TT, Hornby Dublo, K's, Scalextrix all interchangeable.  I mix and match   1980s / 2000s Mainline / Hornby etc coupling rods and bodies, 1950s/60s Triang and H/D chassis some with Romford or GR Wrenn wheels.  Some built 40 years ago.  They just work and keep working,  I have a Hornby Grange with 60 year old H/D 3 rail wheels on a Triang chassis, it works, it pulls trains, and a Hornby Grange. its feeble and looks silly with its anorexic coupling rods.

That's why I try to live in the 1960s Railway wise.  

[kevinlms]

In that Tri-ang were no different to any other large toy maker. Plenty of other examples in other countries and includes Peco for their track. They made reliable products at a competitive price for the day, to satisfy most modellers, often youngsters. Not fine scale products for those wanting museum quality.

In more recent times, the model railway market has changed and now the the biggest source of revenue is the adult market. So the product demand has changed and better quality models are what sells.

[GoingUnderground]

12 hours ago, kevinlms said:

It's entirely a different age and what you wrote suggests that the idea of having all parts available as spares, really was uneconomic. Sub-assemblies do improve things, but still not a solution that comes close to breaking even, let alone makes money, on a retail level.

Yes common spares like motors, brushes, couplings, mail bags etc are worth stocking, but most parts probably could go years without selling one.

The modern approach like Pete's Spares, would seem to be the way to continue spares, as they have the turnover to make it worthwhile.

 

If any one doubts what I said was true and it's all about providing 'a service' - then remember the owners of Tri-ang or Hornby have gone broke more than once!

 

IMHO, you've missed the point totally.

 

It was a very different age, and I'm not for a moment suggesting that we go back there. All parts were available as spares because, by and large, they were needed for ongoing production of other models as well and wouldn't have been sitting around gathering dust for long. They made most, if not all of the parts items themselves in Margate, so lead times and batch sizes were entirely under their own control and could be changed relatively easily and rapidly if necessary. Look at the service sheets and you'll see lots of the same part number appearing over and over again across different models, or one service sheet being applicable across several models with only a few minor differences, so the range of spares required was nowhere near as large as you seem to be assuming.

 

The economics for Peters Spares, and before them Modelspares, seems to me to be much more fragile because they do have to wait for the orders for spares to come in as there is no other use for the spare parts. Peters does sell new models as well, they don't restrict themselves to selling only spares as a quick look at their website will soon show. Arguably they are following Triang's example in selling finished models to make their money.

 

Your comments on the failure of Lines Bros and then Rovex's new owners DCM seem to be based on a misunderstanding of the causes of the failure of these groups. There is a very significant difference between an individual company in a Group going broke and its parent company going broke. A group can be brought down by a catastrophic performance in another part of the businesses that is so great that it totally outweighs the profit made in the rest of the group.  

 

When Lines Bros went under, it was because Lines were using profits from their UK operations to subsidise the activities of their overseas subsidiaries and took too long to get rid of the unprofitable overseas activities. Rovex was a profitable business, and was the dominant player in model railways in the UK at least in OO gauge, or DCM wouldn't have bought it from the Lines Bros receiver.

 

When DCM went down it was due to poor business decisions in areas largely outside of Rovex that drained away the cash from DCM. Rovex was still a profitable business inside the DCM group even though its profitability had been dented by the reduction in the market for model railways, and IIRC, the arrival of new players into the UK market. If it hadn't been profitable it wouldn't have been rescued.

 

I can't speak for events after DCM went down, and leave that to others to cover.

 

Have a read through Pat Hammond's Story of Rovex to get a better picture on the Lines Bros and DCM collapses. 

 

8 hours ago, DCB said:

 

 

Its a different age and a different system.  Triang / Mecanno etc were manufacturers and any spare parts could be taken from stock intended for production and replaced with new parts, almost instantly.  Modern Hornby is a wholesaler and orders batches of models from manufacturers, obviously (?)  it can't send faulty units back to North Korea or where ever for rectification, so has to decide whether to stock spares or simply write off and replace faulty units or refund unhappy customers. (the dealer is historically Hornby's customer)   In the 2000s  new model has many new bespoke parts and even different batches of the same model have different iterations of ostensibly similar parts which often do not interchange.  The Triang  Jinty, Diesel shunter and saddle tank, shared 90% commonality and the differences were basically the body shell, fixing screw and bracket.   Later they messed it up with smoke units etc, but basically one coupling and one coupling screw covered the range.   They really didn't need many spares to cover the range, and as they were only covering current models they could get parts from production.   Modern Hornby is different, just watch the TV show.  A couple of guys bodging and cannibalising returns to get them going again.

I reckon I have more spares than Hornby,  yes its frustrating that Triang only had 4 or 5 wheelbases but its so much simpler that they all take 1/2" armatures,  Triang 00 and TT, Hornby Dublo, K's, Scalextrix all interchangeable.  I mix and match   1980s / 2000s Mainline / Hornby etc coupling rods and bodies, 1950s/60s Triang and H/D chassis some with Romford or GR Wrenn wheels.  Some built 40 years ago.  They just work and keep working,  I have a Hornby Grange with 60 year old H/D 3 rail wheels on a Triang chassis, it works, it pulls trains, and a Hornby Grange. its feeble and looks silly with its anorexic coupling rods.

That's why I try to live in the 1960s Railway wise.  

 

The models were damned reliable, some still running today with all their original components still in full working order, and in all probability the quantities needed for spares in the 1950s and '60s were negligible compared to the quantities needed for production runs. So It's likely that there wasn't a significant additional cost in holding them. The use across several models also helped as the parts in greatest use would have been made more often and in larger batches to get the unit cost as low as possible.

 

The products did improve but some parts must have remained unchanged and been manufactured and in regular production use for getting on for 20 years. One only has to think of the DMU R157, introduced along with the EMU R156 as they shared components (and even the moulding tool for the floor panel insert for the trailing bogie in the power cars), in 1956 or '57, sorry I don't have the exact year to hand. It went on until the mid/late 1970s using the same components. The only thing that changed was the addition of the roof mounted headcode box with its illumination and that only affected the bodyshell as provision for illumination of a destination blind was built in to the roof moulding back in the 1950s but not used.

Edited May 20, 2023 by GoingUnderground

[cypherman]

1 hour ago, GoingUnderground said:

 

IMHO, you've missed the point totally.

 

It was a very different age, and I'm not for a moment suggesting that we go back there. All parts were available as spares because, by and large, they were needed for ongoing production of other models as well and wouldn't have been sitting around gathering dust for long. They made most, if not all of the parts items themselves in Margate, so lead times and batch sizes were entirely under their own control and could be changed relatively easily and rapidly if necessary. Look at the service sheets and you'll see lots of the same part number appearing over and over again across different models, or one service sheet being applicable across several models with only a few minor differences, so the range of spares required was nowhere near as large as you seem to be assuming.

 

The economics for Peters Spares, and before them Modelspares, seems to me to be much more fragile because they do have to wait for the orders for spares to come in as there is no other use for the spare parts. Peters does sell new models as well, they don't restrict themselves to selling only spares as a quick look at their website will soon show. Arguably they are following Triang's example in selling finished models to make their money.

 

Your comments on the failure of Lines Bros and then Rovex's new owners DCM seem to be based on a misunderstanding of the causes of the failure of these groups. There is a very significant difference between an individual company in a Group going broke and its parent company going broke. A group can be brought down by a catastrophic performance in another part of the businesses that is so great that it totally outweighs the profit made in the rest of the group.  

 

When Lines Bros went under, it was because Lines were using profits from their UK operations to subsidise the activities of their overseas subsidiaries and took too long to get rid of the unprofitable overseas activities. Rovex was a profitable business, and was the dominant player in model railways in the UK at least in OO gauge, or DCM wouldn't have bought it from the Lines Bros receiver.

 

When DCM went down it was due to poor business decisions in areas largely outside of Rovex that drained away the cash from DCM. Rovex was still a profitable business inside the DCM group even though its profitability had been dented by the reduction in the market for model railways, and IIRC, the arrival of new players into the UK market. If it hadn't been profitable it wouldn't have been rescued.

 

I can't speak for events after DCM went down, and leave that to others to cover.

 

Have a read through Pat Hammond's Story of Rovex to get a better picture on the Lines Bros and DCM collapses. 

 

 

The models were damned reliable, some still running today with all their original components still in full working order, and in all probability the quantities needed for spares in the 1950s and '60s were negligible compared to the quantities needed for production runs. So It's unlikely that there wasn't a significant additional cost in holding them. The use across several models also helped as the parts in greatest use would have been made more often and in larger batches to get the unit cost as low as possible.

 

The products did improve but some parts must have remained unchanged and been manufactured and in regular production use for getting on for 20 years. One only has to think of the DMU R157, introduced along with the EMU R156 as they shared components (and even the moulding tool for the floor panel insert for the trailing bogie in the power cars), in 1956 or '57, sorry I don't have the exact year to hand. It went on until the mid/late 1970s using the same components. The only thing that changed was the addition of the roof mounted headcode box with its illumination and that only affected the bodyshell as provision for illumination of a destination blind was built in to the roof moulding back in the 1950s but not used.

Hi all,

You are dead right about Triang's interchangeability. The chassis on the B12 was used on at least 4 different locos. B12, Hall, Black 5, N15. If not more.

[kevinlms]

10 hours ago, GoingUnderground said:

 

IMHO, you've missed the point totally.

 

 

 

 

The models were damned reliable, some still running today with all their original components still in full working order, and in all probability the quantities needed for spares in the 1950s and '60s were negligible compared to the quantities needed for production runs. So It's likely that there wasn't a significant additional cost in holding them. The use across several models also helped as the parts in greatest use would have been made more often and in larger batches to get the unit cost as low as possible.

 

The products did improve but some parts must have remained unchanged and been manufactured and in regular production use for getting on for 20 years. One only has to think of the DMU R157, introduced along with the EMU R156 as they shared components (and even the moulding tool for the floor panel insert for the trailing bogie in the power cars), in 1956 or '57, sorry I don't have the exact year to hand. It went on until the mid/late 1970s using the same components. The only thing that changed was the addition of the roof mounted headcode box with its illumination and that only affected the bodyshell as provision for illumination of a destination blind was built in to the roof moulding back in the 1950s but not used.

I don't think I am totally missing the point, I did earlier state that sub-assemblies were a better option than a whole host of individual parts. Also the common parts for many models - of which I previously stated that this saved lots of money for the TOY market.

 

Yes, I agree that having a factory, meant that any parts could be taken off a shelf relatively easily. But you also said that the models are 'damned reliable', so what was the point of having huge lists of parts to the public - it wasn't necessary.

 

Perhaps I went a little overboard in suggesting it 'sent them broke' (although I don't believe that is true) obviously that wasn't a key thing, as you pointed out. The fact was the world of model railways, was changing in the mid 1970s with the likes of Airfix & Mainline. Tri-ang needed to keep up by improving some of their models. Some of the new models of that vintage, were nothing like the quality of the Airfix 4F - something I don't understand why Tri-ang didn't make earlier, using mostly existing 3F parts, just a new body shell.

[GoingUnderground]

5 hours ago, kevinlms said:

I don't think I am totally missing the point, I did earlier state that sub-assemblies were a better option than a whole host of individual parts. Also the common parts for many models - of which I previously stated that this saved lots of money for the TOY market.

 

Yes, I agree that having a factory, meant that any parts could be taken off a shelf relatively easily. But you also said that the models are 'damned reliable', so what was the point of having huge lists of parts to the public - it wasn't necessary.

 

Perhaps I went a little overboard in suggesting it 'sent them broke' (although I don't believe that is true) obviously that wasn't a key thing, as you pointed out. The fact was the world of model railways, was changing in the mid 1970s with the likes of Airfix & Mainline. Tri-ang needed to keep up by improving some of their models. Some of the new models of that vintage, were nothing like the quality of the Airfix 4F - something I don't understand why Tri-ang didn't make earlier, using mostly existing 3F parts, just a new body shell.

I'm sorry, but, IMHO, you are missing the point because you are not looking at it in the context of its time. I'm talking about the 1950s and 1960s the Triang Railways era, which ended with the takeover of Rovex by DCM in1971. You're talking about the mid-late 1970s onwards, the Hornby Railways and Hornby Hobbies era onwards, when things started to become very different for manufacturing businesses generally and for Rovex in particular in the 1980s with competition from new entrants into the OO gauge model railway market seeking a piece of the action at their expense through more realistic models manufactured and assembled on a sub-contract basis outside of the UK. Rovex were slow to recognise that change in the market, something that nearly proved to be fatal, but that doesn't make their policy of making spare parts available to dealers in the 1950s and '60s wrong, which is what you seem to be saying based on the very changed circumstances of up to 30 years later.

 

Consumer durable goods were relatively much more expensive in the 1950s and '60s than today and were expected to be repairable for less than the cost of replacing them. Today's "throw-away and replace" consumerism didn't exist. Replacing an unrepairable item meant going without for longer for some other appliance that they did not have. This was true even for those parents who could afford and had space at home for luxury toys like model railways for their kids like me.

 

I still remember the horror of one of my bosses in the early 1980s when his local garage told him that they couldn't replace the broken speedo on his rather expensive and newish car as the speedo was not available as a separate part and they'd have to replace the entire one-piece instrument cluster. As a child of the 1950s, (I'm old, I'll admit it) I'm utterly horrified that so many manufactured products nowadays cannot be repaired when some minor component in a sub-assembly fails, and the whole sub-assembly, or in the worst case the whole thing, has to be thrown away and replaced.

 

Triang included two booklets with every Triang Railways and Triang Hornby loco that I bought in the 1960s, one was the user manual, the other was details of the servicing scheme which included lists of dealers who were part of that scheme. It even listed service dealers outside the UK. 

 

They made servicing "desks/kits" avaialbe to dealers to make it easier for them to repair locos etc. and supplied them, not the public, with the service sheets so they knew which part numbers to quote when ordering parts to repair items. I don't think that I ever saw a service sheet in the 1950s and '60s, but that didn't stop me ordering from my favourite hobby shop replacement pantographs for my EM2 which suffered the, sadly, usual breaks at the top of the upper arms, and fitting them myself. It's only since I returned to the hobby about 15-20 years ago that I got to see my first service sheets.

 

The models were damned reliable, but not when they fell off a table onto the floor especially if it was a hard floor, a fate that my own 3MT, R.59, my first Triang loco, suffered a couple of times at my young hands in 1959 to my great distress, or were dropped or trodden on if the layout was on the floor, or suffered a similar fate at the hands of younger siblings or pets, or user error such as over oiling and getting oil into the commutator slots (guilty as charged, m'lud), or taking it apart out of curiosity and breaking or losing a key part in the process (been there, done that, read the book, seen the film, got the DVD and the T shirt!). There will have been instances where they simply wore out due to very extensive use - such as axle holes in the chassis going oval resulting in wheels locking up. Being man-made, very occasionally they did fail.

 

The commonality of components meant that there wasn't a "huge list of parts" irrespective of whether the public had access to the parts list or not. As I've tried to explain, a huge list of parts was something that Rovex did their very best to avoid.

 

The models were simple back in the 1950s and '60s. So simple and with so few components that there was no sense back then in only making spares available as made-up sub-assemblies. Folks would have been livid if they wanted to replace worn out commutator brushes and found that they had to buy the entire motor bogie or a complete X.04 motor because those are the next step up from the component parts. 

 

I love getting the 1950s and '60s Rovex models running again, something that I wouldn't be able to do were it not for the availability of secondhand parts to replace broken, worn out or missing items. The fact that these parts were used across so many different models means that I am generally not restricted to finding parts or sub-assemblies made specifically for the loco that I'm working on, thank goodness.

 

Sermon over.

 

You can all come out of hiding now. 

[Pylon King]

The world of Triang covered such an extensive variety of products which have fascinated me since childhood. Due to space and storage I built a small compact diorama to capture those wonderful catalogue images , even the scenic scatter materials are Triang/Hornby while several of the Model-Land buildings are original preproduction samples . Rovex were certainly responsible for enlightening the minds of countless children up and down the land .

Edited November 11, 2023 by Pylon King

[Pylon King]

 

Edited November 11, 2023 by Pylon King

[sandwich station]

On 29/04/2023 at 23:53, GoingUnderground said:

Apart from a different roof moulding to accommodate the pantographs and changeover switch and a different livery, it is identical in all other respects to the R160 double ended diesel. If the fuel tank offends you that much it is very easy to unclip and could be replaced with whatever scratchbuilt underframe equipment you felt to be appropriate. On the R160 the fuel tank is dark blue, the same shade as the body, but on the R257 double ended electric loco it is black. That's one relatively easy way to tell if the tank on an R160 is original = blue, or black = replacement.

 

The R160/257 also makes a very good starting point for producing a more realistic-looking EMD F7/F9 than the mix'n'match R55 which has features of the F7/F9 as well as contemporary locos from Alco, their FA, and the Fairbanks Morse "C" Liners.

 

The double ended diesel is R.159, not R.160 and it was only the early versions that had blue fuel tanks. The later ones had black.

[rockershovel]

Speaking of "giraffe cars" and the like, it would be interesting to know more about the interchange (of ideas, at least) between Tri-ang and Lionel which was obvious around that time?