D400

Now then. That looks an awful lot like 37350/D6700 in late 1980s "celebrity" livery. Is this a hint for a future Accurascale Exclusive? 😉 If so could you let us know before I take a scalpel to one of my existing ones! Cheers! Bruce

More Variants 🤔 17105 at Porthmadog about 40mins ago 😉 Bruce

Although Completely out of my era I could be very tempted by a Lined Black Hinton Manor :). Can Accurascale let us know if they have/would be prepared to tool up for the Collett 3500g Tender? (And before someone says it, yes I know Hinton Manor's tender is actually a one off built by the SVR in preseveration but asking AS to do that is a bit much!) Regards, Bruce

I've dropped you a PM. Very kind offer. Regards, Bruce

Another carriage lighting topic! So I have a good look at the AC lighting board and it consists of the following: Bridge Rectifier to convert A/C to DC. 5v Regulator to drop the DC down to 5v 0.22F super capacitor rated at 5v (hence the reason to drop the voltage) Hall sensor and associated transistors to operate the lights. Resistors and LEDs to actually provide the lights So what does all this mean? Well fitting a decoder of any sort would be less than straight forward to control the existing lights - but not impossible, although you'd loose the stayalive doing that. I installed a DCC concepts flashing tail light into mine, but sadly the circuit from that will not operate at just 5v meaning the stayalive capacitor can't really be used. In the end I fed the circuit from the DC side of the Bridge Rectifier and added my own additional 25v rated capacitor to provide some stayalive to just the tail light. Bruce

Unfortunately it appears to be its own custom decoder, "Bachmann Mk2f" is one of the options in LokProgrammer to change the settings. I would suggest though it is similar (if not the same) to the ESU digital lighting bars. Certainly all the options are the same. Regrards, Bruce

Thanks Fran for this in-depth and honest appraisal of the situation. Its far from a deal breaker for me but with 50s and 37s side-by-side it does become rather obvious! Look forward to seeing the results. Regards, Bruce

When I spoke to Steve at Chester Cathedral last August he confirmed that they would be supplied with undersized wheels as per the Hornby version (and AC Deltic). He did also say that scale sized drop in wheels would be available for those with more generous curves - hopefully this will still be case. I'm personally hoping for scale sized wheels for 16.5mm gauge, but if not, hopefully the EM/P4 ones can be used with the centre gear shaft swapped? Only time will tell. At the end of the day, AC have to stick to the 2nd Radius Curve standard that seems to have become the norm, and there simply isn't another way round it I don't think. Bruce

19 and 20 with Livingston Thompson. A real step up from previous Peco offerings - quite remarkable really. Regards, Bruce

Speaking to Accurascale yesterday they did say they don't have anymore locos for Run 1, however they did hint that Run 2 might not actually be that far behind it. Regards, Bruce

Depends what you want to do. If you want to fit a hi intensity (actually called a sealed beam unit) in the place of the car headlight (as per 37099) then its pretty straight forward. The AC loco uses Fire optic paths from an LED circuit board behind the front, so simply removing car headlight and replacing it with a sealed beam (Replica Railways do some nice ones) and jobs a goodun. If you want to move it, that's far from impossible too as the circuit board has various locations for different position of the Surface mount LED, however you'll need to solder on a new one and remove the old one which is quite a demanding task for someone who isn't expert with a soldering iron. At the moment I'm waiting to see what Accurascale do next themselves, but the locos certainly have lots of scope for customisation! Regards, Bruce

Cheeky thought time. Given the number of commissioned exclusives of Class 31 and other locomotives now, are we likely to see more commissioned exclusives in Run 2 ... ;) Cheers! Bruce

Just for clarification because it seems I didn't make it clear enough, I am not talking of warranty repairs or spare parts repair defects. I have made plenty of use of Accurascale's warrant service (in particular when trying to reapply bits to my Deltic which fell victim to the carpet monster!) and there help and service has been excellent - indeed to be given replacements for parts "lost" FOC is much better than the other manufacturer who's spare service is being mentioned in this thread - they would charge. BUT, because they charge, I have no issue ordering parts which are not for use to replace bits but to undertake as mentioned modelling tasks such as renumbering. Are you saying Stephen that if I email you a wants list you might be able to help? Funnily enough it was avoiding the same activity that was the first thought that popped into my mind when Accurascale first came on the scene with their Deltic way back at Warley 2018, in fact I asked the then embryonic team if the bogies could be made available as spares for us on "Other EE locomotives". The reply was "Maybe, but we are well aware these bogies are used on other locomotives...😉" - at which point I understood what was being said even then! Cheers, Bruce

I don't think this is covered anywhere else. As the range of AC locomotives increases the range of detailing parts included in those locomotives increases too! Some of us modellers (shock horror!) would I'm sure like to customise our locos and modify them to represent other locos. Accurascale has been very good in the past with supplying parts from their wagons for models to use elsewhere and I was wondering if this is likely to expand to include parts from locos. Obviously it is unfair to expect items for free, can items be requested for a nominal fee? Off the top of my head items I would like to be able to buy would include: Replacement Buffer beams - as both the Deltic and Class 37 models feature buffer beams as a separate part (clever idea!) it would be great to be able to have 2 sets per loco enabling them to be swapped from fully detailed to operational if required. Loco buffers the buffers on the Class 37s in particular are without the best I've ever seen from anyone, would have many uses! Bogie parts to enable modellers to customise there 37s (and 55s) to other examples with different combinations of cast and fabricated bogies. Same for Class 37 boiler ports and exhaust plates. Just a few quick ideas of the top of my head! Obviously this is "above and beyond" what is required of a manufacture but with both the big suppliers spare ready available these days I wondered if AC could beat them in that regard too! Kind Regards, Bruce

I think you mean the other way round @McC , My 37419 is reburnished and F8 definitely provokes a slipping sound (great fun!) not a Cold start - look forward to the 37/0s arriving with the other sound set. Without wishing to see any further toys thrown out of prams, yes the speaker within the both Deltic and 37 is the same unit which has been called by others the "EM1". However, my loco sounds much better than my own EM2 installs which surprised me! All good fun. Bruce