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All-new Heljan 47 in 00 gauge


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1 hour ago, Black 5 Bear said:

And especially now Mike as the newly tooled Bachmann 47's are being discounted. 

I might wait for the inevitable price reductions later in the year, before I add a FYE, green liveried 47 to supplement my collection.

 

20 minutes ago, The Fatadder said:

I guess that’s what happens when you come out with a higher priced lower quality product against a recently released competitor product.  
 

if they’d gone in at an Accurascale price point, (or delivered closer to Bachmann hitting the shops) it may have been a different story.

 

 

 

16 minutes ago, Roy Langridge said:

 

Well, I took a look when I got the email from Rails, was generally underwhelmed at what I saw and could not be bothered to post here. To my mind there are still issues with the tooling that I will not / cannot overlook and given there are alternatives I don't see that I should compromise.


Roy

 

 

Agree with all of the above. I can't get over the 'something' about the cab front that looks off and the bodyside windows with no attempt to mask their plastic edges. It doesnt help that the new Bachmann version is so good and bogie detail aside the older Bachmann version looks better than this one. 

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13 minutes ago, Michael Hodgson said:

 

Perhaps people have got all the Brush 4s they want?

I haven’t, I still would like a plain Blue pre tops WR namer, but neither companies seem to want to do one 🤷🏻‍♂️

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1 hour ago, younGGuns7 said:

I haven’t, I still would like a plain Blue pre tops WR namer, but neither companies seem to want to do one 🤷🏻‍♂️

Because they cannot afford the metal for a George Jackson Churchward nameplate 🤣

 

Though North Star, Odin and Thor shouldn't break the bank

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14 hours ago, younGGuns7 said:

I haven’t, I still would like a plain Blue pre tops WR namer, but neither companies seem to want to do one 🤷🏻‍♂️

Weren't the namers Crewe builds? I've only seen pics of the Brush version from Heljan so far.

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15 hours ago, MikeParkin65 said:

 

 

Agree with all of the above. I can't get over the 'something' about the cab front that looks off and the bodyside windows with no attempt to mask their plastic edges. It doesnt help that the new Bachmann version is so good and bogie detail aside the older Bachmann version looks better than this one. 

 

I agree that there's something "out" with the Heljan front. I just went onto Rails' website to see if I could find some similar photos of the two to compare from roughly the same angles, and came up with these two:

https://railsofsheffield.com/products/class-47-316-br-blue-plated-headcode-panels-diesel-locomotive-dcc-sound

 

https://railsofsheffield.com/products/Bachmann-35-414-class-47-4-47435-br-blue-diesel-locomotive

While they aren't exactly the same, my attention focused on the front "ledge" below the windscreens; the Bachmann one shows a slope on top while Heljan's seems almost level. There may well be other slight differences, but that's what caught my attention first. It seems to result in too much flat metal below the windscreens, above that ledge, although it could be a trick of the lighting.

 

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14 hours ago, Michael Hodgson said:

Or you could get a second hand Lima one and change out of fifty quid.

 

Perhaps people have got all the Brush 4s they want?

I'd still go for the Vitrains one for around £100. Needs laserglaze and it's worth putting a better shade of yellow on the ends, but no moulded handrails to deal with or live with.

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9 minutes ago, SRman said:

 

I agree that there's something "out" with the Heljan front. I just went onto Rails' website to see if I could find some similar photos of the two to compare from roughly the same angles, and came up with these two:

https://railsofsheffield.com/products/class-47-316-br-blue-plated-headcode-panels-diesel-locomotive-dcc-sound

 

https://railsofsheffield.com/products/Bachmann-35-414-class-47-4-47435-br-blue-diesel-locomotive

While they aren't exactly the same, my attention focused on the front "ledge" below the windscreens; the Bachmann one shows a slope on top while Heljan's seems almost level. There may well be other slight differences, but that's what caught my attention first. It seems to result in too much flat metal below the windscreens, above that ledge, although it could be a trick of the lighting.

 

 

That's possibly it. I look at the Heljan one and think "Why the long face?". If the ledge was profiled downward then it would make the cab front look less tall below said ledge.

Edited by 97406
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1 hour ago, 97406 said:

I'd still go for the Vitrains one for around £100. Needs laserglaze and it's worth putting a better shade of yellow on the ends, but no moulded handrails to deal with or live with.

Its a shame they got the height of the bogie frames so wrong (short), leaving too big a gap between bogie and body.  Which reminds me I really need to crack on with attempting to retrofit Bachmann bogie frames on mine.  Most of my 47s are Vi with shawplan bits

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16 hours ago, Michael Hodgson said:

Or you could get a second hand Lima one and change out of fifty quid.

 

Perhaps people have got all the Brush 4s they want?

Nowt wrong with the Lima 47's.  I have a few of them, slowly working through the my 'fleet' adding extra pick-ups and wiring in 8-pin decoder sockets.  Adding extra pick-ups even on the traction tyred wheels makes a huge differance and mine run at a nice crwal on speed step 1 in DCC mode.  Will eventually add extra details over time.

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25 minutes ago, The Fatadder said:

Its a shame they got the height of the bogie frames so wrong (short), leaving too big a gap between bogie and body.  Which reminds me I really need to crack on with attempting to retrofit Bachmann bogie frames on mine.  Most of my 47s are Vi with shawplan bits

 

I’ve not noticed that before but I wasn’t particularly looking for it. Duffs tend to spend their time in the background on my layout as they were common but a little boring in the banger blue period. I still view them as a design classic though, especially after how long they have lasted.

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2 hours ago, SRman said:

 

I agree that there's something "out" with the Heljan front. I just went onto Rails' website to see if I could find some similar photos of the two to compare from roughly the same angles, and came up with these two:

https://railsofsheffield.com/products/class-47-316-br-blue-plated-headcode-panels-diesel-locomotive-dcc-sound

 

https://railsofsheffield.com/products/Bachmann-35-414-class-47-4-47435-br-blue-diesel-locomotive

While they aren't exactly the same, my attention focused on the front "ledge" below the windscreens; the Bachmann one shows a slope on top while Heljan's seems almost level. There may well be other slight differences, but that's what caught my attention first. It seems to result in too much flat metal below the windscreens, above that ledge, although it could be a trick of the lighting.

 

The bogies or the body seem way out, the outer axle box should be level with the first handrail and its about 3-4 mm out and the cab footsteps are also misaligned with the cab doors.  It could be the wide angle lens of course so I just don't know but it just doesn't quite look right.

 

 

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That 'ledge' in front of the windscreen was apparent on the latest 7mm scale 47 too, so I fear it has translated to the 4mm version. The original 47 may have attracted criticism for its excess girth, but at least the 'ledge' was correct, so one has to wonder how this backward step can happen (I felt the same way about the Bachmann Class 43 Warship's weird gearing when the old Class 42 was so good).

 

This kind of thing only serves to increase my appreciation of Lima's toolmakers decades ago. I'm interested in seeing Hornby's two-tone green livery application to the ex-Lima 47 (now pushed back to September) - hopefully it won't have the headlamp........ I have some A1 Models etched original fixed roof grilles, a set turned brass buffers with etched backing plates and a Hornby underframe (battery box donor) looking for a home.....!

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The only one I am waiting on is 47 492 Enterprising Scot and even then I think I will bide my time with getting one to allow for some discounting unless it starts selling out at a few places first. Plenty of time for Bachmann to bring one out too.

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Having looked at the photos on Rails I'd better get my other house sold pdq as I count 7 that I could usefully use, all with noise. North of two grands worth.  I'd definitely expect coffee and cakes with the new King Fred at the Amelienborg for my personal commitment to the Danish economy if I do buy that lot.

I wonder how straightforward it will be to "de-domino" 47137 as I would ideally like it with headcodes behind the glazing for the 1975 summer season? Perhaps @61661 could advise.

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8 minutes ago, JN said:

I thought people might want to watch:

 

That’s not quite right , the first one was 2001-2003 A res version. I know this cos I brought one and I was only in that house 2001- sept 2003

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11 hours ago, rob D2 said:

That’s not quite right , the first one was 2001-2003 A res version. I know this cos I brought one and I was only in that house 2001- sept 2003

Dont help that bloke working for Heljan plugging the 47 dont know when it first came out, should of been asked does this 47 have chassis rot !! 

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7 minutes ago, owentherail said:

Dont help that bloke working for Heljan plugging the 47 dont know when it first came out, should of been asked does this 47 have chassis rot !! 

 

At least he would know not to write "should of" and "dont".

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It's actually a sober reminder that the original Heljan Class 47 - the very first 'newly tooled' D&E model of the super detail era - came out nearly a quarter of a century ago, in other words before quite a few of todays proper grown up adults were born.

A good comparison for me in relativity is, for example, when Hornby introduced the 'Morning Star' Britannia into its range in 1981. This had a newly-tooled body (featuring 'separate wire handrails' and a proper representation of the boiler section beneath the running plate). It replaced the original Triang Britannia body tooling introduced in 1959, i.e. 22 years earlier. To my teenage self, that earlier Britannia might as well have been introduced in 1659, the 1950s being utterly ancient history to my perspective then. 

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