Hornby - New tooling - 57' Bow-ended suburban coaches

[gwrrob]

The crimson versions of these are now starting to appear in the shops.

 

Edited March 7, 2019 by gwrrob
add photos

[Hilux5972]

According to the latest Hornby magazine, the handed coaches come from the following reasons. The guards compartment was on one side of the coach or the other, all the brake equipment was on one side of the coach or the other, and all the off centre roof vents are on one side. That is the response they got direct from Hornby themselves. Makes sense to me. My rake will be winging its way to NZ soon, hopefully followed by the 2nd rake soon after that. 

Edited March 7, 2019 by Hilux5972
Spelling correction

[woodenhead]

Wonder if the bogies will end up on a spares basis?

 

Wouldn't mind four pairs to upgrade my existing west country B-set wheelsets.

Edited March 7, 2019 by woodenhead

[rembrow]

I've just been charged on my pre order for the 4 non 'a' suffix crimson versions

[The Johnster]

As Mr Burns would say, while doing that thing with his fingers and looking evil, 'excellent'.  I feel a trip to my local purveyor of model railway comestibles coming on tomorrow.  They look lovely from the photos, about as good as one might reasonably expect from an RTR volume producer; my only gripe is the shiny buffers but this is not beyond the wit of man (or even Johnster) and a tin of matt black. to deal with!

 

As for spare 7' bogies, I'd imagine they might be available as they have been in production for some time on the gangwayed 57' Colletts, and possibly on previous versions of these as well.  But H are cutting down on spares as everyone knows!  MJT or Comet are alternative sources, fold up brass frames with cast whitemetal side detail overlays.  These can be superglued, no soldering necessary and are not difficult to build.

[dibber25]

I was recently looking for Mk1 bogies - the latest type as fitted to Railroad Mk1s. Nothing anywhere. I ended up scrapping a coach to get the bogies. I think it's unlikely that there's any spare Collett bogies. (CJL)

 

[The Johnster]

5 hours ago, Hilux5972 said:

According to the latest Hornby magazine, the handed coaches come from the following reasons. The guards compartment was on one side of the coach or the other, all the brake equipment was on one side of the coach or the other, and all the off centre roof vents are on one side. That is the response they got direct from Hornby themselves. Makes sense to me. My rake will be winging its way to NZ soon, hopefully followed by the 2nd rake soon after that. 

This has been discussed earlier in the thread; the sets were, as Hornby correctly say, a 'mirror image' lengthways so that the all the equipment was on one side, which makes some sense in terms of the battery boxes but seems pointless in any other respect.  They seem to be unique as far as GW non gangwayed coaches in being handed in this way, so whatever advantage was expected was apparently not worth the bother of repeating.  None of us could come up with a reason for the coaches being handed within the sets, and it is a bit of a mystery.  I can see the point of handing corridor coaches so that the corridors all face the platforms, but this depends on all the platforms being on the same side as the train!

 

My two will be entering service in South Wales in the 50s from a broken up set, and to emphasise the point I intend to have same handed coaches coupled together with the first class adjacent to the brake.  I note that the crimson versions do not have set branding for the Birmingham or London areas; this suits me!

Edited March 7, 2019 by The Johnster

[woodenhead]

I had looked for bogies when the bow ended corridor stock came out, like Dibber with his Mk1 bogies, nothing.

 

im in no hurry

[Pteremy]

In similar vein the 9ft Pressed steel bogie on Hornby Hawksworths would be useful for anyone building mid-late 30's coaches, including Sunshine and Yellow Disc. 

[Neal Ball]

Handed carriages I think were a speciality of the GWR, Someone obviously decided it was a pattern worth repeating, but mainly on corridor stock. I doubt it made station stops any quicker. 

 

Re the bogies, I emailed Hornby when the original Collets came out asking for spares, they pointed me to AC models at Eastleigh, I didn’t get a reply from them. I would have thought there would be a call, maybe worth an email to Peters Spares.

[The Johnster]

4 hours ago, Pteremy said:

In similar vein the 9ft Pressed steel bogie on Hornby Hawksworths would be useful for anyone building mid-late 30's coaches, including Sunshine and Yellow Disc. 

These are available from Bachmann as spares.

[The Johnster]

My local shop has BR liveried Collett suburbans and I'm off out to get some!

[The Fatadder]

4 hours ago, Pteremy said:

In similar vein the 9ft Pressed steel bogie on Hornby Hawksworths would be useful for anyone building mid-late 30's coaches, including Sunshine and Yellow Disc. 

 

It is a shame that they are not available (given the moulding is a lot better than the available Bachmann one), I much prefer the bogies that are under both Hornby Hawksworth and Colletts to the available castings from Comet et al.  And would very much like to be able to put them under my B Sets, and some of my kit built coaches that are in the to do pile.

[Danemouth]

23 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

My local shop has BR liveried Collett suburbans and I'm off out to get some!

 

I presume we are talking about am emporium on Penarth Road - in which case next week will see him sell a couple of coaches to me.

 

Like you i will assume that a set was broken up and two or three coaches ended up at Danemouth.

 

Cheers,

 

Dave

[The Johnster]

That’s the one!

 

 

 

[tomparryharry]

On ‎26‎/‎02‎/‎2019 at 03:51, john dew said:

I agree......you can just about read it if you blow up Rob’s photos.

 

I suspect Johnster is correct about the “ No Smoking “ triangles.........I think the GWR signs had red letters on a white background.....the BR signs had whte lettering on a red background. .....like the ones on Rob ‘s coaches! I suspect that I can live with that.....not too many people in Vancouver will notice.

 

 

There are some of the crimson/maroon  coaches just arrived at the Pontypool & Blaenavon Railway shop. Initial view is very favourable.

 

Ian

[The Johnster]

I’ve picked my two up from Lord & Butler’s, then gone for a beer or 3 and some pub grub.  On bus home now but the squeeze has intervened with an order for the local shops, curse mobile phones, which means another beer as well.  Will report on coaches later but can’t see much wrong with ‘em in the boxes!

[The Johnster]

And now I've got them home, opened the boxes, and have had a look.  First, the bad news; the brake 2nd has to go back for replacement because one of the handrails at the brake end is missing.  This will probably have to wait until Monday now, I've a pretty full day tomoz with the rugby.

 

On to the better stuff, which is that they are in every other respect every bit as good as I expected.  The finish is just about perfect (though I will be doing something about the shine wheels and buffers) and the coaches have a very definite 'presence'.  All my minor misgivings about no smoking notices are relieved, and this is I think the first brake coach I've ever had with painted detail in the guard's compartment.  Not sure what can be done to improve it, an ungildable lily, but one could I suppose replace the door handles and grab rails with separate components (I won't be doing this, the moulded ones picked out in brass paint look pretty good).  The roofs appear to have brackets for destination boards, but I can't imagine these were ever used much.

 

What are the black plastic strips included in the 'alternative close couplings' packet for?

[The Johnster]

It's just occurred to me that they might be the destination boards!

[Philou]

Hope you enjoy the coaches, Johnster. Pity one's got to go back. Peter is away this weekend - if you wanted to see him!

 

Cheers,

 

Philip

 

PS: I was thinking of getting some, too.

[The Johnster]

Well, I reckon the glitch on mine is just unlucky and probably not typical, and with that taken into account I’m happy to recommend them!  Their clear improvement over an Airfix B set next to them is remarkable; the B set will be withdrawn from service at the end of the current timetable sequence!

 

There is still work for a B set at Cwmdimbath, but it’ll be a Comet flat ended one.  The Airfix bogies might have a future under a refurbished K’s A31 trailer and a cut’n’shut Airfix all third as a strengthener. 

 

So this purchase will be to some extent offset with new coaches more suitable to the Tondu area made from bits made surplus by it.  Win win. 

Edited March 8, 2019 by The Johnster

[The Stationmaster]

Mine are waiting collection in Alton where they arrived very recently.

[lofty1966]

I'll be surprised if Hornby make the bogies available separately as they had stopped offering the old railroad ones for upgrading from the earlier MK1's a long time before the newly tooled 57 footers appeared.

[The Johnster]

The handrail issue on mine is a shame; this is otherwise a near perfect model.  Having had some 'bits dropping off' issues with a 42xx, I am less than convinced that H have adequate QC in place (I accept that this is particularly difficult with the Chinese production model, but B do not seem to suffer in the same way).  I am delighted that the coaches have appeared so quickly after their announcement, and with the quality and value for money in general, but less pleased that I have to make another cross town 2 buses each way trip which is going to take me about 4 hours to exchange the model for a good one.  This was not visible in the shop with the coach in the box.  

 

I would be highly miffed if I was reliant on mail order, as it is a lottery as to when your replacement is going to turn up, especially if you are an overseas customer.  If I am just unlucky, that's not so bad and I can live with it (it's nice to have something to grumble about at my age), but if this is a general trend H need to get it under control asap.  It looks like carelessness because of the model being rushed to market before the process is ready for it.  The competition has a very unenviable reputation for tardiness, but a reputation for shoddiness could be just as damaging, and H are not in the best condition to sustain much damage right now!

[Ian Hargrave]

The QC issues have been a perennial “difficulty “ with Hornby for a very long time,I’m afraid.The Hornby thread has been inundated with complaints of one variety or another....the recent Hornby Duchess is one example of too many.

 

As one who gnashed his teeth over it on several occasions,reluctantly I have come to accept that this sort of occurrence is par for the course and that if we want....as we all do...these utterly brilliant Hornby models,then we grin and bear it,shrug our shoulders,take/send it back and request a replacement.This is the way of Hornby ‘s world .It shouldn’t be,I know.Trying to change the situation is akin to banging your head against a brick wall.

 

There is one respected member of this forum ( among many) who has tried to convey this to Simon K .He is sill foaming at the mouth after the exchange as he will tell you. I have a more sanguine view of this. I really don’t think that there is anything Hornby are able to do about it.Currently,I don’t think they are in a position to do so.