Wolseley

Our 6 year old grandson insists on calling them concrete trucks for that very reason.

Nothing looks more like painted metal than painted metal.

On the subject of new bodies on old chassis, the chassis these bodies were fitted to were not exactly scrap, as I have reused some bits and the motors will eventually find a home elsewhere and the bodies, while not exactly new, were hardly vintage, but here are two Tri-ang/Hornby streamlined Coronations fitted with Dublo A4 chassis. In case you're wondering, I found the A4 chassis to be a better fit than the Duchess one, and it allows the cab detail to be retained. The rear pony truck assembly is the original Tri-ang one (easily adapted with a bit of filing) and the front bogie from a Dublo Duchess (I have a few in my spares box).

And if it takes more than that, it's time to take it apart, clean and service it.

I recently fitted Dublo bogies to a rake of Tri-ang Caledonian coaches, really just to get consistency in wheel standards and ease of coupling and uncoupling. The surprising thing I found was that, in spite of not now having pin-point axles like they did with the Tri-ang bogies, the coaches actually roll better and run more smoothly than they did before.

Clyde Model Dockyard, perhaps?

Interesting, in that the last of the Caledonian Railway's gunpowder vans were almost carbon copies of GWR Iron Minks, even down to having GWR rather than CR brake gear.

In case anyone is wondering, yes, it is a three rail layout. I have converted the Cardean to three rail using a Marklin skate, but I haven't got around to doing the B12 yet.

Here is my B12. I'm no expert on Tri-ang, but I believe the BR lined black one was the original incarnation of the model. Alongside it is a GEM whitemetal kit of the Caledonian Railway 903 (Cardean) class, which was designed to fit the B12 chassis.

Here's the set I have:

Well, I have my City of London now, have converted it to three rail and it looks like, once I have performed a bit of surgery on the cab backplate and footplate, it's going to fit the body (it's an early Tri-ang-Hornby one) with a little bit of room to spare. I know I tried this once before and had problems, but maybe I did something wrong.....

I was just working on my Wrenn City of Stoke on Trent, adding a Dublo three rail pickup, and noticed that it also has "L" and "R" stamped on the pole pieces.

Well, this has been a very interesting collection of responses, containing much information that needs to be noted for future reference. Thank you everyone. I removed the body and ran the locomotive for a couple of circuits and found that, not only was the problem getting worse, but it was starting to get rather noisy. Now I don't mind dismantling other Dublo motors to service them, but I would much rather leave Ringfields alone, so I started off by looking at possible problem areas that did not require the motor to be pulled apart. The first thing I checked was whether or not the brushes were worn and it turned out that my memory wasn't playing tricks on me - I had renewed them. Then I checked the end float of the armature, as Nearholmer had suggested. Initially it looked in order but, as I was about to look elsewhere, I noticed something amiss - sure there was no excessive end float, but the shaft was at a slight angle and, with a bit of a prod from a screwdriver, it would move slightly from side to side. What had happened was the grub screw securing the adjustable bearing housing assembly was not tightened down properly, and the assembly (it is the earlier one that is screwed in from the front of the motor housing) must have become looser with use, and the armature shaft had come out of the bearing hole (or whatever you call the bit in the housing it fits into) and was moving slightly up und down sideways as well. I put everything back in its right place, tightened up the grub screw and was pleasantly surprised when it started and ran as it should - and ran a bit more quetly than it had been. Problem solved..... Now I don't know the history of this loco, and it was in a rather parlous state when I bought it (it was a "non-runner" with missing paintwork and bent cab roof and was said to be only suitable for spares) but I suspect a previous owner must have been mucking about with it, as the adjustable bearing housing assembly is one part I definitely didn't touch when I was servicing the motor and chassis a few months ago. Anyway, after all that talk about my Ringfield Castle, here it is (I hesitate to call this one "she" as I renamed it Isambard Kingdom Brunel):

Thanks for the response. As it's almost 10pm here and there's a fair bit of dismantling involved, I might leave this for tomorrow night. At this point I can say that it is definitely not the magnet, as I replaced the original one a few months ago with a neo-magnet when I bought the loco, as the original magnet was so weak that the it barely moved when power was applied. I think I replaced the brushes, but I'll have to take them out to check (wouldn't be the first time I've thought I have done something and I haven't). I have a horrible feeling that the most likely culprit will be the armature windings, but I'll have a look into it and report back.

My Ringfield motored Castle has begun misbehaving. At times it can move off very slowly when starting and when this happens it either either stops (a push will restart it) or it picks up speed after it has travelled 6 feet or so. This can happen either in forward or reverse, but is more likely to happen in the forward direction. Then it will happily travel around for a few minutes (sorry to be vague, but it is very variable) then begins to slow down again and, unless it picks up speed, which it sometimes does, it stops dead. When it is behaving itself, it draws about .45amp, but when it shudders to a stop, the ammeter needle hits the stop, as if there is a short circuit. I was just testing it at full speed, rather than a more normal speed, to see if it made any difference, both in forward and reverse and noticed that, just before it stopped, which it did after eight circuits of my 8'x4' layout, there was a shower of sparks from the condenser. I have never had this happen before. Can someone please explain what is happening here and how to fix it?

I think I need to get my hands on some more of these tank engines so I can convert them into approximations of the HR and G&SWR engines. The NB had a fleet of 0-6-2 tanks as well, but theirs had a decidedly lean and hungry look compared to the well-fed Dublo tanks.

This layout reminds me of one that one of my school friends had - that would have been in the early to mid 1960s.

I believe the main component of these superglue removers is acetone - a substance that I wouldn't want to put on a piece of Dublo. If you do want to try it I would suggest testing it on the underside of the tender first. Some of the paint used on Dublo is so durable that even paint stripper has its work cut out removing it but, on the other hand, I have even seen a quick spray and wipe with Windex remove some paint on painted tinplate - I have seen this happen to a maroon D12 coach and a few track pieces.

I was spending the evening going through my collection of Dublo 0-6-2 tanks and, taking one apart to clean and lubricate its innards, I noticed the letters "L" and "R" stamped on the pole pieces. I haven't taken every Dublo loco I have apart (although I have dismantled most of the at some point) but I can't say I have seen this before. Does anyone know for how long this was done and why Meccano thought it was needed? I mean, it's obvious what the letters "L" and "R" stand for, but it seems so unnecessary given that the parts are handed and can only go on one way around.

This thread has got me going through my collection of Duchesses (at least 18, but I might have another couple stored away somewhere) and so far I have found two Wrenn examples and two Tri-ang-Hornby streamliners that still need to be converted to three rail, one Wrenn that needs to be repainted and one Duchess of Atholl (soon to re-emerge from the paint shops as Duchess of Buccleuch) that had a failed magnet. Fortunately I had one spare magnet and swapped them over - the locomotive, which could barely move before, was performing flawlessly after the magnet was changed. I have never really liked tender drive, if only because the idea of a tender pushing a locomotive around the track just seems wrong.....

I'm not well up on the Tri-ang numbering system, and I couldn't find a number on the underside of the locomotives (although I didn't take any of them apart to have a look) but I have four of the early Tri-ang-Hornby models that use the Flying Scotsman type chassis block. They are practically bullet proof and have the added advantage for me in that they are very easy to convert to three rail by using Dublo (or reproduction Dublo) plunger pickups. Very reliable runners although they are rather gutless things - they can manage three Dublo coaches but start slipping when I add a fourth. I have started converting a rake of four Dublo LMS coaches to run on pin-point bearings to give them something a bit more realistic for them to pull rather than just two or three coaches (my layout is 8'x4', so four coaches is my limit). I have a tender drive model, but I did have a few issues with the conversion to three rail and haven't got around to trying to sort it out yet. I also have a spare streamliner body which hopefully can be made to fit my H-D City of London when it arrives......

Yes, he does have an amazing selection of parts for sale. Only for those of us who live in the UK though. I won't be buying anything from him unless he lowers his postal charges.

I just got myself a Dublo City of London, sans tender, on eBay for £38 - for some reason only one other person was interested, and they just put in one bid. Once it arrives, I'll see if I can get the mechanism to fit one of the Tri-ang-Hornby bodies I have stashed away.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe the bodies of the Wrenn models were hand assembled using K's kits but with plastic bodied tenders.

Well, when I tried it the chassis definitely wouldn't fit but maybe the pole pieces were bent slightly outwards and I never noticed. If it worked for you I'll give it another go.