lofty1966

I emailed a couple of times to try and purchase some goodies. Never heard back so I'm guessing gone the way of the Dodo.

Glad I'm not the only one who laughs at the garbage this clown spews.

Thanx Will. Two of the 'F's have been shortened to the correct length. Same problem with the decals. (No room) Also have a 'C' with the same conundrum.

Oh dear....

The brake gear on the wagon kit etches (that i have) are useless. All attached to the solebars, so out of line with the wheels and usually so thin an etch they bend when you so much as look at them. The Damo B had the "relief " detail on the wrong side when you folded up the solebar etch anyway too. Definitely more scratch aids than esoteric kits.

I've bought a couple of these kits recently (via ebay). Thanx for the heads up!

Er....shouldn't it be the same? It's per revolution which is the same for any scale

They said that last year

I could wholesale these. All my Clerestories have had the buffers replaced with more prototypical buffers

I'd steer clear of superglue as it can set before you are happy with positioning. I use glue n' glaze, a pva water based glue. Plates can be removed at a later date if needs be without damaging the model

Not quite correct John. There are single shoes on the centre wheels operated by a Morton lever. I'm going to use a sprung centre axle using a 2mm brass tube as an inside bearing. This should then allow sufficient side play and stop the vehicle rocking on the centre wheels.

Any ideas on underframe (vacuum?) Cylinder(s) if any ? Positioning etc?

Falcon Brassworks kits now highly sought after? Desperate times....

Anybody have the instructions to this van, please? I started building the body about four addresses ago and in the ensuing moves the instruction sheet has gone AWOL

247 Developments have whitemetal 7ft bogies available or try Shapeways for 3D printed ones

Then you really should have a screwlink coupler

The current Hornby version does not have a "pancake" motor. It also has NEM mount couplings on the bogies. Not that it really needs them as they were single running units.

What's the point of all the work of trying to shoehorn in a completely different chassis? Where are you going to hide the motor tower/power bogie? Be even more obvious than the Dapol "solution"

Excellent work on the ends. My Parkside/Ratio hybrid and an ABS kit.

There are no new style spare bodies available from Hornby (yet)

Airfix body on Old chassis with new tooling cylinders and sidebars etc. Also new tooling front bogie.

Sorry I didn’t make it clear enough. As far as I can ascertain: There are two different “old style” chassis’ (three if you count the original unpowered chassis from Airfix) one has a Ringfield motor mount and one has a centre drive for the can. The Ringfield chassis is the oldest which was also used on the 1000xx Counties. When the can motor was introduced the Castle got it's "own" chassis and that continued until the "new tooling" Castles. There are two “old style” bodies as well. One with a fire iron tunnel and one without. The new tooling Castle uses a longer chassis that will not fit the old style bodies. You can fit the New tooling Castle cylinder blocks and metal valve gear/slide bars to the older chassis’ with a little bit of trimming of the cylinder block mount. If you are really brave (stupid) you can just about squeeze a new tooling front bogie under the older chassis but it is major work and not a lot of clearance in the vertical plane despite a lot of filing of the chassis block and the bogie. The new tooling Castles wheel spacing is also slightly different as well. There are two types of wheels fitted amongst the new tooling Castles. The very first release of the new tooling has its own unique wheel “R” no. All releases after it appear to have a new “R” number. I have no idea what Hornby changed as there are no spares available for the latest issues. Comprehensive enough?

Er, what cheap bodies? There are none. One came up a while back and went for over 25 quid. The "cheap" ones are the earlier less detailed models.

Several Castles have the can motor. You would need a new chassis block as the ringfield drives the rear wheels and the can drives the centre.