Dapol OO 'Air Ministry' 14T tank wagons

[Mark Hamlin]

Anybody seen these yet at Warley?

[gwrrob]

2 hours ago, Mark Hamlin said:

Anybody seen these yet at Warley?

 

Leave it with me @Mark Hamlin

[Garethp8873]

9 hours ago, Mark Hamlin said:

Anybody seen these yet at Warley?

 

Yes I saw them yesterday and they looked very good. @gwrrob will post shots of them no doubt :)

[PMP]

10 hours ago, Mark Hamlin said:

Anybody seen these yet at Warley?

Some images here

https://albionyard.com/2023/11/26/warley-2024-images-from-the-trade-3/

[cctransuk]

That tank wagon is the first Dapol model that has really impressed me.

 

CJI.

[gwrrob]

Lots of liveries to be seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[TheSignalEngineer]

3 hours ago, gwrrob said:

Lots of liveries to be seen.

Looks like my tank wagon fleet may get a revamp.

 

[46444]

5 hours ago, gwrrob said:

Lots of liveries to be seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's all gone a bit Bradley Wiggins! Or is it a Whimsey? 

[Mark Hamlin]

12 hours ago, gwrrob said:

Lots of liveries to be seen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

These are looking very tasty indeed. Thanks GWRRob

[MarkSG]

They do look nice. Justifies my decision to pre-order one.

[gwrrob]

3 hours ago, MarkSG said:

They do look nice. Justifies my decision to pre-order one.

 

It's a shame I couldn't get some out of the cabinet and turn them over to photograph underneath. I'm sure they'll be superb when released.

[greatcoleswoodhalt]

On 27/11/2023 at 16:28, gwrrob said:

I'm sure they'll be superb when released.

 

An email from Hattons today (30th) suggests these are "expected in Q2 2024".

[MonsalDale]

Which liveries are appropriate for 30s and the 50s?

[gwrrob]

44 minutes ago, greatcoleswoodhalt said:

 

An email from Hattons today (30th) suggests these are "expected in Q2 2024".

 

A better photo than I could manage at Warley.

 

[gwrrob]

2 hours ago, MonsalDale said:

Which liveries are appropriate for 30s and the 50s?

 

I would say the black liveries as according to the blurb they were built between 1939-44, converted to class B in 1947.

 

https://www.Dapol.co.uk/blogs/news/oo-gauge-air-ministry-tank-wagons?fbclid=IwAR28bqVenHFZapwIOMqSY8xqNQ6iQ73kFElFQqNm339_Snm0yLgzN5ne5YE

[MarkSG]

4 hours ago, MonsalDale said:

Which liveries are appropriate for 30s and the 50s?

 

They were built as class A tanks between 1939 and 1944, and then some were converted to class B in 1947, so only those in original condition would be suitable for the 1930s and even then only the very tail end of it. Both the class A and class B would be suitable for the 1950s. 

 

The easy way to tell the difference is that all the class B tanks were black, while the class A tanks were silver, white or beige. Although one minor gotcha here is that, although not stated by Dapol, the Shell-Mex Motor Spirit tank (class A, silver and red, number 7522) appears to be an as-preserved example and wouldn't have carried that livery in service. So if you're after realism, then it's probably best to avoid that one. 

[Suzy Sulzer]

12 minutes ago, MarkSG said:

 

They were built as class A tanks between 1939 and 1944, and then some were converted to class B in 1947, so only those in original condition would be suitable for the 1930s and even then only the very tail end of it. Both the class A and class B would be suitable for the 1950s. 

 

The easy way to tell the difference is that all the class B tanks were black, while the class A tanks were silver, white or beige. Although one minor gotcha here is that, although not stated by Dapol, the Shell-Mex Motor Spirit tank (class A, silver and red, number 7522) appears to be an as-preserved example and wouldn't have carried that livery in service. So if you're after realism, then it's probably best to avoid that one. 

 

 

Very informative .Would you mind advising on appropriate 1960s livery's please ?

[Cwmtwrch]

49 minutes ago, MarkSG said:

The easy way to tell the difference is that all the class B tanks were black, while the class A tanks were silver, white or beige. Although one minor gotcha here is that, although not stated by Dapol, the Shell-Mex Motor Spirit tank (class A, silver and red, number 7522) appears to be an as-preserved example and wouldn't have carried that livery in service. So if you're after realism, then it's probably best to avoid that one. 

Class A tanks were light stone [officially anyway] before WW2, with a red line around the tank, although the tank colour could be silver, still with the red band, from 1939. The tank colour was replaced by shades of matt dark grey from 1941; post-war the livery was silver tank and red solebars. The Lobitos livery is therefore either pre-WW2 or for a wagon carrying contents with a flashpoint above class B, such as lubricating oils, for which there was no restriction on colours. I don't know if it's genuine. The Shell-BP class B livery is post WW2; the horizontal bars either side of "BP" were not applied for very long, but would have been seen for several years. White was used for pressurised tanks, such as those for LPG or ammonia, with various orange or red bands depending on contents and date.

39 minutes ago, Suzy Sulzer said:

Would you mind advising on appropriate 1960s livery's please ?

The same, except that Dove Grey was allowed for Class A from the early 1960s.

[Dunsignalling]

1 hour ago, Suzy Sulzer said:

 

 

Very informative .Would you mind advising on appropriate 1960s livery's please ?

 

AIUI, the Class A Shell-BP grey livery is post-1960. I was hoping it was a bit earlier!

 

I'd like Dapol to do similar markings on a silver tank some time!!

 

John 

Edited November 30, 2023 by Dunsignalling

[MarkSG]

2 hours ago, Suzy Sulzer said:

Very informative .Would you mind advising on appropriate 1960s livery's please ?

 

All of the class B (black) ones would be, I think. The class A tanks I'm less sure about. The Shell Motor Spirit livery is definitely wrong for the era (and I suspect that none of these wagons ever carried it in service), and Cwmtwrch has informed us that the stone (or beige) livery is pre-war and therefore also not correct for these tanks. I think the silver Esso and Regent tanks would be OK for the 50s and 60s. I certainly hope so, because one of those is what I've ordered!

[MarkSG]

Much though I like these models, I do get the feeling that Dapol haven't put as much effort into researching appropriate liveries as they have researching the design of the wagon. The Shell-Mex and Lobitos liveries appear to be wrong for the era, and the Berry Wiggins livery, although correct for the era, doesn't appear to have ever been applied to an Air Ministry tank. At least, I can't find any photos of it on one. The only photos I can find of an Air Ministry tank in in-service condition (ie, not on a preserved railway) are in Esso, Regent and Shell/BP liveries. That doesn't mean they never carried any others, of course, but I do wonder what Dapol's justification is for some of the choices they've made.

[Cwmtwrch]

14 hours ago, MarkSG said:

The Shell Motor Spirit livery is definitely wrong for the era

 Tourret has a photo of 5056, an ex-Air Ministry wagon, in exactly this livery, except that it appears to have red solebars. The photo is undated, but presumably post-war. The caption and the text don't quite agree on the owner, but it was probably Shell Mex, not Shell-BP. I'm not sure about the number Dapol have used.

15 hours ago, MarkSG said:

I think the silver Esso and Regent tanks would be OK for the 50s and 60s. I certainly hope so, because one of those is what I've ordered!

These liveries look OK to me. The Shell-BP class A tank with twin logos carries an A prefix to the number, which was used because the monoblock tank series duplicated the earlier numbers, so this is definitely a 1960s livery.

[Pteremy]

22 minutes ago, MarkSG said:

 I do wonder what Dapol's justification is for some of the choices they've made.

 

When I first researched the proposed liveries I thought it possible that they had tried to avoid the 1950s liveries that Bachmann have used on their more 'generic' tanks. Maybe they will appear in a future run. 

 

1 minute ago, Cwmtwrch said:

The Shell-BP class A tank with twin logos carries an A prefix to the number, which was used because the monoblock tank series duplicated the earlier numbers, so this is definitely a 1960s livery.

 

Tourret (p251) says this was done from 1964

[markw]

1 hour ago, MarkSG said:

Much though I like these models, I do get the feeling that Dapol haven't put as much effort into researching appropriate liveries as they have researching the design of the wagon. The Shell-Mex and Lobitos liveries appear to be wrong for the era, and the Berry Wiggins livery, although correct for the era, doesn't appear to have ever been applied to an Air Ministry tank. At least, I can't find any photos of it on one. The only photos I can find of an Air Ministry tank in in-service condition (ie, not on a preserved railway) are in Esso, Regent and Shell/BP liveries. That doesn't mean they never carried any others, of course, but I do wonder what Dapol's justification is for some of the choices they've made.

The Lobitos livery is based on a drawing and description in Tourret but it is 6'7" tank on 10'6" wb, so nothing like an Air Ministry tank.

Tourret has Berry Wiggins 106, an Air ministry tank in this livery.

[MarkSG]

57 minutes ago, Pteremy said:

When I first researched the proposed liveries I thought it possible that they had tried to avoid the 1950s liveries that Bachmann have used on their more 'generic' tanks. Maybe they will appear in a future run. 

 

That's not unreasonable, of course. A lot of buyers won't necessarily be aware of the differences between the type of wagon, and so would perceive a similar livery as a duplication.