Pete Piszczek

Works for me, now. I suspect a lot of these sleepy sites get taken down for a short while by their providers when traffic to the site increases by a million percent. The sudden interest in Crossley powered locomotives may have just done that...

I can't get the grin off my face!! http://www.ehattons.com/stocklist/results.aspx?searchfield=Class%2028

The cab doesn't seem to be seated particularly well in many photos I've seen on-line. Seems to aggravate the flushness aspect on the roof. I rather fancy D8242. HHY, plus arrows.

Polite way of saying there's a lot of slop? There doesn't appear to be anything different about the slots the axles drop into at the rear. Quite frankly the reviewers should pull the damn thing apart before they start gushing... I've broken three wires now, the last connected the board to the LEDs on the buffer. The solder connection didn't have enough heat and was brittle to begin with, I didn't have any trouble fatiguing the connection to failure. To resolder you have to pull the board, which means taking the buffer beam off. I had to use a etched micro saw to separate the yellow part from the chassis. The fact that they got the red and white lights backwards is rather annoying because there is not an easy fix, unless Hattons wants to supply new sets of lamp assemblies. The cab side mod (photo below) will be sanded down and fixed (again). This is a "what not to do" photo, but amply demonstrates what the model looks like with a repositioned rain strip on the cab side. This is 0.5 mm styrene rod, the thinnest I had in inventory, glued too high up the roof line. I may use a thinner diameter brass wire next time I work on it and halve the distance between the rain strip and window. I'd have already fixed my Teddy, and chipped it, but I made the mistake of going spelunking under my home, and I keep finding things to fix...

I'm there now too, smooth running both long hood and short hood directions. Slow speed performance is really good, very quiet, it will be even better once chipped. The missing bit of gear tooth proved not to be a problem, there is enough there to engage, the contact stresses are probably low enough to where it doesn't matter. None of the gears were shimmed, just the external crank. Spent hours today checking quartering, looking for tell tail rubs, etc. trying to diagnose why it was a thumper going long hood forward. In the end shims were fitted to the external crank to lessen it's sidewards play- the crank seemed to be the problem. The blocks are 40 thou thick, 70 thou wide, and 125 thou tall. Not sure how wide you could go before the crank might have trouble on sharper curves, there's still side play even with 80 thou worth of shims. The shims were glued in place with rubberized cyanpoxy, a elastic form of superglue. They worked like a charm. Be warned, if you shim the crank, the crank pin extends through the back side of the crank and can catch. A Dremel motor tool was used with a cutting wheel to grind the pin ends off flush with the backside. A dab of epoxy may end up in the pin recess on the backside, then filed down flush with the back crank face so there is an even bearing surface on the rear of the crank. I don't want an edge that could eat into my relatively soft plasticard shims. Could get fancy and put a brass wear plate on the face of the shim too... I'm pleased with the model's performance now. It still waddles a bit, but the prototype is supposed to be lively, especially at speed. Cosmetics next, blacken the pick-ups, shave the rainstrip off the cab side and relocate it upwards a bit, fill in the pilot, and beg for some accurate numerals from someone's decal set. Even if your cab steps survived shipping without coming adrift, if you plan on disassembling the model, just cut them cleanly off first. That will save you the aggravation of breaking the steps off as you work on it. The steps will be the last thing reattached, with brass pins, when the Teddy Bear is put back together. I agree with Brian, I'm at about a 85% happiness factor with the model. Philosophically speaking, if you treat this as a not strictly RTR model, but a nearly finished kit, and are prepared to put 2-3 hours into fine tuning it, you'll be quite happy. Of course, a decoder isn't fitted yet...

Here's what it looks like when it's been disassembled for those willing to break the model down. You really need the right size screwdriver too, all the fasteners on my sample were so tight that I almost stripped the fastener heads. I also noted that when I removed the fasteners that hold the chassis together, and then ran the model on rollers, slow speed performance improved greatly. Two shots of the keeper plate on the bottom that covers the gears. If you slip a flat blade in at the right spot it comes off easily. I'm annoyed they left the hole in the keeper plate under the gear. There should be a arched piece here to keep dirt and hair out. The keeper plate is also very weak at this rectangular hole, be careful or you may break it. I had trouble disassembling the chassis even after removing the fasteners. Why? Because the wiring was caught between pieces when it was assembled, that's probably why the fasteners were way too tight. This bit was crushed between the metal chassis halves, that's copper showing, a short was probably inevitable at some point. Another crushed wire, this time between the plastic hood and platform. This is what my counter gear looks like. I was going to follow Trevor's advice and fit a pair of shims to lessen the lateral movement. Close examination revealed a bad tooth (see arrow). Not sure if this is from damage or poor molding- you can really see the bad tooth though when you rotate the gear. The loco has a distinctive thump in one direction. The hairs in the photo are my fault- trying to clean excess lubricant with a cotton bud. This model had to be a nightmare for the nimble fingered factory workers to assemble. Not sure how I am going to get it back together. I'm going to ask Hattons for a new counter gear and shim the heck out of everything to reduce slop. There's a part of me that says I should return the loco for a replacement. My personal feeling is that the next might have issues too, there's a lot that can go wrong apparently, and at least I know what's wrong with this one. It is a nice model, in my case though there are some quality issues- caveat emptor.

Here's what killed my Teddy Bear after about an hour of run time: The bottom of the DCC plug extends down into the chassis. There's a piece of black electrical tape covering the bottom and sides of the recess. When the tape was removed, there was a puncture wound from one of those DCC plug prongs. Unscrewing the circuit board and lifting it, brought my loco back to life. Not good, I could see some pricey decoders getting fried when the insulating tape wears through... It still runs like a pig though, now I'm going to have to investigate what's wrong in the drive train.

Not really, I regularly get models that have been "shock tested". The plastic sleeves that Bachmann and Hornby use aren't really fit for international shipping without additional padding. Some UK merchants have been slow to adapt larger boxes with padding. This is really only an issue with locomotives, wagons can have the snot knocked out of them without breaking...

That's a good question. Coinage is usually made from fairly inert alloys; you don't want crap forming on them and then rubbing off in peoples' pockets. I've been using five minute epoxy as my metal to just about anything else glue since the late eighties. It's changed color somewhat on older models where it is visible, but the resin hasn't deteriorated, crumbled or otherwise caused any issues. I weight some of my UK stock with US nickels. Non-ferrous and heavy for their denomination.

There's a lot to like with this model, D9500 arrived in one piece, except for one of the small black spigot looking things that are underneath. All the parts were there, cosmetically excellent, although one of the cab steps is loose, easy fix. The fine mesh material behind the steps is great, Bachmann should take notice of this. The packaging is also top notch, foam around the plastic cradle, this should be mandatory for all the locos from Bachmann/Hornby. The connecting rods look anemic, a couple of coats of thickish paint may be an improvement. Long hood forward running on the rollers was reasonable quiet, but it waddled like a duck. Small hood forward was much smoother but there was a distinct growl. Ran for 30 minutes each way, didn't really seem to smooth out much, low speed running was poor. Then it stopped. Apply DC either direction and the unit quickly draws over an amp. The wheels and motion are still free moving so it isn't a jam on the bottom side. I wasn't going to crack the loco open, I have enough disassembled locos on the workbench already. If the Clayton remotoring project hadn't left such a bad taste in my mouth, there'd be more of a willingness to dissect and fix. It will cost almost $20 to ship it back; postage is still owed on a previous return. Curiosity may get the better of me though, why'd it stop... :icon_frustrated: Spent an hour last night with a Stone IPA while studying the model and prototype photos. I've convinced myself that if you shave the rain strip off above the cab windows, and put a finer, thinner strip up a bit higher, you can go a very long way in resolving the cab side issues. There is a "looking down" builder's photo of D9500 in my collection. It only shows one large hole on the exhaust housing...

Neat conversion Andy, I like the brass piping! I've been fooling around with a rake of these and I'm terrified I'm going to damage the plastic pipes- they are very finely cast. One comment though- you might want to use a bit more than adhesive tape to secure the coinage on the inside. I use epoxy resin, you really don't want the coins coming adrift and piling up on one side. Maybe not a big problem on a switching layout, but if the wagon ends up in a substantial rake, with grades and curves, that off center mass could be disastrous...

I bet I know who'll get the best runner of the two!

Etched part wishlist: An etch for a shorter window frame would be a useful part. The foot holds on the side of the bonnet are needed too. Throw in a Swindon works builders plate as well. Of course etches for the front and back windows wouldn't hurt either, then you could sell a complete set of laser cut glass... Does it have the small diameter Class 17 motor inside?

We're getting dangerously close to the "postie's just put the mag through the letterbox" kind of update. Shush! Better tone it down before we attract a moderator.

Just received Hattons notice, cards been charged! It won't be long now!

Seaboard Air Line Railroad Yellow is spot on...

Yeah, the bog standard brakes were listed on Hatton's website in the December time frame. Seems like they were only there for a few days...

Incorrect seating could be one issue. Previous Heljan locos had bearings that could seat in any orientation; the Claytons have bearings that are keyed. There is a flat sided area on the bearing . On my unit though it wasn't that the bearing was incorrectly seated, it was that the brass "lip" one of the bearings was too thick. It had a much thicker lip than the other three bearings. One thick lip and the worm ended up being squeezed, especially if the bearing on the other side was also on the thick side of whatever tolerance they were working to. It only has to happen on one side of one worm and you basically have a poor runner.

Has anyone pulled a motor from the second run and compared the amount of torque required to turn the shaft to one of the motors from the second run? The chassis on the second run is apparently identical to the first run, but I have to wonder about the motor windings. It was easy enough to correct the bearings on my Clayton, but the motor really was in a class by itself. It's hard believe that the motor windings haven't been changed. The motor that came in my unit was almost impossible to turn by hand. It ran alright, but when it started it really started- you could have put the thing in a blender or other kitchen appliance...

There was talk earlier that Hattons would Email buyers confirming the price and order details. Anyone received a message yet?

:icon_thumbsup2: Why didn't Heljan think of that! :icon_e_wink:

I'm rather enjoying this topic. Lots of extra Ribble chassis!?! HMMMN. Maybe Heljan thought the Ribbles would sell like Blue Falcons and they were ready to release another "limited edition" Ribbles only with that fine factory weathering.

The Co-Bo is missing from the list of possibilities. The weirdness factor of the Class 28 would probably ensure sales worthy of a future run. All in due course...

I'm sure someone will model the whole class! I'm only surprised it wasn't a Class 21/29... :icon_razz: Heljan certainly gets my vote on the Baby Deltic. :icon_thumbsup2:

They were linked to the old forum and were temporarily lost with the switch to the new server. Andy seems to have fixed things though! :icon_thumbsup2: