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Why do Farish 4w fetch so much?


Leicester Thumper

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I kepp seeing this strange phenomenon with Graham farish 4 Wheel carriages, On ebay they seem to fetch a stupid price no matter if there's one, three, or ten of them, and there's no difference if it's boxed or not.

 

I have picked up some fantastic secondhand execeelent unboxed ones in LMS and GWR livery all for a fiver each....

 

What's up with this world? or is it a lack of people getting out and just hitting bid because they are bored???

 

Engines, yeah i can understand that, but why 4 wheel coaches? lol.

 

Bruce.

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How so? I thought they were based on a UK GW prototype??

 

 

Based is most likely the right word. I am under the impression that much like the old Farish suburban and main line coaches they are somewhat of a generic design, the features of which may give the coach a certain leaning towards one company or another. (I may be wrong about this as I can't remember where I heard this before).

 

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The four wheelers don't fit any design I've seen - to start with they are very long for four wheelers. I did ask Colin Allbright what the prototype was but he didn't know either. In fact I'm not sure the prototype wasn't "take a chunk of the bogie coach with the ends further in" 8)

 

The bogie coaches are a bit more clear - the mainline ones are (barring roof and ends) are very Maunsellish even down to the length, while the suburbans aren't too far off all kinds of generic non-corridor stock except for the roof - which like the mainline stockis an odd profile more akin to the early clerestory coaches and some of the pregroup stuff (eg LNWR) - and the length which is a bit long..

 

People have made some quite nice SR emu stock and the like using them as a base.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Dennis Lovett replied to my enquiry a few weeks ago:

 

The coaches were released in the early 1970s when the Farish N scale range was initially launched. I am not aware of the tooling being used after the Shredded Wheat project or the tooling being transferred to us from Poole .

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The four wheelers don't fit any design I've seen - to start with they are very long for four wheelers. I did ask Colin Allbright what the prototype was but he didn't know either. In fact I'm not sure the prototype wasn't "take a chunk of the bogie coach with the ends further in" 8)

 

The bogie coaches are a bit more clear - the mainline ones are (barring roof and ends) are very Maunsellish even down to the length, while the suburbans aren't too far off all kinds of generic non-corridor stock except for the roof - which like the mainline stockis an odd profile more akin to the early clerestory coaches and some of the pregroup stuff (eg LNWR) - and the length which is a bit long..

 

People have made some quite nice SR emu stock and the like using them as a base.

 

Yes that does make sense about the Maunsell look... I had contemplated a conversion project myself with those... I can underatand the 'lets chop it in half' idea... saves the brain ache of research And drawing a seperate 4 wheel design

 

Dennis Lovett replied to my enquiry a few weeks ago:

 

The coaches were released in the early 1970s when the Farish N scale range was initially launched. I am not aware of the tooling being used after the Shredded Wheat project or the tooling being transferred to us from Poole .

 

Obviously fitting the theory the moulds were damaged... plausible reason not to transfer them to Bachmann stock. Even so, if Bachmann did take the moulds on, would the 4 wheelers last that long in the range? possibly not.

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Obviously fitting the theory the moulds were damaged... plausible reason not to transfer them to Bachmann stock. Even so, if Bachmann did take the moulds on, would the 4 wheelers last that long in the range? possibly not.

 

Given the age of some of the models in the current range I don't see why the would not be in production unless it had been found that the were not selling. What would be very noticeable would be the detailing or rather the lack of it when compared to other models in the range.

 

 

 

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I wonder if the same reasoning explains the original Farish Pullmans also fetching high prices on eBay? Might be another 'tooling not transferred from Poole' model. Agree about the four wheelers fetching high prices - I bought a LMS brake for £7 in the hope of obtaining some more, but gave up after 18 months and sold it on. For £14 :O .

 

The other N gauge item that I'm aware of that fetches odd prices is the Lima London Brick bogie wagon, which is all the more amazing seeing as it's not even a UK prototype! Nice livery though... I've got 5 myself... :lol:

 

Then there's the Farish NE Fish van - I sold five of these in two batches for a total of £65 having had them sitting around for several years, and I very nearly repainted them. Gulp.

 

There's definitely a correlation between nice livery and high price though - the Peco orange Charringtons mineral wagon and the shiny Fina tank wagon also fetch good prices.

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I wonder if the same reasoning explains the original Farish Pullmans also fetching high prices on eBay? Might be another 'tooling not transferred from Poole' model.

 

 

From memory the tooling of these was transferred but was declared to be beyond further use. The prices that they do fetch occasionally give me thoughts about selling mine on.

 

 

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I make the record for a Farish GW 4-w: £57.50 + £2.50 postage on eBay.

 

There are even cardboard versions selling at £6+ each as I write.

 

:blink:

 

I'm trying not to think of the few I brought for a colliery layout, then sold (although I probably ruined them with painting and weathering).

 

Another option is to hack a bogie suburban coach onto a Peco Brake Van chassis- alot of fun and alot cheaper too.

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  • 4 weeks later...
  • 2 months later...

The four wheelers don't fit any design I've seen - to start with they are very long for four wheelers.

 

Given that they originally came out in coffee-coloured "teak" along with the GER livery J69, I compared them to the GER 4-wheelers used on the "jazz" service out of Liverpool Street and found them to be a fair approximation.

 

Most pre-grouping railways had a third class five-compartment 6-wheeler of approximately 32 foot length which looked not that much different ... so I separate the bodies from the chassis and fit them to Fleischmann 6 wheel chassis (anyone want a job lot of farish 4 wheel coach chassis??)

 

As to why they sell for so much ... well, sometimes they do, and sometimes they don't. It all seems to depend upon who's in the bidding.

 

Last summer I got a rake of 3 S&DJR 4-wheelers for £45. Next time I saw a single S&D one listed, it went for over £50 ...

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