Hornby 1972 - 1996

[Robin Brasher]

The 24 years between 1972 and 1996 represents an era in which Hornby was producing trains to run on scale track at its factory in Margate. The trains were reasonable models but they were not as accurate as the present day models made in China.

 

I am modelling the Swanage Railway and as the Flying Scotsman is visiting the Swanage Railway this month I dug out my thirty year old model with a rake of ex LNER crimson and cream coaches which ran surprisingly well considering they are about thirty years old.

[sncf231e]

The models of that period were above reasonable in my opinion; some of the China models are a bit too fragile I think. Both are of course not accurate models being 1:76 on 16.5 mm track .

Regards

Fred

[Legend]

I think the models of the time were reasonable enough , although nothing like the finesse of latest models.  I have the Flying Scotsman model pictured and compared to newer versions its got tender dive , but I think the most obvious thing is the thicker valve gear .  Horror of horrors I still run the BR Gresleys and LNER Gresley teaks behind my latest models . Perfectly happy doing that .

[cypherman]

Hi all.

I have 4 of the 1970's Flying Scotsman engines. One is immaculate and in it's original box. One is run as is when I get the chance to run engines. I do not at the moment have a layout of my own, and 2 have been modified and weathered. All 4 of them run as well now as they did 40 years ago.

Edited March 3, 2019 by cypherman

[Il Grifone]

The old Hornby models are not as accurate as the modern product,, but do have the great advantage of working without falling apart.

 

I have two examples of Flying Scotsman, as 4472 and 60103, though the latter is incomplete*. There is something not quite right about the front end. I think the distance from the buffers to the smokebox is excessive and sitting too high doesn't help either.  But the sheer indestructibility of the mechanism makes up for such minor details.

 

* On the 'to do' list - put on hold by the later acquisition of the LNER version.

[Robin Brasher]

The Coronation Pacific was another model that benefitted from a tender drive. As the tender chassis was derived from the Wrenn City chassis it provided additional weight which gave the model an excellent performance. My 'City of Bristol' is 32 years old and I bought it in a sale from Gamleys of Worthing for £19.99. I had to wait until 2001 before the matching coaches came out which I obtained from the Engine Shed at Ford. Although they are not accurate models they give a good impression of the prototype and the coaches have been reintroduced this year.

[andyman7]

I don't think the tender drive version uses the Wrenn City chassis - the first releases in 1970/71 did so but they were loco drive, using the A3 Flying Scotsman chassis. When the model was reintroduced in 1983 tender drives were the order of the day so a new cast chassis frame for the standard Ringfield motor was tooled.

 

I like this era of models, probably because they were the 'everyday' range of my youth. Whilst not in any way sophisticated they are mechanically pretty bulletproof and a boxful of standard spares for RIngfield and X03/X04 motors will keep a whole fleet running.

Edited March 5, 2019 by andyman7

[andyman7]

Here's a typical model of the era - R354 Class 47 'Rail Riders'. Clip together assembly with a single wire with tag terminals from the trailing bogie to the motor bogie. Contrast with the spaghetti of wiring in a modern Hornby Railroad engine, which will have all wheel pickup via a DCC interface.

[BernardTPM]

3 hours ago, andyman7 said:

I don't think the tender drive version uses the Wrenn City chassis - the first releases in 1970/71 did so but they were loco drive, using the A3 Flying Scotsman chassis.

 

Quite correct. The Railway Modeller review remarked that it was the first truly 'Triang-Hornby' model; a new release using components from both firms.

[Il Grifone]

The tender chassis originated with the Dublo 8F and carries a host of overscale rivets. It then appeared under the City tender body which is plastic and rivet free (welded) (an unlikely combination! and inexplicable as they already had a suitable chassis with Duchess of Montrose). Following the take over merger it went to Wrenn, and was used under the Streamlined Duchess tender. It is of course incorrect for a streamlined Coronation tender, as it has rear steps attached to the frames. a minor point considering how much underlength the locomotive is. I would have thought this could easily have been avoided, as they could have used the front bogie from the Hall. Perhaps there were problems with clearances?* To the end the location of the 3 rail pickup plungers could be seen under the chassis floor.

 

* There were still 13½" radius Tri-ang curves to contend with at the time. Even radius one (as it is now) gives problems.

Edited March 6, 2019 by Il Grifone

[Robin Brasher]

The 13.5" Tri-ang series 3 track had been phased out by the time the tender driven Coronation appeared. 'City of Bristol' would run on system 6 1st radius curves. I had a 4' x 3' test track which I could take in the boot of my hatchback and 'City of Bristol' would run happily on this track. Hornby did make a proving model of a scale length 6225 'Duchess of Gloucester' but Hornby abandoned this because of clearance problems with the front bogie against the streamlined casing. There is a picture of this on page 150 of Pat Hammond's Hornby Railways volume 3.

 

The problem with a scale 'Coronation' is that it needs a large layout to run it on radius 4 track and many people have not got the space to run it. My latest portable layout is 9' x  4' 6"" to accommodate radius 4 track which is much harder to transport and to set up. Most people only have enough room for a layout with a maximum of radius 2 and the compromises with locomotives like 'City of Bristol' enabled them to run top link locomotives on their layouts.

[locomad2]

Quite a few models  I purchased in this era, however never really liked the tender drive motors, squealing noise brings to mind plus stalling on points

[Il Grifone]

It's true that the sharp Tri-ang curves had been phased out several years before, but many of their customers would still have had them. How well the model copes with them I don't know however.

I'm trying to fit a Dublo Duchess chassis in a GBL Sreamlined Coronation, but have problems with getting her to go around curves. The solutions appear to be flangeless bogie wheels (like modern models' ponies) or cutaways in the shroud (like the pre-ear Dublo A4). I'm not keen on either!

[Robin Brasher]

We have got 13.5" series 3 track on our Tri-ang layout so I will see how the tender driven locomotives work. Tender driven locomotives work well if they are well engineered and the Fleischmann 2-10-0s seemed wonderful when they ran on our club layout. They were silent and very powerful.

 

Unfortunately the Hornby tender driven models were not so well engineered and hearing the noise from the motor in the tender seems wrong. I have also had problems with some tender driven models. For instance the locomotive wheels have locked solid and the cog in the motor of my 9F has worked loose so the motor spins but the locomotive stays still.

 

If the driving wheels are fairly stiff the locomotive wheels skate on the track as on my Schools class locomotive. The motors can squeal but this can be rectified by putting oil on the driving shaft.

 

If you have a good tender drive locomotive it is a huge improvement on the old Tri-ang Hornby locomotives. For instance the original Tri-ang Hornby locomotive driven ' Flying Scotsman' would only pull three coaches on nickel silver track whereas the tender driven one would probably pull ten coaches.

 

[Il Grifone]

My tender driven 9F (92220) suffers from the driving wheels locking. She used to be terrible, but is much better now, Basically there is too much play in the motion and the coupling rods can get out of line. Mine wasn't helped by the leading wheelset being very slightly out of quarter. I reset it, which was agreat improvement and swopping it with the fourth set has almost cleared the problem. She is not paricularly noisy and I think that, like the Airfix 61xx, it's actually the plastic body that amplifies the noise. She is also rather prone to derail, but my test track is not laid as well as it might be and Trix fibre track is not very forgiving in any case (weird half round railhead and 15¾" radius!). I must try tightening the slop and reducing the excessive boiler height. Resetting the valve gear so that both sets drive the locomotive the same way is also planned.

 

Haulage is another matter. I find most Tri-ang and/or Hornby locomotives are happy with four or five Dublo tinplate coaches (assuming level track and no Magnadesion or traction tyres), which are both heavy and not very free running. Pin-point axles will roughly triple the load handled.

[sagaguy]

This is my Triang Hornby Coronation which was one of the early locos supplied with a Dublo 8F tender chassis that i fitted plunger p/ups.It runs very well with my 3 Coronation coaches but baulks at tinplate coaches,the loco is quite light.The second pic is of my recent Hornby railroad loco drive 9F again fitted with a 3 rail 8F tender chassis,goes around Dublo 3 rail standard curves a treat.

 

                            Ray.

[kevinlms]

7 hours ago, sagaguy said:

This is my Triang Hornby Coronation which was one of the early locos supplied with a Dublo 8F tender chassis that i fitted plunger p/ups.It runs very well with my 3 Coronation coaches but baulks at tinplate coaches,the loco is quite light.The second pic is of my recent Hornby railroad loco drive 9F again fitted with a 3 rail 8F tender chassis,goes around Dublo 3 rail standard curves a treat.

 

                            Ray.

3 coaches! Is it on a running in duty from Crewe Works?

[Il Grifone]

The Dublo 8F tender is a hefty beast. I found a Dublo N2 could handle two or three more wagons* than my 8F and put it down to the weight of the tender. Even just the chassis is a solid chunk of metal. Magnadhesion makes quite a difference, but there's plenty of room for lead in a streamlined Coronation...

 

* Around twenty. Compared to today's pin-point plastic models, we are probably talking about seventy to eighty.

[sagaguy]

16 hours ago, kevinlms said:

3 coaches! Is it on a running in duty from Crewe Works?

 Ah,i`ve only got three!

 

                        Ray.

[andyman7]

On 07/03/2019 at 16:11, Robin Brasher said:

Unfortunately the Hornby tender driven models were not so well engineered and hearing the noise from the motor in the tender seems wrong. I have also had problems with some tender driven models. For instance the locomotive wheels have locked solid and the cog in the motor of my 9F has worked loose so the motor spins but the locomotive stays still.

 

If the driving wheels are fairly stiff the locomotive wheels skate on the track as on my Schools class locomotive. The motors can squeal but this can be rectified by putting oil on the driving shaft.

 

If you have a good tender drive locomotive it is a huge improvement on the old Tri-ang Hornby locomotives. For instance the original Tri-ang Hornby locomotive driven ' Flying Scotsman' would only pull three coaches on nickel silver track whereas the tender driven one would probably pull ten coaches.

 

I too found that the valve gear had to be completely free running and aligned properly to run faultlessly with tender drive. The problem with the earlier loco drive models on Nickel Silver track is that Magnadhesion is really essential to their pulling power but of course it only works on steel track. The very last Magnadhesion loco issued by Hornby was the 1989 release of the SR Battle of Britain in Golden Arrow finish as R866. I recall it was deleted around 1991, It was also the very last model fitted with the X03 derivative of the X04 motor, and within a year of it coming out of the range Hornby had upgraded its track to Nickel Silver.

[Wolseley]

On 08/03/2019 at 10:31, sagaguy said:

This is my Triang Hornby Coronation which was one of the early locos supplied with a Dublo 8F tender chassis that i fitted plunger p/ups.It runs very well with my 3 Coronation coaches but baulks at tinplate coaches,the loco is quite light.

 

                            Ray.

 

 

 

Interesting.  I'm in the process of converting four Tri-ang/Hornby Coronations exactly the same way.....

 

[sagaguy]

Very useful the Dublo 8f plunger chassis.This is my loco drive Hornby 9f attached to one.

 

                           Ray.