Hornby Class 87 - Confirmed Newly Tooled Version for 2017 !

[James90012]

On 17/05/2022 at 12:00, boxbrownie said:

I like the Porterbrook, it’s just on the Bullied the purple looks awful……IMO of course.

 

Speaking of which, I've searched most of the regular transfer sites but have I missed anyone who is doing the transfers for 87002 in Porterbrook purple?

[Pete the Elaner]

52 minutes ago, 97406 said:

 

That is another possibility, and similar to my castings when they're fresh from the mould. The castings I make need fettling on the rear face that is stuck to the locomotive front. Epoxy is the best glue to attach them, after painting the loco and the MU parts separately first, as you can tweak the positioning for a few minutes and clean excess glue off with a toothpick with a little white spirit or IPA. Overspray with satin or matt varnish after it has all set.

 

 

 

 

I thought your castings looked good in the photos. I used square bits of plastruct on my Hornby 86s which I detailed about 20-25 years ago & from a normal viewing distance, they look ok.
I find that close-up photography is very unflattering & knowing how close-up the photo of mine is, I don't think they look that bad.

I must admit I had never considered copying others with casting, possibly because it is a process I have never tried before.

 

The other feature I would find useful is TDM fittings. I have a few A1 models etchings left but they are a little too big & I don't think they are available any more. I feel etching is the way to go for these but that is another process I am unfamiliar with.

[97406]

Another backdated 87. The Hornby class 92 pan will get replaced with a spare Heljan BW one, currently on order from Gaugemaster.

[97406]

7 hours ago, Pete the Elaner said:

…

The other feature I would find useful is TDM fittings. I have a few A1 models etchings left but they are a little too big & I don't think they are available any more. I feel etching is the way to go for these but that is another process I am unfamiliar with.

 

I ended up making TDM fittings for a couple of my locos out of small pieces of plasticard ‘lovingly’ shaped with tweezers and wet and dry paper. There was a lot of trial and error, and swearing! I would give my eye teeth for a decent etch to be available. 

[cairnsroadworks]

12 hours ago, James90012 said:

 

Speaking of which, I've searched most of the regular transfer sites but have I missed anyone who is doing the transfers for 87002 in Porterbrook purple?

I managed to persuade Rainbow Railways to do me the silver bits and numbers from Railtec. Plates aren’t available alas. 

[97406]

2 minutes ago, cairnsroadworks said:

I managed to persuade Rainbow Railways to do me the silver bits and numbers from Railtec. Plates aren’t available alas. 

 

I like that. The front handrails are a pain, and I managed to break all of mine with my sausage fingers, so I replaced them with new ones made from 0.7mm nickel silver wire with little mountings made from 0.3 or 0.4 mm wire bent into an ‘L’ shape. The front handrails on the Heljan 86/4s fared little better. For soldering I recommend a using solder paste with 2% silver - Pb62/Sn36/Ag2 - available from Hobby Holidays or Eileen’s Emporium. Use a phosphoric acid flux. Soldering becomes a lot easier with those 2 items.

[Pete the Elaner]

5 hours ago, 97406 said:

 

I ended up making TDM fittings for a couple of my locos out of small pieces of plasticard ‘lovingly’ shaped with tweezers and wet and dry paper. There was a lot of trial and error, and swearing! I would give my eye teeth for a decent etch to be available. 

 

The trouble with cutting them individually is that they tend to be a little inconsistent. Producing them electronically gets around that.

The way to get nice etches is to design them yourself.

I am pretty sure a friend of mine has got some etching done, so I'll ask. Maybe we can work together on artwork & get some TDM fittings made for ourselves? I think 1 sheet of A4 would be more than enough for both of us to have more than would ever need.

[john new]

Finally got around to buying one and currently test running it in on DC as not yet got around to a DCC decoder for it.

 

I noted several posts came up in search suggesting DCC chips are not easy to fit due to Hornby not leaving enough space for one:-

 

1) is there a consensus as to the best chip to get, I am not bothering with sound?

 

2) if you do fit DCC to it can the tail lights be switched off when it is hauling a train rather than when it is running l/engine? I am not obsessive about having loco lamps and train tail lamps but the illuminated lights when this is running with a train do scream out wrong because they stand out so strongly.
 

It may seem daft to some but I would actually rather have both sets of lights off (no front light being less noticeable) than the red one’s screaming wrong!

 

Edited June 28, 2022 by john new

[john new]

On 28/06/2022 at 14:58, john new said:

Finally got around to buying one and currently test running it in on DC as not yet got around to a DCC decoder for it.

 

I noted several posts came up in search suggesting DCC chips are not easy to fit due to Hornby not leaving enough space for one:-

 

1) is there a consensus as to the best chip to get, I am not bothering with sound?

 

2) if you do fit DCC to it can the tail lights be switched off when it is hauling a train rather than when it is running l/engine? I am not obsessive about having loco lamps and train tail lamps but the illuminated lights when this is running with a train do scream out wrong because they stand out so strongly.
 

It may seem daft to some but I would actually rather have both sets of lights off (no front light being less noticeable) than the red one’s screaming wrong!

 

Post boost - Does anyone have the answers to (1) & (2) please.

[wombatofludham]

I've fitted Lais 8pin chips in my 87s and can just about get the body back on.  The chip itself fits in a handy pocket in the chassis.  As supplied the tail lights come on with the headlights although it ought to be possible to disable them if you can access a programmer (like a "Sprog") although I've not personally tried as I'm a bit more sanguine about these things!

Don't be put off by Lais being a budget chip brand, they are fine and even coped with the lardbut current draw on the Heljan 8 pin 86s which has been known to fry some chips.  They do have a very straight line acceleration curve, but for the price I can't fault them for plain vanilla dcc.

[James90012]

I just fitted a Lenz Standard, removed one circuit board screw and sat it where the speaker would go, screwed the circuit board back and all seems good!

[97406]

On 21/07/2022 at 21:59, wombatofludham said:

I've fitted Lais 8pin chips in my 87s and can just about get the body back on.  The chip itself fits in a handy pocket in the chassis.  As supplied the tail lights come on with the headlights although it ought to be possible to disable them if you can access a programmer (like a "Sprog") although I've not personally tried as I'm a bit more sanguine about these things!

Don't be put off by Lais being a budget chip brand, they are fine and even coped with the lardbut current draw on the Heljan 8 pin 86s which has been known to fry some chips.  They do have a very straight line acceleration curve, but for the price I can't fault them for plain vanilla dcc.

I've used Lais chips on the bulk of my DCC conversions and they have done the job admirably. Some will get replaced with sound chips in due course, and they will then get put in new locos that need them.

[VXDH92]

On 01/06/2022 at 10:11, cairnsroadworks said:

I managed to persuade Rainbow Railways to do me the silver bits and numbers from Railtec. Plates aren’t available alas. 

That looks absolutely awesome! I'd love to have a Porterbrook 87.

 

Just a friendly pointer if I may - I think the yellow warning patch on the front should meet with the white window frames (i.e. no purple in between)...

 

Love it 'though - that roof and underframe weathering really top it off 🙂

[BR(S)]

32 minutes ago, VXDH92 said:

Just a friendly pointer if I may - I think the yellow warning patch on the front should meet with the white window frames (i.e. no purple in between)...

 

The purple was visible in that area, though it wasn't always the case:

 

https://andrewstransport.smugmug.com/Britishelectriclocomotives/Class-87-electrics-87002/i-Tx9gshS

Edited July 26, 2022 by BR(S)

[cairnsroadworks]

33 minutes ago, VXDH92 said:

That looks absolutely awesome! I'd love to have a Porterbrook 87.

 

Just a friendly pointer if I may - I think the yellow warning patch on the front should meet with the white window frames (i.e. no purple in between)...

 

Love it 'though - that roof and underframe weathering really top it off 🙂

Many thanks glad you like it. I’d missed the purple band around the top until I checked the prototype pictures, so it was retrofitted :-)

[VXDH92]

46 minutes ago, BR(S) said:

 

The purple was visible in that area, though it wasn't always the case:

 

https://andrewstransport.smugmug.com/Britishelectriclocomotives/Class-87-electrics-87002/i-Tx9gshS

Oh yeah, learn something new every day. It seems it was altered after some time then? I think my personal preference is the original, with no purple between the purple and white, but there's not an awful lot of difference tbh.

[cairnsroadworks]

11 minutes ago, VXDH92 said:

Oh yeah, learn something new every day. It seems it was altered after some time then? I think my personal preference is the original, with no purple between the purple and white, but there's not an awful lot of difference tbh.

Looking back at prototype pics it seemed to have been modified after only a couple of weeks. Pics of it in late June 2003 show it already modified. 

[Bonniedundee]

Good evening all, I’m looking for any images of Intercity 87’s on the sleepers during the 90’s. I understand that they ran during the unsociable hours but hoping that some of you might have stayed up to photograph the sleepers. I’ve tried flickr etc but no joy so far

[brushman47544]

Photos of overnight sleepers would mostly be in the dark, so you could try by searching by [station name]  + station + sleepers. Using Carlisle I found this on Flickr. Otherwise you could try start or end points where departures/arrivals would be in daylight at least in summer. But no so easy for the WCML.

 

[newbryford]

2 hours ago, brushman47544 said:

Photos of overnight sleepers would mostly be in the dark, so you could try by searching by [station name]  + station + sleepers. Using Carlisle I found this on Flickr. Otherwise you could try start or end points where departures/arrivals would be in daylight at least in summer. But no so easy for the WCML.

 

 

And you can always try searching for the headcodes of the various sleeper services. "1s25 87" for example.

The above pic pops up with "sleeper 87 1991" as a search.

This is "sleeper 87 1992"

 

 

[ThaneofFife]

Nice photo of 87009 in the executive livery in the latest Hornby magazine with confirmation these are the first models to get the 21 pin interface.

Pity no pic of large logo 87006 yet but at least there was no report of this version being cancelled.  I believe this model needed some sample revisions whatever that entailed but both models will become my favourite 00 locos.

Expected soon.

RRP now £217.99

Edited September 25, 2022 by ThaneofFife

[ThaneofFife]

The new 87s are now due in January.

[BR(S)]

Picture of 87009 in Intercity Executive livery about a third of the way down the page here:

 

https://uk.Hornby.com/community/blog-and-news/engine-shed/reflection

 

Good comparison picture here:

 

 

Edited December 26, 2022 by BR(S)

[Ncarter2]

7 hours ago, BR(S) said:

Picture of 87009 in Intercity Executive livery about a third of the way down the page here:

 

https://uk.Hornby.com/community/blog-and-news/engine-shed/reflection

 

Good comparison picture here:

 

 

Great photo, I used to enjoy patrolling the station in its pre modernisation days. 

[ThaneofFife]

lets hope H get the correct face on 87 006.  nothing but originals jumper equipment.  my waters re sensing this could easily be cocked up.......especially if they are sending TT120 train sets out without a power clip for the track !