Chuffed 1

Unfitted M309426 was photographed at Harrow in 1952 in ‘Wagons of the early BR era’ Larkin. In standard BR unfitted grey.

Phew! Having just acquired a tiny geared motor and Hornby pug chassis parts, I was about to commence scratchbuilding an Imperial Paper Mills fireless for my impending Gravesend West Street layout. It would have joined the various wagon, coach and loco projects overtaken by highly unlikely RTR products!

Has anyone seen West Hill Wagon Works new ‘Oil Storage tank’? it appears to be a complete body and underframe ( but no axleguards, buffers, springs or brake gear) of an ex-LMS 6w Milk Tank wagon. And at £6.95 it’s an absolute steal!

Surprised they went for all 16t minerals and not just the rivetted ones. At £25 a pop the welded version is more affordable from Bachmann. There’s also ex-P.O. Minerals that could have been done instead. Ex-LMS steel-ended 5 planks and vans with the secondary suspension would have filled a massive gap in RTR. Ah well!

Very surprised they didn’t do a ‘Baby Castle’ (Collett 0-6-0). A pretty ubiquitous loco from right across Wales to the S&D, Devon, DN&S, M&SWJR, Fairford Branch, the West Midlands. The Bachmann version is well past its bedtime with its undersized wheels, awful chimney and moulded detail. Dapol have already done the most common tender and it would fill that mid-market niche nicely. I’m sure the 28xx will sell, but in sufficient numbers?

🙈 Quite!I should have looked in ‘Hose Who’ !

Just received a copy of Dave Larkin’s Pre-Nationalisation Wagons of British Railways today. Has a 1965 Don Rowland photo of a dia 1479 van in Millerhill yard. The vacuum pipe has been repositioned but the steam pipes are still in place. Was the southern still removing steam pipes in summer at that time or was that for loco’s only?

Notice that the next Nelson is Sir Walter Raleigh in Southern and early BR liveries. An odd choice for the latter as it received a MN chimney in January 1956 and the long boiler two years later (and late crest two years after that). So unless it has a unique chimney and the unique long boiler it’s only accurate for 1952-5 inclusive.

My bad, thanks for that explanation. Explains this perfectly. Cheers!

Don’t be a knob, Jason. plenty of people look at old threads all the time. Apparently they Google Rmweb and whatever subject they’re interested in!

FWIW the official report on this alleges “the crew were answering a call of nature whilst en route to Farningham Road light engine, when it ran away and crashed into stock at West Street.” This was clearly nonsense for a whole variety of reasons and I’ve always believed the crew were negotiating the lower part of the IPM access gradient when the loco slid into the stationary vans close to the factory itself. I believe a cover story (and the turning of the loco on the still extant turntable) was contrived to cover up the passing of the ‘no BR locos past this point’ sign. The idea of the loco setting off by itself to fortuitously collide with vans on the one occupied siding seems somewhat unlikely. It also doesn’t explain the body crease either. Had the loco come off any other embankment nearby it would have needed more than a patching-up! Reminds me of a mate who was an armourer in the RAF. He and some pals rolled a Land Rover quite badly, so they hammered out all the panels and quickly resprayed it. However, the MTO discovered the accident because they’d forgotten to clean their boot prints off the inside of the roof! He did praise the quality of the restoration though!

Perplexed at this year’s offering. Whilst a lot of people will find something worth buying, and accepting the eras are now more widespread, unfortunately there’s nothing for me modelling SR/WR early sixties. I did consider the 14xx but it was the same tired old moulding with the completely wrong chimney and general clunkiness. The last Hornby loco I bought was before Covid and now my hopes reside with Accurascale and Rapido, particularly the former who are open and approachable. A shame, as the catalogue on SK’s return had some excellent locos (and rolling stock). Guess its reheated dinners from now on (unless you’re ER).

That’s my whole point. For twenty-odd years we had two big manufacturers competing to keep costs down. Both Bachmann and Hornby have scaled back over the last three to five years and now we have smaller manufacturers competing on spec, with much smaller ranges, more in the line of 00Works and batch-building. I don’t think Hornby sees 00 gauge as it did 10 years ago and Bachmann seem ever-slower in bringing their stuff to market, compared to Accurascale, Rapido or Dapol commissions. I’m glad I accrued my extensive rolling stock over the last decade; I couldn’t afford it now.

I was thinking more of Arnold but I get your point. For me in 00 it seems the glory days may be over Of two big manufacturers competing sufficiently to lower prices somewhat.

This whole adventure ( I can’t think of a better word) seems like a complete recreation of the Hornby brand as an online sales/‘new’ scale product. I can’t see the same commitment to two gauges simultaneously, especially in these troubled times, and fear Hornby is pulling out of 00 and N. Whether this new scale and approach is a success or not is beside the point for me. The future in 00 seems to be neither blue or red box and the future product range may suffer accordingly.