Bachmann MEA/MFA Wagons - Two Versions?

[John M Upton]

Hello

 

Gathering a collection of various wagons, I have a number of Bachmann's MEA and the lower bodied cousin MFA wagons. Did Bachmann produce two versions of this model(s)? I only ask as I swear that the chassis on the most recent example I have seems different in some way.

[beast66606]

Correct - the early versions had damaged brake gear (the mould had been damaged), this was later corrected.

 

hth

[60026to]

I thought that the original tooling had really chunky brake gear compared to the second version which was a tad more refined ?

[John M Upton]

Thank you for that, confirm something that was lurking in the back of my mind that at some point the chassis had been retooled. It was mostly seeing some MEA's on EBay in the old original style Bachmann boxes (back when they first really got going) and then seeing the chassis on the batch I have just received from Hattons that made me think that there may have benefitted from some attention at some point as the current version looks too good to be that old.

[Mark Saunders]

The original Bachmann one had an all in one chassis with integral brake lever while the current one has a retooled chassis with separate brake lever (same as the HEA)!

 

Mark Saunders

[beast66606]

Those who doubt my comments probably need to look carefully at the chassis.

[Ron Ron Ron]

Bachmann have upgraded a number of their long running wagon chassis in recent years.

Whether or not they've also corrected the fault mentioned by Dave, is not in dispute, but as far as I can see, they've certainly gone for improved more detailed underpinnings on those wagons tackled so far.