High Level Kits

Thanks Jordan. Everything's done now and the etches/castings are on order so it's just the turnaround times on those, maybe around 4 - 5 weeks. The model will be on the stand at EM North and Scalefourum.

The High Level chassis helps bring out the potential of the Wills and Lima bodyshells. The heavy Finecast body with a big Mashima will certainly pull a lot, as will the Lima model if it’s stashed it with weight. The plastic body, used for the stand model, is very user-friendly to work with, coming to bits easily to allow improvements. Other than the firebox being too wide, is pretty accuate with the only major flaw being the flimsy rear mounting Lima used, which has been taken care of using etches.

The High Level chassis kit was designed to fit the forthcoming Bachmann 94xx, based on the best information available to us at the time. When this was delayed, Jim Smith-Wright decided to see what could be done to fit one to a Lima 94xx and at the same time, Tim Shackleton used a High Level chassis with a Wills Finecast whitemetal body kit. The Wills kit is a good 50 years old, and the Lima body dates back to the 1970s. Inevitably there will be compromises because expectations were different back then. However if you don't mind doing a bit of work then either route can produce an excellent result. How far you take it – fitting a fully detailed cab interior, for instance – is very much down to the individual modeller. Some will be happy to go the whole hog, others will accept a few compromises as the price for getting a good-looking and comparatively inexpensive 94xx model up and running.

The mechanism does not protrude into the cab so you could do that, and fit a fully detailed cab interior.

Following on from the above, Hornby magazine issue 123 (September 2017) which is now out, contains a fine article on the 94xx in which someone has done a tidy job mating the High Level chassis with a Wills Finecast body. The second photo shows what can be done with a Lima body on the same chassis. Either one's a winner - Lima bodies are available on Ebay for a few quid, or you can breath some new life into the old whitemetal kit, which is basically a sound model. Both chassis have custom gearboxes and can take a huge motor, which is hidden in the boiler space, as is the High Level way.

94XX in the model press. More details here: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/125216-high-level-94xx-hits-the-bigtime/

In Hornby magazine issue 123 (September 2017) which is now out, there's a fine article on the 94xx in which someone has done a tidy job mating the High Level chassis with a Wills Finecast body. The second photo shows what can be done with a Lima body on the same chassis. Either one's a winner - Lima bodies are available on Ebay for a few quid, or you can breath some new life into the old whitemetal kit, which is basically a sound model. Both chassis have custom gearboxes and can take a huge motor, which is hidden in the boiler space, as is the High Level way.

You make a lovely couple - I'm picturing the matching jumpers now!...

The engineering curator of Beamish Museum is a keen and very capable modeller, you could try there...

Yes it is. I tried etched verions but it was a nightmare and the louvres wewren't looking as good as they could.

The 45XX is not out of the question.

Going to try for Scalefourum, but a lot depends on the etchers...

More pics.... http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/125167-fowler-dm-gwr-no-1/

The pilot model for the latest High Level kit is finally done, complete with embellishments. It needs a bit of a clean-up to bring it up to exhibition standard, but not sure when that'll happen, so here it is...

The wheels come with the crankpin holes already opened, so jig-drilling is not an option, nor is using the wheels as a jig, as the material is so much softer than the brass cranks. Particular attention has been paid to the crank throw of the flycranks and this is constantly coming out within acceptable tolerances in relation to wheel dimensions. An alternative wheel can be used from the Gibson range, which can be matched to one of their nylon flycranks, although this doesn’t look as good.

The front wheel crankpin sits right behind the conn rod, so the crankpin nut would have to be paper thin. On the model, the Jackshaft is gear-driven, and this drives the rear wheels; the front wheels are also driven by gears, with no crankpin, so they aren't connected to the rods at all... that's the illusion bit!

Porcy, it’s always rewarding when someone shows enthusiasm for what I’m doing, so I’m grateful to you for posting this. The brakegear and sandpipes are missing, and the fit of the chassis needs to be sorted, but that’s more or less the finished model. I was particularly pleased to find that the ‘IllusoDrive system worked well on this model. Hopefully, the website should be behaving now...

It's this larger variant...

The website problem is still on-going, but anyone who needs to acces it can do so using this link: http://www.highlevelkits.co.uk/chris/Pages/ Once you're on the home page it should work as before.... Cheers, Chris.

Re my website problem, I've been trying to get in touch with the hosting company and can't so suspect there are problems there. I'll try again tomorrow.

Yes, I've done it. I've been very busy so my attention has been elsewehere. Give me a ring in about a week or so...

I've posted a few pics from Jim Smith Wright showing what he's achieved using a Lima body and High Level chassis. Here's a link http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/124550-jims-94xx/

Jim Smith Wright noticed the thread on the Bachmann 94xx and kindly sent me these pics in case they would be of interest to RM web patrons. Hope you enjoy them.

Thanks for the comments so far, especially The Johnster for such a full reply which must have taken a good while. I'm going to have a further read of that. Any more views are most welcome... Keep the comments coming about what you would like from a chassis kit particularly the level of complexity. It wouldn’t be difficult to adapt the existing designs into fold-ups, and the kits already come complete with gearboxes, so that's already sorted. Making a wheeled unit that is the right shape and runs smoothly is not a problem, but matching some of the detail from the complex mouldings of modern RTR without multi-part etch assemblies may be a challenge.

Sorry if I've mislead... just to be clear, a basic chassis means a basic chassis kit?...