Dapol announce a 28xx in OO

[Steamport Southport]

I don't think anyone is desperate for a Manor. They've been available since 1980 and you could probably pick up a Mainline one for about £20 and it would still give the newer versions a good run for it's money.

 

 

 

Jason

[No Decorum]

23 minutes ago, Steamport Southport said:

I don't think anyone is desperate for a Manor. They've been available since 1980 and you could probably pick up a Mainline one for about £20 and it would still give the newer versions a good run for it's money.

 

 

 

Jason

Hm. Perhaps I’m not desperate. However, I got myself a Manor with sound and I’m absolutely delighted with it. It arrived in the middle of other locomotives, some of which have been troublesome, and it performs like a dream. My only regret is that I didn’t get a sound fitted Mogul. An Accurascale one is coming my way too. Duplication may be undesireable but it is always interesting to see how two manufacturers approach the same subject. I have a Bachmann Manor and it is lovely. It has a flyworm gear which always struck me as an excellent idea; it’s a pity they gave it up.

Edited May 30, 2023 by No Decorum
Spelling.

[Michael Hodgson]

15 hours ago, AY Mod said:

 

If I knew of a stockist of Sense of Proportion I'd have passed the suggestion on where to get one from.

You can get one .... at the same place as you get these

 

[OnTheBranchline]

On 13/05/2023 at 18:57, 57xx said:

 

The Hornby 28xx isn't actually that bad, certainly not like the insipid olive green of the Kings. Side by side with my Manor, there is very little difference.

 

The level of detail still holds up pretty well too.

[Dunsignalling]

On 30/05/2023 at 11:55, Steamport Southport said:

I don't think anyone is desperate for a Manor. They've been available since 1980 and you could probably pick up a Mainline one for about £20 and it would still give the newer versions a good run for it's money.

 

 

 

Jason

Though I wouldn't even shell out that much without seeing it go!

 

Mainline's Manor was built using the best r-t-r technology the UK consumer was willing to pay for in the 1970s/early 80s, (i.e. not a lot). The "rude mechanicals" therefore aren't renowned for longevity, and certainly won't have improved with age! 

 

Any "running" will be of a Mainline nature, even if it still happens and the wheels are all still where the factory put them.

 

John

 

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by Dunsignalling

[No Decorum]

5 hours ago, OnTheBranchline said:

 

The level of detail still holds up pretty well too.

I have to agree. These are from a time before Hornby rather lost the plot. They run well. However, experience of Dapol’s Manor might well convince me to get a Dapol 28XX with sound.

 

Edited June 20, 2023 by No Decorum
To remove ambiguity.

[melmerby]

On 30/05/2023 at 11:55, Steamport Southport said:

I don't think anyone is desperate for a Manor. They've been available since 1980 and you could probably pick up a Mainline one for about £20 and it would still give the newer versions a good run for it's money.

 

 

 

Jason

I've got a Mainline Manor, bought brand new when they first came out and it isn't a patch on the current offerings

The mechanism is crap and always has been and the body is lacking in detail.

[Star-rider]

I’ve been quietly pondering this announcement for a while.

 

Like may on here a new 28XX was not something that was particularly on my mind. My Hornby 28XX looks OK, I remember waiting for a couple of years for the windowed cab variety (3803 class?) to be offered in a 1930’s shirt-button livery but it never came so I ended up buying a second hand one and taking the paintbrush to the tender, that has also performed perfectly well.

 

However, as the contented owner of Dapol’s Manor, Mogul and Small Prairie with sound fitted as standard and a decent amount of weight combined with smooth running I’m starting to get tempted. I think a 28XX to the same standard would look very good at the head of a train of all those high-spec Great Western wagons Rapido are selling me.

 

The price of almost everything seems to threaten a spontaneous bowel movement these days -that’s already been talked to death – but if you consider the proposed price for the sound fitted models after available discounts then mentally deduct £130.00 for what it would cost to fit a decent sound decoder and speaker to one of my existing Hornby models the nett price of the new loco becomes a little less unpalatable. The days of a loco for under a hundred quid are all but gone, £130-£150 is where todays value is at.

 

So, fifteen quid a month tucked into the old biscuit barrel may put me in the market by the time they arrive.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

The Hornby 28xx is OKish, but too light for traction for a start. So if Dapol make a good job of it I am in. (It should have 95% the pulling power of the Heljan O2, which is - correctly - the available RTR OO eight coupled that's top for grunt.)

 

On 30/05/2023 at 12:16, No Decorum said:

I have a Bachmann Manor and it is lovely. It has a flyworm gear which always struck me as an excellent idea; it’s a pity they gave it up.

Looks like a good example of value engineering, one machined component that does two jobs. But it isn't, because worm gear efficiency - which is poor - is at its best when the worm is as small in diameter as possible. (Something that H-D got right on theior Ringfield motors.)

 

It only works reasonably well in the Bachmann split chassis because the Mabuchi FK130 motor is a real animal with bags of torque. The split chassis mechanisms I bought are almost all worn out and long gone, but I have retained these motors for projects and yet to see a failure. So much for all the ninnies complaining about can motors instead of 'serviceable' open frame motors...

[The Johnster]

I used to be very keen on flywheels, my modelling career being a long and often pointless search for reliable and controllable slow running using RTR chassis.  The answer to my problems was of course full compensation in etched brass kit chassis which are a bit beyond my ability comfort-zone, and nowadays it's arguably DCC which I can't afford.  A big brass flywheel gives an impression of precision engineering and a belief in a model's ability to perform well in this regard, but...

 

As I have learned, while a fly can certainly smooth out the running when a train is running along at a decent hop, it won't adequately help with good controllable DC slow-running in 4mm.  It won't do any harm, but in slow running, and for smooth stops and starts, the motor is turning slowly and at a low voltage, so in DC the braking effect of wiper pickups and drag of geartrains and bearings are at their proportionate maximum, all counting against satisfactory performance, and the fly will be turning slowly, and therefore contributing little stored energy to the driving wheels.  The same would be true of an electronic stayalive were one to be available for DC; again, i would do no harm, but the input current would be low and thus the output would be very transitory, and less likely to overcome whatever had caused the stall in the first place.

 

I have come to the conclusion that current RTR chassis, with can motors and worm/cog/idler drive, are pretty good if well set-up, and the space needed for a fly of effective size can usually be equally well used for ballast; the enemy here is the space needed in small tank engines for DCC gubbins and speakers, but many more recent designs take this into consideration quite well.  I would like to see lower final drive gear ratios than the 28 or 30 or so to 1 that seem to be standard, but this is unlikely to happen as it would affect top speeds for those of us lucky enough to have room for layouts on which trains can realistic run fast.  I'd rather 40 or 50:1, but of course this isn't a reliable solution either, as mechanical drag from the geartrain will increase; no such thing as a free lunch. 

 

I'm content with the performance of current RTR mechs, and think some of the 0-4-0 industrials are miraculous.  But I still think there is room for improvement before I would feel really sastisfied; I can get the desired performance from my locos but have to be very restrained on the control knob and alert to any speed changes from the loco.  You get to know each loco's peculiarities and compensate for them (this is not unrealistic, incidentally).  I don't think there is much room for improvement in RTR mechs unless full compensation becomes normal, which I suspect might be unreliable and costly for volume production. 

 

The ultimate answer has to be a fundamental base-up rethink of the technology, and I believe that it is possible using NFC control and charging to have rechargeable on-board battery power source and bluetooth smartphone control, dispensing with the need for metal track, wheelrims, and pickups, and using 'direct drive' motors on the axles, with no geartrain at all, the motor shaft and the axle being the same thing.  If I had lottery money, I might even consider trying to produce it commercially myself; it would of course be completely compatible with existing systems.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

7 hours ago, The Johnster said:

...I have come to the conclusion that current RTR chassis, with can motors and worm/cog/idler drive, are pretty good if well set-up, and the space needed for a fly of effective size can usually be equally well used for ballast; the enemy here is the space needed in small tank engines for DCC gubbins and speakers...

An area for improvement in construction is making any ballast readily removable, so that there is the option to create voids or to substitute a denser ballast material as the owner requires. Of current RTR OO brands, for this factor Bachmann lead the field, regularly having screw secured ballast  weights.

 

7 hours ago, The Johnster said:

...unless full compensation becomes normal, which I suspect might be unreliable and costly for volume production... 

Bachmann's first eight coupled  has a simpler yet very effective alternative applicable to larger locos, two sprung saddles bearing on the second and fourth driven axles. Sadly they have not repeated this technique in later products, and I do wonder if it was because this feature got no mention in any review I have seen.

[BVMR21]

Hattons have got their order deadline up for these now set as the 13th of November (2023), which is useful to know.

[34theletterbetweenB&D]

Seems a little premature, when Hattons reckon to have it in stock Q4 2024. I am going to wait till it arrives to make sure it's a goodun.

[sjrixon]

Did anyone express interest direct to Dapol on their direct only version? 2874. And if yes, did they acknowledge your interests? 

[E100]

20 hours ago, sjrixon said:

Did anyone express interest direct to Dapol on their direct only version? 2874. And if yes, did they acknowledge your interests? 

 

I have but not had a reply.

[E100]

I also hope we may get an update soon on the project as it is slated for release at the end of the year.

[E100]

Still no updates on this project sadly from what I can see. They said they did plan to share CAD's so I presume the delivery date will probably have slipped a fair bit as we haven't seen those.

[Harlequin]

16 minutes ago, E100 said:

Still no updates on this project sadly from what I can see. They said they did plan to share CAD's so I presume the delivery date will probably have slipped a fair bit as we haven't seen those.

Dapol don't believe in talking to us about their model development in the way that other more enlightened manufacturers do.

 

I suspect when we see it, it will be close to, or in, production and I wouldn't be surprised to then spot one or two nasty errors that can't be fixed before the models reach us.

 

Edited July 12 by Harlequin

[No Decorum]

20 hours ago, Harlequin said:

Dapol don't believe in talking to us about their model development in the way that other more enlightened manufacturers do.

 

I suspect when we see it, it will be close to, or in, production and I wouldn't be surprised to then spot one or two nasty errors that can't be fixed before the models reach us.

 

Which, with luck, will be corrected on a later batch. Due to the grand folks on RMweb, I avoided the Prairie with the dodgy rear wheels. Easily fixed, one might say but I have a backlog of fixes and enhancements, so I’d rather not add another to the end of the queue. I’m waiting for a second batch Prairie and I have sympathy for those who bought examples in the first run. When it comes to the Mogul, I have a first batch one and a second batch one. The second batch Mogul has been improved, especially the shade of green, but then there’s the problem of the blue-black paint on the second batch ones. Fingers crossed!

[BVMR21]

Was having a look on FB and in the comments of one of their posts a few weeks back they said they were still looking over the CADs, so I think we can deduce from that these will probably not break cover until early to mid 2025 at the earliest.

[Star-rider]

On 23/07/2024 at 13:38, BVMR21 said:

Was having a look on FB and in the comments of one of their posts a few weeks back they said they were still looking over the CADs, so I think we can deduce from that these will probably not break cover until early to mid 2025 at the earliest.

No bad thing for me, I've just blown my 28XX savings on a second sound fitted Mogul 😁

 

(well, it's been a while since I had a new loco and I felt something was due, life is not living unless you succumb to a little self indulgence now and then).