Trains4U

 

What you're saying there is a little misleading. The Pendalino is not a 10 year old model, it's, what 3 years old at most.

 

 

Add 50% to that. It's now 4.5 years old (Released March 2007)

Time flies when you're having fun...

I've put Craftsman white metal horns on mine £2.00 for four (I don't sell them - yet) but you can order them direct from the craftsman website.

They are uniform size, rather than different sizes, but to be honest, they look a whole lot better!

I've uploaded a couple of vids I took last week with my Mobile phone (Before I put the new horns on)

My first foray into Youtube...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k4GX_Xt0G9U&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ims6p2erUsI&NR=1

I do have a decent Video camera, so I'll start practicing with that...

That's awesome - I want a go! - Though with all that high fencing, it does remind me a little of the guided track in Jurassic Park. There aren't too many Tyrannosaurs at Heathrow thankfully.

An observation (not an experiment)

Comparing the trailer cars' free-wheeling abilities, with those of the Bachmann CEP, even on a 1% gradient, the CEP trailers just 'ran away', leaving the VEP's stuck.

The latest (lit) Hornby Pullmans did do better, but their Maunsells were as good as the Bachmann CEP trailers.

I tried a similar experiment with two unpowered trailers from the CEP and VEP on runswick leamside. The circuit is approximately 80ft

With appropriate force, the trailers of the CEP will freewheel a complete circuit before coming to a stop. (From the station overbridge)

The VEP trailers, pushed with a similar force get about 10 ft (Just past the end of the platforms.

Not particularly scientific, but shows up the friction that the Hornby motor has to overcome with clipped-in axles, rather than pinpoint or roller bearing mounts., hence the need for traction tyres.

eBay is now stupidly expensive for the seller.

New items cannot be sold cheaply on ebay, unless you are selling for the following reasons:

To make something/anything back in an emergency cashflow situation

Are selling stolen goods

Are not paying any taxes

are mental

If I sold a loco on eBay, at my normal shop prices, I would lose money due to the excessive fees for listing, final value and paypal.

Business users do not qualify for "Free Listing" days and you have to turn over £2000 a month to get a 2% discount on final fees.

However, these have changed recently from their tiered approach to a flat 10% for collectables.

To sell a £1000 item used to cost about £35, it now costs about £130 if paid by paypal - no longer viable.

I don't sell on eBay anymore - they have become too greedy. and in turn caused selers to force their asking prices up.

If there are many others like me, then the market will slowly die off, unless eBay change their policies, because to be honest, it's too much effort for the returns realised and I can do so much better with shop sales and at the handful of shows I attend each year.

Sorry to hear about your problems S.A.C., but at least you've managed to correct the assembly problem, the missing door handles is a new pain. Have you now got the correct chassis with the right steps per vehicle?

 

I feel sorry for any retailers caught in the middle of this, if any have read these posts about the incorrectly assembled bogies, they may fear a number of units being returned.

 

If you were a retailer, what would you do?: Would you:-

(a ) Return all unsold incorrect VEP stock to Hornby?

(b ) Try and rectify the VEP bogie problems yourselves?

(c ) Keep quiet and do nothing?

 

Cheers, Brian.

I must admit, I'm now considering the magnitude of hacking up 90+ DTCs...

Excellent Gareth,

Many thanks for the side-on comparison photos, you couldn't have highlighted the problem any better. It can now clearly be seen, that the Hornby VEP is decidedly squat, when compared with the Bachmann CEP, it's almost as if they've built it to the old British Trix scale of 3.8mm/ft. Even your end-on photo of the two types of cab, shows the discrepancy. The dimension to study is between the cantrail guttering and the bottom of the body, it should be 25.3mm, like the correct Bachmann CEP and EPB. A friend of mine, who is also a RMwebber reckons that they may have squashed the body, so as to raise the underframe up over the bogies, whilst maintaining the roof height, but helping the unit handle sharp Hornby curved track? Shame really, because overall it looks quite smart and the colours are good.

I wouldn't worry about the different height of the CEP ends (we know why), depends on the track pitch, the load being carried and sagging of the springs, but bodies of different sizes will never match up.

Well done, you've just saved me a lot of money. My kit VEPs can now be refurbished.

 

Cheers, Brian.

Or perhaps Ceptic and I have just cost you a lot of money...

Ceptic's measurements show that the CEPs and EPBs are too tall.

What l discovered was that the VEP's height, from the body-side base. at sole-bar level, to the top of the roof's gutter, is approximately correct, at 25.3mm. Whereas, the same measurement taken from the EPB and CEP averages out at 26. 5mm.!!, as these pics. show.

 

so even if you do refurbish your kitbuilt VEPs, (assuming they are accurate) they'll still be smaller.

As this height difference is clearly unacceptable, I guess you now need to chuck out the CEPs and EPBs and build them from kits instead?

In the end-on photo of the the two models, isn't the Hornby model a little behind the Bachman one? Perspective is making it look smaller.

Yes, about an inch an a half behind (I didn't move them from the positions shown in the photo above)

I think the height comparison between the VEP and CEP s a little unfair when the CEP isnt the same height within the same model!

On the left is the powered car, on the right the unpowered car

So this causes some considerable variation with the VEP

Powered car

Unpowered car

I now need to fill that hole and fix the hanrail that got damaged at the weekend...

Shaved the door, looks better, but now really needs gluing as it keeps sliding forwards.

I think I need to takeanother 2mm or so off the bottom of the door though...

OK,

Photos are still a bit crude, but here is what I've done in addition to the changes shown previously:

Inside wall of gangway, and gangway step painted black

Rubbing plate painted black around the outside

Weathered black applied to the buffers

All of the yellow front very slightly dulled with Tamiya weathering poweders

Tamiya powders (oil black) applied damp to the cable recesses, steps and the distinctive space above the gangway that is always missed bythe carriage washer

Powder also applied to door joins and gutter.

Gangway exterior has had slightly different colour of warning yellow applied to he outer half of the compression mechanism and has been lightly weathered.

Buffers painted weathered black

I think it now really looks like a 4-VEP

I suppose my point is that the conversion, whilst is should not be necessary, is relatively straightforward.

Far from rubbishing the model, and Hornby (and me) losing lots of sales, I'm hopeful that people will still buy it, knowing that they can achieve a better result with not a lot of effort. - though obviously invalidating any warranty.

If done carefully, no painting or filling is required, and there is no fiddly messing around with the lighting circuits and light guides.

I've got a lot in stock - I'd sooner find a way of selling them (And maybe more) than potentially having them sat on the shelves and then losing money on them if a price cut occurrs.

For me the frontal appearance is the biggest concern - I grew up with them and the appearance of the model just didn't sit right. My irrational impulse to modify overcame the rational cost based fear.

I must admit to breaking into a sweat when my saw broke the paint...

Now my next task is how to tackle the 1st class compartments - that may be next week, once the Open Day is out of the way.

Youd have to find some mazak in it first...

Lets wait and see what my final version looks like, with the painted gangways and some light weathering of the cab ends.

I might offer it as a service, once I perfect the technique.

This unit will probably go back on sale with a mark up for the modification (Maybe at £170 - around the RRP)

That definitely improves the face, Gareth. You are very brave hacking a brand new model worth well over the ton, though!

Be careful not to mistake bravery with stupidity... (I wasn't sure how it was going to turn out!)

Though it now looks like an EMU, rather than a class 207 with a gangway stuck on the front.

Just for clarity, The body is a one piece moulding. The construction will make it very difficult to disassemble further than body removal.

Inside the roofline is a plastic frame (Which has the luggage rack mouldings on it. This is held in by 8 screws and secures the lighting board. Even after the screws come out, the frame cannot be removed as it is wedged in by the many seperate window mouldings, that have been securely glued in place. Getting to the circuit board will be a very difficult task.

The gangway clips in to the front face of the model and can be removed with some care.

The door joins, door gutter, handle and a recess at the top of the door are moulded into the face of the model.

The cable recesses are part of the glazing unit (Clear plastic, painted yellow) as the face of the bodyshell has two apetures in it.

The front glazing unit extends the full width tof the front and is securely glued, the top of the glazing plastic is a few mm above the cab windows.

To carry out the modification, i cut vertically through the bodyshell and glazing unit until the blade passed through the top of the glazing plastic (Which is below the top level of the gangway)

Uning a craft knife, I then scored through the plastic between the two cuts and broke the door away.

The LED lighting is on a seperate board on flying leads, which makes this job a whole lot easier as the whole assembly comes away still in place on the door.

I then filed a mm or so off the bottom of the door and around the top corners to make it fit into the gangway apeture.

The door will need to be glued, as will the gangway, but not until after I've finished painting and weathering.

Since taking the pics, I have painted the inside of the gangway, the gangway face and around the underside of the rubbing plate with Railmatch weathered black, which improves the appearance further.

The gangway is also moulded in Black plastic, so I scored the join with a craft knife to remove some paint, representing the compression mechanism. (Though not as tidily as I could have done - you can see this in the pictures)

I'll try and make a better job of the other end! Watch out when cutting that you don't veer off the vertical. I did, hence the ugly black hole on the right hand side of the door (time to get the filler out...)

Well, my father will kill me if he sees what I've just done to a new £140 4-VEP, that I haven't paid for (yet)

But this is the result of 25 mins with a hacksaw blade (A razor saw would have been better)

I just need to touch up the scratches on the roofline and weather the cab recesses, door gangway and roofline.

It makes the world of difference, the LEDs are still in the right places, but I shouldn't have to do this to a new model really...

Spot the difference?

(Sorry for the poor quality pics, its a bit late to be getting all my camera kit out)

Its all gone very quiet on the Class 26 front....

No it hasn't.

You just needto know where to look:

(See second pic down)

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/38093-n-gauge-society-exhibition-and-agm/page__view__findpost__p__406996

You'll have to get the jacks out to re-rail that 20 Alex. It looks like it might go over.

Two Sub Sector type 5s are just waiting to be outshopped BTW...

The odd thing for me is that I seem to recall during 87 and 88 that the Cardiff-Portsmouth sets were made up of 2x Mk1 SK, Mk2 BFK then another 2 Mk1 SKs.

Perhaps I just wasn't paying that much attention, though I did bash them quite a bit during that time (Though to be fair I was 9 or 10 at the time...)

I used to live in Fratton, and would spend many a Saturday or school holiday bashing the triangle between Portmouth, Eastleigh and Southampton on thumpers and Cardiff trains. (Before the rubbish electrification ;-) )

Thank goodness for that!

 

$16k for this, evidently I'm missing something, but I don't think it's common sense - but that could be Catch 22.

Perhaps the Giraffes are made of Platinum...

and I thought I was pushing the boat out buying a "mint" 201 series Chou Line 6 Set for £44 with the upper cab lights and deflector missing, well it is Kato

If that's the one I sold you - I never described it as mint - and the defects were very clearly described and pictured.

(Just to be clear)

Not everyone has got their first Hawksworth coaches yet!

 

Even though I posted that there are already in the country, it proved very frustrating on Saturday when one person called into the shop after a lengthy trip to have a look at said model, and then promptly accused us of not trying because Hattons had got their models, and we had not!

We get the same "It's in stock at Hattons" (Not necessarily about the HWs though) then they react as if it's your fault the manufacturer hasn't sent them yet, or worse, think you're lying to them, or worse, act as though they expect you to magic said item from your backside or something!

It's part of the job unfortunately...

I am considering maybe changing the company name to AAAAATrains4U though, to see if it makes a difference!

Ours were delivered on Wednesday , still havent unboxed them yet (And the latest 26s)

They'll probably get put out tonight...