pheaton

45015 is safe from the scrappy owing to asbestos in the boiler compartment.....people tresspassing and takings phots in and around the loco should mindful of this especially as potentially some of it is blue asbestos! to be fair robin it might have been the wrong gen type for that 25 but a 6lda power unit is not to be sniffed at......id love a spare set of heads for 26043 and at current 6k each from electroputere im going to need a lottery win to buy them!!!# you can bring a generator back from oblivion......but you cant fix a cracked flame face

My Afflicted one was actually..... DCC sound Valiant....to confirm after the shell started cracking before it got too bad i switched the chassis to an NSE shell and the cracks re-appeared however i have also seen it, in large logo centurion, and on ebay i have seen tell tale cracks in the body shell on the REX version in railfreight livery, and also Edward Elgar in green. but bear in mind these might not have been on there original chassis.

GWR were offered bourton station by the council but turned it down, the GWR were never going to bourton, its a completely separate branch.

Andy, keep a watchful eye on the rest of the chassis, some Hornby 50s were afflicted by the same problem as the 31s.....

Only difference in the castings is between the sound equipped and non sound equipped models, the cowlings were just stuck on......but i suspect they will also have to supplied specially as well since i doubt the old ones come off the chassis at all in one piece. I think your find Hornby will produce a complete motorised chassis specifically for the returned models and then just discard the old ones. However a small number of sellers seem to be picking up a lot damaged chassis quite often on ebay and selling them as spare parts...

MIke, Hornby wont destroy stock to make a spare for you, i think you will find the chassis for replacements like yours are ordered speacially, its frustrating i know but Hornby normally come though!

Touche royal oak Its -2 your late to book on....tell me would you rather fumble with a manual choke on your mk1 fiesta or would you rather the ECU sorts it for you? similarly would you rather scrape the windscreen or perhaps let the ford patented heated windscreen do the job for you? clearly you can appreciate a classic piece of machinery you and me are alike otherwise i wouldnt let 26043 commit emotional blackmail on me im not picking on the fiesta as such believe me as im sure your aware there are far more comical things to pick on in the motor industry (eg rover k series ) but ill level with you..... your a professional railwayman, and i tip my hat to you ..but in that unit on your avatar...youve had a day from hell would you like to get your tool kit out....or lift the magic switch that sits in front of your windscreen and as im sure your aware you cant do that in mk1 slammer Mk1 slammer = fiesta mk1 unless its a REP and then its an XR2i the unit in your avatar....ok hands up its not a 64 plate fiesta....but c'mon it's atleast a mk3 or at push mk4

It is a howes resprayed Bachmann 37 with the correct roof from PH designs. The mazak issue can strike at any time the problem is as i said none of the manufacturers have come forward and said "ok people we screwed up" this is what we will do and why, this is what we wont do and why. Personally if in 10 years time i find my 31s crumbling apart then yes ill be annoyed but i wont lose any sleep over it......in a model a couple of months or a year old, thats a slightly different story. Normally this would cause people to vote with there wallet and switch to another manufacturer but by having there own market (no-one else makes a super detail 31 or 50) Hornby can simply say dont like it....tough your stuck with us! I think the whole metal chassis is a little over-hyped IMHO in locos yes it makes sense. but units....really!

I think the point that needs to be made is.... When the lima stuff came out, like the 37 and 47 there was no such thing as a model railway can motor....so it was lima....or Hornby and both motors equally had issues, having said that I could run a full length lima HST with little issues but at the same time some of my 31s were quite literally terrible....but then this is like comparing a 64 plate ford fiesta with a ford fiesta mk1, the mk1 when it came out was very good for its market but now the 64 plate one is much better...... The lima products fitted well within their time-frame, time moves on but the model doesent.....you can either replace your model with an expensive (by comparison) Bachmann/Hornby/vitrains one or you can persevere especially if you have spent time detailing it..... if you happy with a model theres no need to get rid..... case in point.... both 31s are powered and are lima! yes ok they dont have all the bells and whistles of the Hornby model....but am i going splash 200 quid on Hornby 31s to respray them......no the model world is going nuts people quick to point out how poor a model is based on the most rediculous of points.....like the first edition Heljan 33.....the shoulder is wrong.....oh terrible it should be consigned to the list of model world failures.....you must buy the new improved version......WHY?????? is this because i might have trouble recognizing my old 33 is really a 33? is plastic better than mazak or vice versa....there on a par if they are designed correctly....they can do the job just as well as each other, true plastic doesent have the weight but that can be fixed...with a weight.....ive no idea why someone would argue a weighted chassis is any worse or any better than a chassis that is made of metal and acts as a weight....as for the argument plastic goes brittle....oh very true....theres one small flaw in that argument though...... ive yet to see a common rtr loco that has body thats not made of plastic even the ones with the super duper mazak chassis!!!! So to summarise of my loco collection (around 130 locos) probably about 15 of them are lima based (mostly 31s) yes they are best lima chassis i can find and if not they are Hornby replacements! i have 2 rakes of lima load 9 Mk3s and a rake of lima PGAs and a rake of lima tip hooks.....no issue with these for the age they are a good model... And thats my point.....the lima models are good for there age, that doesent make me a lima fanboy i just cant see the point of replacing a perfectly working model which is a reasonable representation of the prototype and works well.... as brian johnson of ac/dc once sang.......ive got better things to do with my money!

The problem as I see it..... this issue doesn't just affect 31s I have seen 50s in the early and latter stages of the same problem.....the issue as I see it is Hornby and Bachmann and Heljan simply haven't been transparent enough about the issue that all 3 of the manufacturers models have suffered over the years...... Hornby have in my opinion not sacrificed models for replacement chassis, replacement 31 chassis for the Mazak issue I believe have been specially ordered hence the long delays....in addition to this the 31 like the 56 and 50 and 60 is one of the most complicated models I have seen in terms of its construction so I suspect Hornby considered user replacement of the chassis to be beyond the skills of some modellers hence the Return To Base approach. That leave the very well raised point.... How long should a model last? Personally I believe the manufacturers should answer that question......my confidence in Hornby was severely dented when my 31s started to suffer this issue and my attention turned to the 4 sound equipped models I had invested in. All Hornby and indeed the other manufacturers need to do is issue a statement about this......many products have suffered issues in the past....but the consumer confidence as a result of those issue can be relieved by a few simple words and an efficient process.

Sorry my bad Tractor is spot on...series.....but the diagram is correct on the left the amplifier would blow as the sum resistance would exceed that of the amplifier.....

Hi Slipstream, theres nothing to stop you adding a speaker apart from space but be wary, you must wire the speakers up according to the maximum resistance you can place on the decoder see the diagram below Do not exceed 4 ohms on a V4 and 100ohms on a v3.5 doing so would lead to the pretty much instant destruction of the decoder. but also the more ohms placed on the decoder generally means a lower volume, so its a trade off between number of speakers, speaker location and speaker quality.... Personally if its volume you want than a pair of 4 ohms wired in parallel in the tanks are potentially your best bet, but if your thinking like me... "you dont go out and buy a top of the range hi-fi and make the speakers point at the floor....., but even i was impressed at the quality of sound....but for me overalll volume wins every time....the louder the better!

TBH slipstream, your going to struggle with the Bachmann default sound esp with the factory default sound setup. ive pretty much got all of the described 37 sound setups and surprisingly the loudest is a pair of speakers in the tanks

Wiggy, does F4 actually slow the loco down? and if so what state does it have to be in? can you describe the steps you made to make it actually stop? That's a cracking layout by the way

The engine starting batteries alone for a class 45 come in (brand new) at 8k (that's excluding VAT) Leopard I noted you put an "undecipherable" what my colleague is saying is that the 45s like many locos on BR had a number of part suppliers....for example...the electrics were supplied by Crompton Parkinson, the engine by Vickers (license builders for sulzer) air system davies and Metcalfe and the exhaust by a subsidiary of the Gloster aircraft company. Different suppliers used different threads it so happens that one of them as specified by D1051 is emeto which is just a name...but its a thread that you cannot by the taps and dies for because it is long obsolete, so if you have stripped thread that you need renew its not always possible to retap it, with say a BSF or dare I say it metric... as im sure you are aware given the business your into. So you have to replace new....and what might seem a simple copper pipe....starts disappearing into brake valves and fuel systems! I would say you wouldn't have much change from 500k if you wanted to go mainline with 45015!

In the world of Bachmann 66022 and the 20 and the 47404 which were among the first RTR DCC sound fitted loco's were always fitted with a 21pin sound chip. I believe to eliminate the harness and increase room to cut down re-design costs, and manufacturing issues. In the world of Hornby 31s and 50s despite being native "8 pin" machines had a redesigned chassis to accommodate the smaller 21 pin fitted circuit board....never really worked out though why Hornby make there circuit boards so complicated.... I don't recall any manufacturer fitting a RTR loco with 8 pin sound.

no clips on the cab fronts its 4 clips, two either side as per heljans useual...

Hornby class 50

owing to an ebayer not putting much effort into a description or photo i have bagged this for £36 http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121339267563?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

thats a howse 3.5 decoder with NO modifications to the speaker, its a standard 20x40 attached to the chassis, no baffle of anything....a bit tinny but im not going to tinker with it...... im all for volume....the more the better!

The factory default sound from Bachmann was dissapointing to say the least, if your not changing the speaker setup the howse sounds will give a lot more volume, i have a NON enclosed 20x40 speaker on a 3.5 which is very loud, if you are going to change the speaker setup then legomanbiffo's sounds are very good. Obviously worth noting changes to the speaker will void the Bachmann warranty, not sure about a reblow though.

Stand Corrected

theres a phot of one such service in the book I mentioned in my post and I didn't say they worked a daily diagram....they worked a service! and also I think you will find a hst on one power car can keep reasonably close to its timing but the fuel sentiment you said is true and in the event needing to come back it didn't...it was hauled to the depot by a conventional locomotive. the service in question was the 10:35 paignton Paddington, however the service started from newton abbot owing to being unable to run to paignton from laira

In the summer of 1987 there was major power car shortage so a number of sets ran in service with one power car only, that car was included in the end in case it required assistance in the rear...or an empty stock working in the opposite direction (like at London Paddington or penzance) which would require the assistance of a conventional loco. Mick is correct in that it would have been used to tow sets or power cars between depots Mick is also correct in that HSTs only had buckeyes.....and not drop heads like conventional mk1, mk2, mk3 stock....but that's not an issue as number of loco's were fitted with buckeyes...eg 33/1 the biggest problem with a HST trailer is the lack of buffers which means you need a rubbing plate to connect to it as only 33/1s were the only diesel equipped with such a plate (for hauling southern region stock) and 73s for hauling GATex stock as neither were not common on the western region a mk2 vehicle was provided because it has the correct rubbing plate on the gangway it didn't have to be ETH fitted because a HSTs rake is non standard ETS it uses 3 phase. When you use a buckeye on a conventional mk1 or mk2 or mk3 coach you would shorten the buffers and use the rubbing plate if you were connecting rakes together or connecting to a buckeye fitted loco 33/1, 66, 67, 73, 90, 91 however if you were using the hook, you drop the buckeye and extend the buffers and fit retention plates. Note that photo shows the buckeye dropped and the buffers extended If you look on page 119 of colin j marsdens HST silver juibilee book you will see one of those coaches in a HST set in service

I would say it did prove superior.... Its a speculative one....and I don't disagree with you, But ask yourself has the 60 ever achieved the availability figures of the 59 (95%) no but more importantly did the 60 spawn off thousands of re-orders.....no in terms of performance there's very little between them, but the 59 led to the EMD series 66 and when the 60 was put out to tender by British rail EMD offered a state of the art class 59, which would have probably contained all the "toys" emd had to strip off the 59 to get to fit the British loading gauge......the only reason they didn't get the order was purely political.