jonhall

The KTA is quite nice, I have minor quibbles with the ferry rams horns and handbrake wheel being too big, but I assume that's to make them more robust, and I can easily do something about that, and the bogies don't seem quite right, but overall not bad. The FEA as produced is very nice indeed, but it was heading for disaster at one point, to their credit Dapol did respond to the critisism and made changes before production. The silver bullet isn't out yet, so I'm not sure it's really a good example, the test shots look like a really nice body, although I wait and see what the bogies, buffers and platforms end up looking like. The Grampus, nice body shame about the chassis. All of these models have good parts, the problem is they have all had bad parts as well, Dapol always seem rush the job. A certain Telfordian seemed to think that getting it right didn't cost more than getting it wrong, I know that's not right, getting it right does cost more and take longer. Dapol seem to be getting to 90% and then stopping, I don't expect them to get to 99.999% because at some point you do have a diminishing return on effort, but they need to get nearer to 99% before they stop. Someone has suggested that the Bachmann one will be about three quid more, and not out until next year, well that sound about right, 15% more effort to get a product thats a lot better seems a pretty good deal to me. Jon

Unfortunately I'm begining to believe that NOT having further releases from Dapol might actually be a good thing. It looks like we arn't going to see an MCA/MDA from Bachmann because Dapol is already in the market, and presumably Bachmann believes potential sales will be reduced, so what else could they 'block' by being first with a poor attempt. The problem is we are no longer in that era, what was acceptable when that model was brought out 40+ years ago, wasn't acceptable 20 years ago, and certainly isn't now. Why should we cut Dapol some slack, they want our hard earned money, and therefore I expect them to have earnt it. Bachmann have shown pre-production shots of their equivilent wagon, which seem to show that it can be done right. Jon

Further to my previous negative reply... when I said no, obviously I actually meant yes, but I don't remember doing so... :icon_redface: turns out i built the master soon after measuring one, but didn't bother casting any as you can't get the bogies.... :icon_frustrated: Jon

But they do look like an MBA, rather than a characature of one, so I think it would be worth the wait. jon

No, but I have measured one, and I know I can cast that size of wagon because I've done MBA and cut down, but I can't see the MBA mould ever being filled again, but at least the batch of 5 MCA/MDA's that I had finished were sold just before the rash of new RTR's was announced (a rare example of good timing....) Watch out for anouncements about RTR inter-war Belgian ferry wagons, then I'll have proof... or maybe not. Jon

[Paranoia] I'm sure I'm being watched, I start scratchbuilding two more silver bullets at Scaleforum in September last year and within weeks the model was announced. I then finally get as far as lettering the last one this week, and no sooner have I done that, but first test shots appear - spooky... :icon_mutter: [/Paranoia] If I don't finish the bogie on the last one, and set up the coupler pockets, will that delay the Dapol ones 'til after Christmas? :icon_frustrated: It takes quite a lot of courage to weather them, which is why I chickened out and asked fellow DEMU member Mark Lambert to do the dirty on the three that another DEMU member, Roget Tuke, had built for me from my resin castings :icon_clap: Perhaps not a good as Dapol's effort should be, but I won't be changing my fleet. :icon_e_biggrin: jon

Can't be that authentic, she dosn't seem to have run aground or collided with anything... I'm very impressed with the cal-mac model, I quite fancy a train ferry, and this is really not helping,.. Jon