OO Gauge GWR Toplight Mainline & City Coaches announced

[County of Yorkshire]

7 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

 

I suppose what you'd need in order to distinguish them would be something like, I don't know, a row of little windows along the top of the sides ... no, but wait ....  😉

 

 

Yes, I know that, but the casual/rubber-necked railway modeller may not. 
 

Fully panelled toplights are the second cousins of the 57ft bow-ended Colletts to my mind, but flush sided toplights are the cousins… Does that make sense to you? 
 

 

[Compound2632]

2 hours ago, Edwardian said:

As I don't speak "Mark I", does BG refer to a (passenger) Brake Van?

 

PBV to you and me! 

(I couldn't resist the rhyme.)

 

I'm not sure about first and second cousins, though. More like elder siblings?

[Edwardian]

36 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

PBV to you and me! 

(I couldn't resist the rhyme.)

 

I'm not sure about first and second cousins, though. More like elder siblings?

 

I guessed the B stood for Brake and the G for Gangway.

 

In the GWR coach working time tables of the thirties, as I recall, PBVs were referred to simply as Brake Vans and it was a given that they were gangwayed. Where exceptionally this was not so, IIRC, the suffix + was added. Some of the short Dean brake vans, of the Keyser K15 type, were gangwayed and others not, but I think all the 57' and 70' general service brake vans were gangwayed, hence no need to make the distinction in the context of a discussion of GW toplights.     

 

I have to say, on release, the Hornby Colletts gave me a mild flutter of nostalgia for my juvenile attempts to model the GW in the 1930s. The Rapido B-Sets and the prospect of Dapol corridor toplights are having a more full-bloodied effect. Clearly, I have reached a difficult age. At least I'd still be modelling a pre-Grouping company!

 

Note it's the coaches that get me enthused; GWR engines in this period, as we know, all looked the same, but the gloriously chaotic variety of GW coach formations .... sheer bliss!  

[rprodgers]

On 27/11/2022 at 18:58, Madreddog said:

I'm sitting here sniggering at the silly people who were paying £300 for the Slaters kits on Ebay some time ago.

But anyone looking for panelled * toplight coaches won’t be looking at a Dapol flush steel panelled one unless they are looking to source replacement etched sides.

 

It all feels a bit like when Hornby introduced there improved GWR  clerestory corridor coaches.

It’s hard to be certain, seeing them under artificial light, but looking at the Dapol toplight city coaches I got the impression that the shade of GWR crimson lake is very different from that chosen on Kernow’s SRM. Until the production models are out this can’t be properly determined.

 

 

 

*I was led to believe that the steel panelled toplights first started to appear in 1912?

Edited November 29, 2022 by rprodgers

[Compound2632]

3 hours ago, Edwardian said:

Note it's the coaches that get me enthused; GWR engines in this period, as we know, all looked the same, but the gloriously chaotic variety of GW coach formations .... sheer bliss!  

 

The situation was neatly summed up by a fellow club member this evening: all Great Western engines look the same but all Great Western carriages look different.

[Miss Prism]

7 minutes ago, rprodgers said:

* I was led to believe that the steel panelled toplights first started to appear in 1912?

 

That's close enough. There were some experiments in 1911, but steel was adopted as standard from 1913.

 

[County of Yorkshire]

The question is, will we ever see the livery as sported by this beauty released? A C32 I believe and the diagram selected by Dapol. 

Edited November 29, 2022 by County of Yorkshire

[Edwardian]

12 hours ago, County of Yorkshire said:

Yes, I know that, but the casual/rubber-necked railway modeller may not. 
 

Fully panelled toplights are the second cousins of the 57ft bow-ended Colletts to my mind, but flush sided toplights are the cousins… Does that make sense to you? 
 

 

 

I know what you're saying, I just think it likely to prove a complete non-issue and not worth the worry. But, since mild humour evidently didn't work, I'll  try boring. Regardless of where upon the family tree steel sided toplights might sit, surely the distinctiveness of their appearance is obvious; the toplights themselves and the prominent bolections are a marked contrast, in any GW livery, from Collett coaches. The latest pictures of the Dapol samples posted here make the point with abundant clarity.

 

Spot the difference 

 

Besides, Southern fans seem to be able to distinguish between Maunsell and Bullied coaches and, now, two types of panelled ex-LSWR stock 

 

So, my only question is where I find suitable motive power in 1921 condition?

 

EDIT: Actually, a further question occurs; does each livery for the period 1921-1939 include two different running numbers for each diagram, thus catering for the six-coach set?

 

Edited November 30, 2022 by Edwardian
link

[Edwardian]

I have been reflecting on these. As a number of people observed earlier in this topic, it's a weird choice. Don't worry, I'm still cheering them on, but I have to agree that this choice by Dapol is certainly an interesting one.

 

What people probably want (I guess) is stock suitable for the branch lines, secondary mainlines/mainline stopper services that are within the reasonable scope of most 4mil model railways, which I venture to suggest, will be in the majority of instances OO gauge and set in fictitious or fictionalised (based on/might-have-been) locations. 

 

As we have Collett non-corridor coaches to modern standards produced by Hornby (I haven't looked at these but I assume the prototypes are mid-late '20s) and 1930-built B-Sets have been announced by Rapido, my further assumption that older style coaches is the gap available to Dapol to aim for, something, indeed, that sits between the prototype Ratio 4-wheel kits and the prototypically generic Hattons GWR 4 and 6-wheelers on the one hand, and the aforementioned Collett types on the other. Further, I would suggest, this need is best fulfilled by models of coaches that were widespread over the GWR system.

 

Objectively, the Dapol Mainline & City coaches meet none of these requirements particularly well, and most of them not at all.

 

• They are a 1913 design, though not out-shopped until 1921 due to a minor interruption on the part of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. They are, thus, near the outer-limit of GWR toplight and wooden coach design.  They represent the move from wooden panels to steel sheeting, so are arguably not old-fashioned enough in character, and were out-shopped only a couple of years before the great 70' steel South Wales coaches, and, within a further couple of years the Collett era was in full-swing, including articulated sets for similar suburban services. Both Corridor and non-corridor Collets designs from the mid-'20s are available RTR, so the Dapol toplights don't extend the period already covered by the superb Hornby RTR coaches by much.  
• They represent a single type of service over very localised geography for a finite period, 1921-1939, after which I understand the sets were broken up and most coaches stayed in London with some going to Wales. Even that 1921-1939 service is divided, I believe, between London suburban lines west of Bishops Road that were steam-hauled by GWR motive power, and eastward to Liverpool Street, which I assume required 4-rail Metropolitan electric traction (though there there might have been a suitable past RTR release for that). 
• On the GWR side of things, there is, I think, nothing available suitable for either the Lake or the lined chocolate and cream liveries. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think the RTR GW loco  that best matches them is the 6100/61XX, introduced in 1931.   
• These coaches are not even broadly representative of stock found elsewhere on the GWR; there was nothing similar elsewhere. Birmingham had its own non-corridor toplight stock, for instance, but these were much longer. For local/stopping/branch services, much more versatile choices to tool to modern RTR standards would be GWR clerestories. Either 48' non-corridor stock (like the Triang Nearly-GW clerestories or the Slaters kits), and/or 57' corridor clerestories (like those Hornby made such a hash of). The corridor versions would give not only express stock for the pre-Grouper, but something of greater use to the Grouper, for although clerestories were fairly rare on expresses by the 1930s, they were cascaded down to form 3 or 4 coach sets for the very mainline stopping services that would best suit most modellers. Stick, say, a Mogul on a clerestory M-Set and that's half of everything you ever need to run right there. 

 

So, why would Dapol choose these rather unrepresentative Mainline & City coaches over something more common and versatile?  I can imagine three reasons:

 

• As a uniform set, tooling costs are not as insanely prohibitive as they might be for a series of more individual, non-standard coaches.
• I can see the appeal of flush steel sides over panels. Hattons has done a remarkable job of replicating full 1890s GWR coach livery on its panelled Genesis coaches (Hornby far less so with theirs), so it can be done, but I imagine it is both a difficult and expensive thing to achieve, and I never forget that Bachmann once announced a train-pack featuring their LMS Period I (?) panelled coaches in full pre-1933 lining, only to bottle out of the attempt. I assume, perhaps wrongly, that reproducing faux panels on flush-sided coaches is easier than lining raised beading on pannelled coaches.  
• They can justify them in BR livery. This seeming requirement will remain a drag-anchor holding back the exploitation of earlier periods until manufacturers become confident enough not need the comfort blanket of BR-era sales. I do not criticise their caution, for all it's frustrating as Hell, because they are investing large sums and must be confident of a return, but market share of earlier periods will grow along with the support they receive, so we are back to the chicken and the egg. Gradual progress is better than no progress in this regard!

As such, I can see that the Mainline & City sets are a sensible way to test the viability of toplights. My concern is that sales of these may not adequately reflect the appetite for 57' toplight corridor coaches, which, logically, must have a much larger potential market, assuming the bulk of the mass market actually makes purchases based upon what stock is actually appropriate for their layout schemes (!).

 

Provided people are, in significant numbers, prepared to buy these Mainline & City coaches just because they are attractive and unusual (in RTR terms), or because they collect GWR stock, or because they just want each new shiny thing, or because the only rule on their layout is Rule No.1, then Dapol might sell enough of these. The number of modellers out there with a genuine prototypical need/rationale/excuse for running these must be vanishingly small relative to the likely minimum production numbers for injection-moulded product.

 

I suspect that Dapol will sell enough of them, both for the reasons I've guessed and for many I haven't anticipated. I am not free of concern that they won't, however, and that's largely why I am tempted to buy half a dozen of these.  If these models are the gateway to corridor toplights in due course, it's important they succeed. People seem happy enough to buy 61XX Prairies and various GWR diesel railcars, even though many are not especially aiming to replicate a London suburban setting or service, so, on that logic, Dapol ought to sell these coaches. Mind you, it really does my head-in when people insist on using GWR diesel railcars on bucolic West Country branch lines, yet that is the perfect illustration of why these new coaches should sell despite their, to me, obvious and proper limitations.   

 

Put simply, surely relatively few inter-war GWR layouts could strictly speaking justify Mainline & City 48' toplights? Surely almost every inter-war GWR layout needs corridor toplights?   

 

When it comes down to it, though, these will be a great little set of attractive period coaches that would grace any GWR-themed layout, so, why not?

 

For anyone who has got this far, thank you for your patience.

[The Stationmaster]

34 minutes ago, Edwardian said:

I have been reflecting on these. As a number of people observed earlier in this topic, it's a weird choice. Don't worry, I'm still cheering them on, but I have to agree that this choice by Dapol is certainly an interesting one.

 

What people probably want (I guess) is stock suitable for the branch lines, secondary mainlines/mainline stopper services that are within the reasonable scope of most 4mil model railways, which I venture to suggest, will be in the majority of instances OO gauge and set in fictitious or fictionalised (based on/might-have-been) locations. 

 

As we have Collett non-corridor coaches to modern standards produced by Hornby (I haven't looked at these but I assume the prototypes are mid-late '20s) and 1930-built B-Sets have been announced by Rapido, my further assumption that older style coaches is the gap available to Dapol to aim for, something, indeed, that sits between the prototype Ratio 4-wheel kits and the prototypically generic Hattons GWR 4 and 6-wheelers on the one hand, and the aforementioned Collett types on the other. Further, I would suggest, this need is best fulfilled by models of coaches that were widespread over the GWR system.

 

Objectively, the Dapol Mainline & City coaches meet none of these requirements particularly well, and most of them not at all.

 

• They are a 1913 design, though not out-shopped until 1921 due to a minor interruption on the part of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. They are, thus, near the outer-limit of GWR toplight and wooden coach design.  They represent the move from wooden panels to steel sheeting, so are arguably not old-fashioned enough in character, and were out-shopped only a couple of years before the great 70' steel South Wales coaches, and, within a further couple of years the Collett era was in full-swing, including articulated sets for similar suburban services. Both Corridor and non-corridor Collets designs from the mid-'20s are available RTR, so the Dapol toplights don't extend the period already covered by the superb Hornby RTR coaches by much.  
• They represent a single type of service over very localised geography for a finite period, 1921-1939, after which I understand the sets were broken up and most coaches stayed in London with some going to Wales. Even that 1921-1939 service is divided, I believe, between London suburban lines west of Bishops Road that were steam-hauled by GWR motive power, and eastward to Liverpool Street, which I assume required 4-rail Metropolitan electric traction (though there there might have been a suitable past RTR release for that). 
• On the GWR side of things, there is, I think, nothing available suitable for either the Lake or the lined chocolate and cream liveries. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think the RTR GW loco  that best matches them is the 6100/61XX, introduced in 1931.   
• These coaches are not even broadly representative of stock found elsewhere on the GWR; there was nothing similar elsewhere. Birmingham had its own non-corridor toplight stock, for instance, but these were much longer. For local/stopping/branch services, much more versatile choices to tool to modern RTR standards would be GWR clerestories. Either 48' non-corridor stock (like the Triang Nearly-GW clerestories or the Slaters kits), and/or 57' corridor clerestories (like those Hornby made such a hash of). The corridor versions would give not only express stock for the pre-Grouper, but something of greater use to the Grouper, for although clerestories were fairly rare on expresses by the 1930s, they were cascaded down to form 3 or 4 coach sets for the very mainline stopping services that would best suit most modellers. Stick, say, a Mogul on a clerestory M-Set and that's half of everything you ever need to run right there. 

 

So, why would Dapol choose these rather unrepresentative Mainline & City coaches over something more common and versatile?  I can imagine three reasons:

 

• As a uniform set, tooling costs are not as insanely prohibitive as they might be for a series of more individual, non-standard coaches.
• I can see the appeal of flush steel sides over panels. Hattons has done a remarkable job of replicating full 1890s GWR coach livery on its panelled Genesis coaches (Hornby far less so with theirs), so it can be done, but I imagine it is both a difficult and expensive thing to achieve, and I never forget that Bachmann once announced a train-pack featuring their LMS Period I (?) panelled coaches in full pre-1933 lining, only to bottle out of the attempt. I assume, perhaps wrongly, that reproducing faux panels on flush-sided coaches is easier than lining raised beading on pannelled coaches.  
• They can justify them in BR livery. This seeming requirement will remain a drag-anchor holding back the exploitation of earlier periods until manufacturers become confident enough not need the comfort blanket of BR-era sales. I do not criticise their caution, for all it's frustrating as Hell, because they are investing large sums and must be confident of a return, but market share of earlier periods will grow along with the support they receive, so we are back to the chicken and the egg. Gradual progress is better than no progress in this regard!

As such, I can see that the Mainline & City sets are a sensible way to test the viability of toplights. My concern is that sales of these may not adequately reflect the appetite for 57' toplight corridor coaches, which, logically, must have a much larger potential market, assuming the bulk of the mass market actually makes purchases based upon what stock is actually appropriate for their layout schemes (!).

 

Provided people are, in significant numbers, prepared to buy these Mainline & City coaches just because they are attractive and unusual (in RTR terms), or because they collect GWR stock, or because they just want each new shiny thing, or because the only rule on their layout is Rule No.1, then Dapol might sell enough of these. The number of modellers out there with a genuine prototypical need/rationale/excuse for running these must be vanishingly small relative to the likely minimum production numbers for injection-moulded product.

 

I suspect that Dapol will sell enough of them, both for the reasons I've guessed and for many I haven't anticipated. I am not free of concern that they won't, however, and that's largely why I am tempted to buy half a dozen of these.  If these models are the gateway to corridor toplights in due course, it's important they succeed. People seem happy enough to buy 61XX Prairies and various GWR diesel railcars, even though many are not especially aiming to replicate a London suburban setting or service, so, on that logic, Dapol ought to sell these coaches. Mind you, it really does my head-in when people insist on using GWR diesel railcars on bucolic West Country branch lines, yet that is the perfect illustration of why these new coaches should sell despite their, to me, obvious and proper limitations.   

 

Put simply, surely relatively few inter-war GWR layouts could strictly speaking justify Mainline & City 48' toplights? Surely almost every inter-war GWR layout needs corridor toplights?   

 

When it comes down to it, though, these will be a great little set of attractive period coaches that would grace any GWR-themed layout, so, why not?

 

For anyone who has got this far, thank you for your patience.

Some interesting thoughts there and on the face of some very sensible conclusions.  But I think the minds of railway modellers, particularly those buying what is available r-t-r (and is all that is available r-t-r) don't necessary work on either logic or prototypical realism.   The City sets might have got as afar as Oxford in the late 1930s (the Coach Working Book lumps with other stock so I say 'might') but basically the westward limit of their sphere of operation was, at various times, Marlow or High Wycombe (via Maidenhead) but more generally Windsor and Uxbridge and there were sufficient diagrams to need all the sets in that area in 1938/39.

 

But having said that the important fact to purchasers is that they're 'different' and they're 'pretty' so - I understand - they are selling well - thanks to the way the minds of buyers of r-t-r work.  You could equally ask me why on earth I have an NER ES1 on order from Locomotion - something which is niche beyond even the most unusual of niches and yet it too, according to the folk who should know, is also selling well.  

 

It looks like niche models are something that sell - notwithstanding whatever rationale to the contrary we might offer.  But, and it is an important 'but', things clearly need to be attractive in order to sell - back to 'different' and 'pretty'.

 

PS    I understand from talking to 'someone in the trade' at the Warley Show on Sunday that there is a new way of applying livery detail such as lining etc.  It has been used so far on one model and the results are pretty staggering compared with the usual approach of tampo printing etc but at present it is very expensive technology so will take time to become the everyday way of doing the job.

Edited November 30, 2022 by The Stationmaster

[Edwardian]

2 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

Some interesting thoughts there and on the face of some very sensible conclusions.  But I think the minds of railway modellers, particularly those buying what is available r-t-r (and is all that is available r-t-r) don't necessary work on either logic or prototypical realism.   The City sets might have got as afar as Oxford in the late 1930s (the Coach Working Book lumps with other stock so I say 'might') but basically the westward limit of their sphere of operation was, at various times, Marlow or High Wycombe (via Maidenhead) but more generally Windsor and Uxbridge and there were sufficient diagrams to need all the sets in that area in 1938/39.

 

But having said that the important fact to purchasers is that they're 'different' and they're 'pretty' so - I understand - they are selling well - thanks to the way the minds of buyers of r-t-r work.  You could equally ask me why on earth I have an NER ES1 on order from Locomotion - something which is niche beyond even the most unusual of niches and yet it too, according to the folk who should know, is also selling well.  

 

It looks like niche models are something that sell - notwithstanding whatever rationale to the contrary we might offer.  But, and it is an important 'but', things clearly need to be attractive in order to sell - back to 'different' and 'pretty'

 

Indeed, I expect you're right. As my post anticipates, there are all sorts of reasons why these sets might sell despite the logical reasons why they should not! These include the popularity of other products that are strictly only relevant to a few areas like London suburban services. As I conclude, I think they will prove attractive and distinct enough to sell.

 

What I am currently thinking is how far west on GW lines such a set might regularly have gone early in its career (I'm thinking of the Lake livery) . I'd like to think High Wycombe, perhaps with a Birdcage, as that puts me within touching distance of a Robinson 9N and an Improved Director! 

[Neal Ball]

1 hour ago, Edwardian said:

 

Indeed, I expect you're right. As my post anticipates, there are all sorts of reasons why these sets might sell despite the logical reasons why they should not! These include the popularity of other products that are strictly only relevant to a few areas like London suburban services. As I conclude, I think they will prove attractive and distinct enough to sell.

 

What I am currently thinking is how far west on GW lines such a set might regularly have gone early in its career (I'm thinking of the Lake livery) . I'd like to think High Wycombe, perhaps with a Birdcage, as that puts me within touching distance of a Robinson 9N and an Improved Director! 

 

Typically as for "the furtherest West" it would have been Slough and Windsor on a regular basis. Although Reading and Oxford are a possibility.

 

I am pushing the boundary a bit with my rake, which will make it onto the Henley-on-Thames branch.

 

You have some interesting thoughts on the carriages, but please don't put Dapol off them, they are going to look lovely in Platform 2. 😎

[SteamingWales]

2 hours ago, Edwardian said:

I have been reflecting on these. As a number of people observed earlier in this topic, it's a weird choice. Don't worry, I'm still cheering them on, but I have to agree that this choice by Dapol is certainly an interesting one.

 

What people probably want (I guess) is stock suitable for the branch lines, secondary mainlines/mainline stopper services that are within the reasonable scope of most 4mil model railways, which I venture to suggest, will be in the majority of instances OO gauge and set in fictitious or fictionalised (based on/might-have-been) locations. 

 

As we have Collett non-corridor coaches to modern standards produced by Hornby (I haven't looked at these but I assume the prototypes are mid-late '20s) and 1930-built B-Sets have been announced by Rapido, my further assumption that older style coaches is the gap available to Dapol to aim for, something, indeed, that sits between the prototype Ratio 4-wheel kits and the prototypically generic Hattons GWR 4 and 6-wheelers on the one hand, and the aforementioned Collett types on the other. Further, I would suggest, this need is best fulfilled by models of coaches that were widespread over the GWR system.

 

Objectively, the Dapol Mainline & City coaches meet none of these requirements particularly well, and most of them not at all.

 

• They are a 1913 design, though not out-shopped until 1921 due to a minor interruption on the part of Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany. They are, thus, near the outer-limit of GWR toplight and wooden coach design.  They represent the move from wooden panels to steel sheeting, so are arguably not old-fashioned enough in character, and were out-shopped only a couple of years before the great 70' steel South Wales coaches, and, within a further couple of years the Collett era was in full-swing, including articulated sets for similar suburban services. Both Corridor and non-corridor Collets designs from the mid-'20s are available RTR, so the Dapol toplights don't extend the period already covered by the superb Hornby RTR coaches by much.  
• They represent a single type of service over very localised geography for a finite period, 1921-1939, after which I understand the sets were broken up and most coaches stayed in London with some going to Wales. Even that 1921-1939 service is divided, I believe, between London suburban lines west of Bishops Road that were steam-hauled by GWR motive power, and eastward to Liverpool Street, which I assume required 4-rail Metropolitan electric traction (though there there might have been a suitable past RTR release for that). 
• On the GWR side of things, there is, I think, nothing available suitable for either the Lake or the lined chocolate and cream liveries. Forgive me if I'm wrong, but I think the RTR GW loco  that best matches them is the 6100/61XX, introduced in 1931.   
• These coaches are not even broadly representative of stock found elsewhere on the GWR; there was nothing similar elsewhere. Birmingham had its own non-corridor toplight stock, for instance, but these were much longer. For local/stopping/branch services, much more versatile choices to tool to modern RTR standards would be GWR clerestories. Either 48' non-corridor stock (like the Triang Nearly-GW clerestories or the Slaters kits), and/or 57' corridor clerestories (like those Hornby made such a hash of). The corridor versions would give not only express stock for the pre-Grouper, but something of greater use to the Grouper, for although clerestories were fairly rare on expresses by the 1930s, they were cascaded down to form 3 or 4 coach sets for the very mainline stopping services that would best suit most modellers. Stick, say, a Mogul on a clerestory M-Set and that's half of everything you ever need to run right there. 

 

So, why would Dapol choose these rather unrepresentative Mainline & City coaches over something more common and versatile?  I can imagine three reasons:

 

• As a uniform set, tooling costs are not as insanely prohibitive as they might be for a series of more individual, non-standard coaches.
• I can see the appeal of flush steel sides over panels. Hattons has done a remarkable job of replicating full 1890s GWR coach livery on its panelled Genesis coaches (Hornby far less so with theirs), so it can be done, but I imagine it is both a difficult and expensive thing to achieve, and I never forget that Bachmann once announced a train-pack featuring their LMS Period I (?) panelled coaches in full pre-1933 lining, only to bottle out of the attempt. I assume, perhaps wrongly, that reproducing faux panels on flush-sided coaches is easier than lining raised beading on pannelled coaches.  
• They can justify them in BR livery. This seeming requirement will remain a drag-anchor holding back the exploitation of earlier periods until manufacturers become confident enough not need the comfort blanket of BR-era sales. I do not criticise their caution, for all it's frustrating as Hell, because they are investing large sums and must be confident of a return, but market share of earlier periods will grow along with the support they receive, so we are back to the chicken and the egg. Gradual progress is better than no progress in this regard!

As such, I can see that the Mainline & City sets are a sensible way to test the viability of toplights. My concern is that sales of these may not adequately reflect the appetite for 57' toplight corridor coaches, which, logically, must have a much larger potential market, assuming the bulk of the mass market actually makes purchases based upon what stock is actually appropriate for their layout schemes (!).

 

Provided people are, in significant numbers, prepared to buy these Mainline & City coaches just because they are attractive and unusual (in RTR terms), or because they collect GWR stock, or because they just want each new shiny thing, or because the only rule on their layout is Rule No.1, then Dapol might sell enough of these. The number of modellers out there with a genuine prototypical need/rationale/excuse for running these must be vanishingly small relative to the likely minimum production numbers for injection-moulded product.

 

I suspect that Dapol will sell enough of them, both for the reasons I've guessed and for many I haven't anticipated. I am not free of concern that they won't, however, and that's largely why I am tempted to buy half a dozen of these.  If these models are the gateway to corridor toplights in due course, it's important they succeed. People seem happy enough to buy 61XX Prairies and various GWR diesel railcars, even though many are not especially aiming to replicate a London suburban setting or service, so, on that logic, Dapol ought to sell these coaches. Mind you, it really does my head-in when people insist on using GWR diesel railcars on bucolic West Country branch lines, yet that is the perfect illustration of why these new coaches should sell despite their, to me, obvious and proper limitations.   

 

Put simply, surely relatively few inter-war GWR layouts could strictly speaking justify Mainline & City 48' toplights? Surely almost every inter-war GWR layout needs corridor toplights?   

 

When it comes down to it, though, these will be a great little set of attractive period coaches that would grace any GWR-themed layout, so, why not?

 

For anyone who has got this far, thank you for your patience.

 

Some very well thought out points here.

 

Just pulling out a few points. I think the early liveries will do quite well, especially the GWR Crimson as this livery hasn't been available on a 4mm RTR (I think) and should appeal to the casual or non hardcore GWR modeller that like a different livery and have something different and attractive to run behind locos (albeit mostly in incorrect liveries) vs constant chocolate and cream. If demand is high enough then we could see an early suburban tank to follow

 

Picking the catering for BR liveries point (which I have never thought of before), I think it is fair to say that RTR is restricted by BR modellers to get bang for your buck from tooling. Off the top of my head the only RTR model that doesn't (or shouldn't) have a BR livery is the Rapido Jones Goods, but then that model has an as preserved livery and "What if" BR Black. It would have been interesting to see how well the Hornby 4 and 6 wheelers did if they came out as solely Stroudley coaches, if that was the original plan rather than generic, as that could have potentially opened the door for other early coaching stock?

 

On a personal note, I will only be getting a couple of the corrdior versions as my strict rule 1 is "Did it run on the Cambrian mainline circa 1960" so the non-corridors are completely out of the question

[Siberian Snooper]

If they come out in Lake or 1922 livery, I'm up for it,  if they come out in both, then it will be x2. Same if Hornby released the Collett's in the '22 livery, I would be up for a rake. That sort of paint job is beyond my ability on non panelled stock and stretches it on panelled stock.

 

 

[Craigw]

I have a set of the City coaches on order, for several reasons:

 

They are toplights and are looking to be accurate models. I am not interested in supporting producers of freelance coaches.

 

They have produced them in the Lake and 1922 liveries. 

 

If they produce corridor coaches in said liveries I will buy them

 

Regards,

 

Craig W

[The Johnster]

I think the limited geographical range will count against the non-gangwayed toplights, but not disastrously.  Most modellers can find Rule 1 reasons for things if they want them, and almost any RTR item will sell.  The last of these coaches were a 3-coach set used on South Wales on the Glyncorrwg Miners service, which is close enough to the site of Cwmdimbath for me to be buying some; I already have a couple of cut’n’shut Triang clerestories and a set of Ratio 4-wheelers as nods to this train.  
 

If you’re not familiar with Glyncorrwg, check it out; you may need occasional pinches to confirm that you’re not dreaming it.  I’m amazed that nobody TTBOMK has had a go at modelling it!

[SteamingWales]

1 hour ago, The Johnster said:

If you’re not familiar with Glyncorrwg, check it out; you may need occasional pinches to confirm that you’re not dreaming it.  I’m amazed that nobody TTBOMK has had a go at modelling it!

 

I used to work there on the wind farms above the Glyncorrwg and Abergwynfi doing bird surveys. IMHO it was possibly the grimmest place in the whole of Wales. The hills were constantly in cloud and it is an ecological desert dominated by Sitka spruce, Mollinia (purple moor grass) and sheep with not much else 

Edited November 30, 2022 by SteamingWales

[The Johnster]

The Forestry Commission have made a total mess of the ecology of the Glamorgan uplands.  Even back in the 50s, when the destruction of the area had long been completed by the removal of the deciduous trees for pitprops and the mountains were bare, there was more to be seen in the way of flora and fauna up there, but the Sitka have deprived the ground of light and soaked it in acid.  The kites have returned though.  Cwmdimbath, the real Cwmdimbath not my layout, a tributary valley of the Ogwr Fach formed since the ice retreated by Nant Lechyd, is a glimpse of what the area must have been like in general before the coal, a sylvan loveliness, magnificent in Autumn, with a clear stream abounding in brown trout and dippers (one of my favourite birds, comical little walking submarines).

 

For the non-cognesciti, the Glyncorrwg branch was the northern remnant of the South Wales Mineral Railway, a cash-strapped enterprise that made the Brecon & Merthyr look profligrate, running from a junction with the GW Abergwynfi branch at the northern exit of Caerau Tunnel.  The Miner's, a Dyffryn Yard 8750 job, ran from Cwmmer Corrwg, a bare wooden platform just over the GW's connecting viaduct, to Glyncorrwg, another bare wooden platform, where the loco ran around the train and propelled it up into the mountain fastnesses to the collieries, Rhondda South and Rhondda North (not named for the famous Valley but for the Rhondda Coal Seam that they worked).  And I mean mountain fastnesses; the valley was steep sided and so narrow that the railway ran in the stream bed and the mountain reared up precipitously on each side.  The coal trains were propelled as well, becasue there was no run around at the collieries and they could only be shunted in one direction.

 

The working was that of the last in service examples of, in chronological order, GW 4-wheelers (scrapped 1953), non-gangwayed clerestories (1957), and the Main Line & City coaches (1960, after which the mountain track to the pits was improved enough for a bus replacement).  The 4-wheelers had a small porthole cut in the leading BT for the guard to keep a lookout (short though the train was, curvature and the closeness of the mountainsides made this necessary), the clerestories had no BT but the leading compartment was converted into an ersatz driving trailer cab with 3 auto trailer type windows and a foot-treadle operated auto-type bell for the guard to frighten the sheeps with, and the Main Line & City BTs already had side end windows; a droplight was cut into the centre slip-coach style and the bell transferred from the clerestories (wonder if Dap intend to model this).  By the time the Main Line & City stock arrived, pithead baths had been installed and the coaches were kept clean and in good condition in unlined maroon livery; the 4-wheelers and clerestories were in a specific Glyncorrwg Disgraceful Filth livery and you couldn't even read  the numbers!

 

But for Planet Grim Prime, I contend that Dowlais Top roundabout on the A465 takes some beating...

[Edwardian]

10 hours ago, The Johnster said:

I think the limited geographical range will count against the non-gangwayed toplights, but not disastrously.

 

I think that a fair conclusion.  Of course, if you buy them in any of the liveries representing the 1921-1939 period, which may well be the most popular, and you don't buy six of them to run in a set, then you are effectively running a freelance train.

 

Indeed, as their small, tube tunnel friendly dimensions make them so different from what the GWR ran elsewhere, if you take a definition of freelance that is "prototypical, even if not matching a particular prototype", as opposed to meaning "anything goes", then the use of these coaches outside their very specific settings is not even that. It's gone beyond any notion of credible freelance and is rather pure Rule No.1, and you may as well couple them up to City of Truro  for a laugh.

 

As you suggest, that will not be an obstacle to the acquisitive majority, and that's probably just as well!

 

10 hours ago, The Johnster said:

 Most modellers can find Rule 1 reasons for things if they want them, and almost any RTR item will sell.  The last of these coaches were a 3-coach set used on South Wales on the Glyncorrwg Miners service, which is close enough to the site of Cwmdimbath for me to be buying some; I already have a couple of cut’n’shut Triang clerestories and a set of Ratio 4-wheelers as nods to this train.  
 

If you’re not familiar with Glyncorrwg, check it out; you may need occasional pinches to confirm that you’re not dreaming it.  I’m amazed that nobody TTBOMK has had a go at modelling it!

 

Looks a stunning setting, should make for an impressive model.  I am assuming your set would be plain brown? But what luck to have an excuse to use these. 

 

[Bazza]

As far as I'm aware, these coaches were not particularly limited in dimensions because of through running onto the Metropolitan because that section had been built broad gauge. The A60 Met line stock was the widest rolling stock in the country because of the Met's generous loading gauge.

However, I'm waiting for the main line toplights and still hope that Hornby will do a Collet BG, and anyone does a GWR restaurant car.

[Natalie]

Exactly Bazza.

 

Additionally they were certainly not tube tunnel friendly either. Tube friendly is of course much lower than the main line sizes.

 

As regards Edwardian's interesting comments, he misses out a group of people who welcome these coaches as we want to model the upper section of the Circle line that they ran on.

 

Maybe instead of criticising Dapol for creating a model of real vehicles, he should be critical of Hornby and Hattons for introducing generic freelance coaches rather than a specific model for one railway and then fictional livery applications for the others. But that is a whole different argument which has been well done elsewhere.

 

I'm looking forward to a set of the preceding 4 wheel Main line and City and Gas train stock... ideally Dapol will do the associated articulated versions of their new announcements.

 

I could go further and hope that an enterprising manufacturer announces a suite of met dreadnought/ steam stock and electric unit relatives which are even more restrictive geographically than the ML & C stock.

 

Those of us who wish to model train formations correctly are probably in the minority whilst the rest of us will no doubt buy something as it is the correct company for them or it simply looks nice. It is an individual choice. Our hobby is big and mature enough to enjoy a broad church of opinions and likes.

 

 

 

[Edwardian]

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

Exactly Bazza.

 

Additionally they were certainly not tube tunnel friendly either. Tube friendly is of course much lower than the main line sizes.

 

I may have been misled by Didcot's webpage here, but they are certainly shorter than any comparable GW bogie stock of the period, and the point, of course, is their limited range and unusual character.  

 

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

 

As regards Edwardian's interesting comments, he misses out a group of people who welcome these coaches as we want to model the upper section of the Circle line that they ran on.

 

Happy indeed to learn that there are such people. I would be surprised, however, if they swelled the ranks of those with a prototypical requirement for these coaches to numbers that would justify a production run, leaving us back with the fact that these coaches will be bought for other, more whimsical, reasons. I still see no harm in that, however. 

 

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

Maybe instead of criticising Dapol for creating a model of real vehicles, he should be critical of Hornby and Hattons for introducing generic freelance coaches rather than a specific model for one railway and then fictional livery applications for the others. But that is a whole different argument which has been well done elsewhere.

 

Maybe you should not be rude and uninformed in your criticism of others here, even if the relative insulation of doing so online tends to embolden you. Had you troubled to reflect the facts of what I have posted you would (hopefully) have understood that contrary to your assertions I:

 

- Have not criticised Dapol (in the negative sense you imply) for making these models. I have praised the decision, the models and indicated a wish to buy a set's worth of them (6). When you have done as much ...., well, you'd still be wrong on this point.  I believe, and this was in response earlier comments that the choice of prototype was "weird", I in fact said these were an "interesting" choice of prototype. I considered some of the reasons why this was so and concluded that, nonetheless, Dapol had logical reasons for making them and that they would sell well enough. 

 

- Am critical of the Hornby generic short coaches, but not because they are generic but because they are pretty cack compared with Hattons inasmuch as they are not to the same level of detail and quality but, mainly, because they are not prototypical, that is reflecting prototype practice and construction.

 

- Don't criticise the Hattons coaches because I don't suffer from the conceptual difficulty some people evidently have with the idea of a freelance generic vehicle and these are high quality models that reflect late Nineteenth century carriage building practice very well. I do not personally use them for prototypes that they cannot be made to represent, but I don't criticise other approaches to these models.

 

- Didn't, in fact, raise the issue of generic coaches in this context, I am interested in the position someone had apparently reached that running models of coaches that actually existed, but doing so in a formation and setting that was unprototypical, was obviously better than running generic stock of prototypical appearance and more representative of the type of vehicle that might be seen generally on the system. My thought was that I do not think that conclusion is necessarily right. Put simply, which is better representative of, say, a generic GW branch, the Hattons 4-wheelers or a distinctive London suburban set only seen on a limited number of routes? I'm not the one saying there is clearly a correct choice here, far from it, I think its an interesting choice nonetheless.   

 

 

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

 

I'm looking forward to a set of the preceding 4 wheel Main line and City and Gas train stock... ideally Dapol will do the associated articulated versions of their new announcements.

 

These may not, of course, be the prototypes you are referring to, but for those wishing to model such train formations correctly, can you not use the Shire Scenes etched sides?

 

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

 

I could go further and hope that an enterprising manufacturer announces a suite of met dreadnought/ steam stock and electric unit relatives which are even more restrictive geographically than the ML & C stock.

 

Again, I thought you could get these? IIRC someone does kits, but you can get 3D prints on Shapeways. The modeller surely has a route to these formations?

 

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

 

Those of us who wish to model train formations correctly are probably in the minority whilst the rest of us will no doubt buy something as it is the correct company for them or it simply looks nice. It is an individual choice.

 

 

I think here we share similar conclusions.

 

53 minutes ago, Natalie said:

Our hobby is big and mature enough to enjoy a broad church of opinions and likes.

 

 

 

 

It is, so please reflect that by not misrepresenting the opinions of others.

 

Thanks

 

 

Edited December 1, 2022 by Edwardian
Spelling!

[The Stationmaster]

23 hours ago, Edwardian said:

 

Indeed, I expect you're right. As my post anticipates, there are all sorts of reasons why these sets might sell despite the logical reasons why they should not! These include the popularity of other products that are strictly only relevant to a few areas like London suburban services. As I conclude, I think they will prove attractive and distinct enough to sell.

 

What I am currently thinking is how far west on GW lines such a set might regularly have gone early in its career (I'm thinking of the Lake livery) . I'd like to think High Wycombe, perhaps with a Birdcage, as that puts me within touching distance of a Robinson 9N and an Improved Director! 

As far as I'm aware High Wycombe wasn't in the original list of destinations - in fact it appears to have been substituted for Marlow and then only for a short time.

 

As the GWR 1929 TT lurks in my 'library' that has been simple to check and the furthest points of operation that summer were Uxbridge and Staines with yjr other trains starting from either Hayes & Harlington or Southall.   There had been a major cull, at the hands of the MET, of GWR through services in the 1920s although I can't remember which year it was offhand (duly checked and it was 13 January 1926 according to Peacock in his book about GWR London suburban services)  and that appears to have ended the longer distance trains from the likes of Windsor, Maidenhead and Reading.

[Miss Prism]

[darthmh]

3 minutes ago, Miss Prism said:

Now were talking !!