Ozexpatriate

I finally got around to unboxing it. There was some carnage with separately added details. The chimney was busted off - this is easily fixed. The green box on the top of the left tender front was busted off. This is a bit trickier to set correctly but some CA adhesive should see to it. Additionally there were two other black plastic bits that I can't identify floating around the inner packaging. I haven't noticed anything obviously missing yet - brighter lighting and magnification might be needed. I didn't have the problem that some have reported with the safety valve. Otherwise, it looks like a lovely model.

I picked up my Tintagel Castle at the post office on Saturday morning. I peeked at it to check that there was no number plate (there wasn't, sorry Neal) but I haven't unboxed it yet.

Clearly with the prior illustrations in this thread it is neither unique nor pervasive. I share your concern about the smokebox door, but wasn't aware that there is a TSA requirement for electronics to go by surface mail. I thought that since the Dubai printer toner incident (or was it Bahrain) there were more X-ray inspections for air mail packages making things take longer.

This is the same kind of problem as the backwards T9 tender frames. Ok so mistakes happen. Someone grabbed a bucket of BR Castle smokebox doors and put them on a GWR Castle. It shouldn't happen and when it does it should be fixed. Hornby customer support were willing to fix the T9s. Perhaps they will do so with Tintagel Castle? Has anyone asked Hornby customer support what they plan to do yet? I'm in limbo. I am waiting for my model to wend it's way over the pond. Will it be from a good batch or the bad batch? Time will tell. I can only imagine how Neal feels. I've been waiting for the 28 months since this product was announced with a a great deal of anticipation. Now I've added trepidation as well. I think it's amusing that Rails is still advertising photographs (linked earlier in this thread) with with number plate moulding.

I don't think it is "all about the GWR". I think 7013 was simply stating that it's a bit unfair to categorize a nice GWR layout as a cliché where a similar layout representing another company might not be considered as such. From wiktionary: Clearly there were a lot of GWR layouts at one point in time and this has led to the feeling by many that the concept was overused and hence, a cliché. There was an odd convergence on the GWR by manufacturers spanning RTR to plastic kits. Standardized locomotives, somewhat standardized architecture and lots of different locations in pretty countryside with a bit of something for everyone led to their popularity. Personally I think that this thread is really only relevant for exhibition layouts - when people pay for the privilege to view layouts, they bring high expectations. For the rest of us, the "it's my layout, I'll do what I want" rule trumps. But I think we covered this ground before.

Mike, thanks for this data! Grumble, grumble, pout... "shirtbutton roundel", grumble The Collett coaches will have the shirtbutton as new liveries this year and the smart money in the Bachmann new releases says that the Dukedog will too. Bit of a look up for mid-to-late 30s GWR modellers.

At long last! Fantastic news. Thank you. With Silver Link also being made available before it appeared in Hornby's monthly new releases bulletins, it seems that with all the trouble they have had with expectation managment, Hornby is now trying to make sure that they 'over deliver' on their commitments. Either way, it is very good news and a good sign that perhaps at last Hornby is turning the corner with their supply chain problems. (Tooling issues with Tintagel Castle notwithstanding.)

Yes, the website worked for me too, I even remembered my password! Of course for me the sums are all wrong. There's no provision for removing the VAT and replacing the predefined postage with the international rate, but that's the normal drill with web-hosted orders from the UK, and so long as all that is sorted when the order ships and the card is charged, I don't mind. I'm looking forward to the GWR liveried version.

Wow - I knew the history of the RODs was confusing but that really makes my head spin. Thank you for taking the time to write all that down. EDIT (ADDED THE FOLLOWING BACK FOR COHERENCY): It seems that if Bachmann wants to make a non-Swindonized GWR ROD, it properly should be black. I guess I need to be careful with my definitions. I don't have the new Bachmann catalog in front of me and they don't seem to have an image loaded on-line. From recollection of my very brief look at the new catalogue (which only arrived last night and I can't check it right now so I might be wrong), the illustrations show a GWR safety valve cover, painted green, which would indicate some level of Swindonization on their proposed model of 3099.

You did sort out the italics for most of your posts though!

Coincident with Keith's (melmerby's) post at the top of this thread, there was a letter to MREmag posted on Monday (March 14) on 3099 appearing in the Bachmann catalogue, also quoting RCTS as the source. Since you can't reliably link to MREmag content, I'll post it the details here: If this contravenes our copyright policy, it should be deleted - it's unclear to me. I'll be delighted to have a 1920s GWR steam locomotive. If it was black, then the model probably should be black, though it does look nice in green. This leads me to ask, were any of the non-Swindonized RODs, 3050-3099, 6000-6003, painted green, or were they all black like 3099? (As Mike knowingly points out, there are probably many GWR modellers who don't have all the necessary reference works at hand - like me!) And ... does anyone know how to properly format a table in the text editor?

I can say that I want one and will pre-order it because it is in green "GREAT WESTERN" livery. I will purchase it whether it is "wrong" or not. I do appreciate knowing that the choice of this running number does not represent an authentic combination of details and livery. With two batches and reuse of numbers, GWR RODs are certainly a minefield to get the details right.

I sense a cross-over to the unusual layouts threads. Willy Wonka's chocolate factory as a rail served industry anyone? ... milk tankers, liquid chocolate tankers, open wagons loaded up with sweets. Oompa-Loompas instead of penguins. Then of course the Cadbury factory in Bournville was rail served, with very distinctive industrial locomotives.

Rather like the 'east side of Chicago', infamously used in a particularly annoying 1970s pop song*. Immediately east of Chicago is Lake Michigan. *If I provided a reference, you'll have it stuck in your head and be mad at me.

I'm quite sure in this case it did. If this gent took his layout on the UK exhibition circuit, there would doubless be critics and some of them harsh. Absolutely. Which is precisely why I think that this whole topic is a bit of a 'slippery slope'. No one likes slavish copies of other layouts ... but ... what's really wrong with children waving on a bridge, or a schoolboy with cap, shorts and notepad at the end of the platform? We don't really have the technology to make them stop waving when there are no trains and go home for tea, but they still add some visual interest. As to the US, there is a big difference in exhibitions. Distances are great and people can generally only get to relatively local shows so the exhibition roster is quite static. Also the standards are highly variable. I don't see a lot of "Oh no, not another Pennsy mainline or D&RG narrow gauge in the Rockies" thinking. There's more emphasis on trade and something for the kids to do. I think the high standards in UK exhibitions is what drives this concern.

The Model Railroader annual special issue "Model Railroad Planning 2011" arrived in the post the other day. I was flipping through the layouts in the magazine and what to my wondering eyes should appear, but there sandwiched between an urban-shunting shelf-layout and a an article on "Distinctive" layout themes was a GWR BLT in all it's glory. A classic BLT, except with the fiddle yard orthoganal to the detailed section making an "L", it is based in Thomas Hardy's Dorset, hypothetically on a branch of the Yeovil-Dorchester line. All done by a gent in Utah! Autocoach with 14xx - tick B-set - tick Small prairies - tick Dairy - tick Goods shed - tick (No cattle pens though.) Freelanced (as were the buildings), doubtless there are details that could be criticized, but nevertheless I loved it and congratulations to John Flann who not only built it, but had it published in a widely circulated magazine right in front of an article on "Distinctive themes for distinctive layouts". Other than the editorial choice of "OO" rather than the more semantically correct "00", it was a nice little article and goes to show that a there's no final arbiter on what is a cliché.

Impressive. Nice fidelity to prototype. There really is a prototype for everything.

I know I really should wear corrective eyewear (I even have an unfilled prescription) but is that a horse on the platform to the right of the picture? I don't know what I would call that, but that's not a cliché!

This thread makes me uneasy - probably because though a couple of happy accidents in the late 1970s I became interested in modelling the pre-war GWR and stuck with it to this day. I admit it, perhaps I lack imagination, but I'm caught up in the mystique of the Great Way 'Round. It's comfortable and I enjoy it still. Extrapolating some themes here, everything I own is a cliché. I'm not usually one to quote chapter and verse but sometimes when it says exactly what you want to express, it's compelling. So in that spirit: Ecclesiastes 1:9 (New International Version, ©2010) 9 What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. Is this always bad or wrong or something to be avoided? I say no. Reproducing a railway in miniature is inevitably going to create a lot of similar content. And indeed when things are missing (famously around here, trap points and 'proper' signalling*) it is rightly pointed out. If a commercial structure is a good representation of what I am looking for I don't see that as something to be avoided, simply because other people have also used the same kit. I don't intend to exhibit anything I build and some of the cameos that we see frequently, are interesting to non-railway afficionados that might visit. (They don't attend the exhibition circuit.) If the intent is to build an exhibition layout to demonstrate to the modelling fraternity, then yes, we value creativity and sigh at something that appears derivative of someone else's ideas. That's understandable - slavish copies of other layouts is not what visitors to an exhibition want to see for their admission fee. I remember a permanent layout exhibit behind glass from what has to be the mid-1970s where the lights dimmed every five minutes for 'nightime'. It was built with lots of German stuff that had every cliché in the book: a wedding, a funeral, a fire with the fire brigade attending, the man running for the bus/tram whatever etc. It was engaging, but I respect the perspective that it would be tiresome indeed to see this on every exhibited layout. But if you have a boy on a street with a football or a pool of water in a canvas tarpaulin on a sheeted wagon these things are very everyday, and it doesn't feel fair to castigate them as clichéd. Yes we value creativity and decry plagiarism, but at the end of the day, there really is nothing new under the sun. * when to use ground discs versus post-mounted signals remains a deep mystery to me to this day.

The list is now officially communicated by Hornby in their December releases. See page five. Tintagel Castle is now officially scheduled for MARCH 2011.

You are right - patience is a virtue and good things come to those who wait, but in this case I would not consider anyone eagerly awaiting a Tintagel Castle and frustrated by the manufacturing delay as being in the 'WANT IT NOW' camp. Tintagel Castle was announced at Christmas 2008, for the 2009 year. Once we hit January 2011, it will be 25 months and counting since the product announcement. In the meantime, I believe all the other Castles (in sundry BR liveries and configurations but no GWR liveries) announced for both the 2009 and 2010 years have been delivered. There is a clear business imperative to market to the BR modellers first before pre-nationalization modellers. It's unfortunate that there have been tooling problems getting Tintagel Castle manufactured.

Somebody posted a list of "delayed until 2011" items on the Hornby forum. I can't speak to the veracity of the data. At the top of this list is: R2848 Castle Class Tintagel R2848X DCC Fitted

This is a new datapoint. We were told some time back that details on the production samples for No. 5011 were wrong, causing delays from the summer. A broken mould explains why the delay is as long as it has been. This is an interesting piece of information. Hornby executives have been messaging to the finanical community that they were bringing manufacturers other than Sanda Kan on-line. This would appear to evidence that this strategy is working. Thanks for sharing your conversation with Mr. Kohler.

Once pre-ordering information is available, I hope some kind soul will post it here for us non-Model Rail subscribers. Activities like the Sentinel might make me a believer that the ~$90.00 for a US subscription is worth it.

Indeed I am on the sidelines wistfully watching you all enjoy the Hawksworths. They do indeed look fabulous and hopefully they will be a very successful offering from Hornby. I made my choice not to stray past 1947, even though I will time warp a bit in the first half of the 20th century. I agree that the shirt button is quite 'orrible. It looks grand as a brass blazer button, but is quite lonely and lost on a Collett tender.