Porfuera

39 minutes ago, J-Lewis said:

Physical TT catalogue has also been confirmed for the new issue of Hornby magazine due in shops on Thursday.  So presumably the PDF version will be available around the same time?

Not quite - as I mentioned above he said that the pdf would be available after the magazine. His actual words were "at a later date... towards the end of the month"

Wow! Very little about Phase 3 - just the Class 37 I think.

Phase 3 and 4 over the next 3 or 4 years as mentioned above. New stuff will get interspersed with that.

There were unassembled initial test shots of the J50 from the actual moulds as well as a 3D print.

Duchess and Class 50s next month - analogue versions will arrive slightly before the TXS-fitted ones. Class 66 "on track for November", which we knew already.

A new catalogue will be available with the next Hornby magazine or available to download towards the end of the month(?).

I think that was about it - did I miss anything...?

1 minute ago, PaulRhB said:

But to an extent the established market evidence would say the pannier was always going to be a strong seller and works with a single auto coach, conventional coaches and freight. 
That’s why it’s a little odd, they could just keep running that in various GWR liveries for years. It’s certainly got more appeal than the J50, and  that’s from someone who wants the J50 😆

All the sets so far have been big mainline trains, where’s the equivalent of the various OO 08 and GW 0.4.0 start sets? And I do hope they have a Christmas set in the pipeline this year as that’s a huge seller to the market they claim this scale is for. 

I point you back to my previous statement that everyone has their own ideas on what they should have started with or what they should be making now 😄

What they have produced so far has sold out repeatedly - would anything different have sold better? No-one here has access to their sales figures but presumably they based their opening sets on what sell best in 00?

43 minutes ago, Tim Dubya said:

Surprised there isn't any Gurt Western stuff yet.  I'd have thought a pannier and B set would have kept them Western fans fed for a while?

It has been said many, many times that they can't do everything at once. Also everyone has their own ideas of what Hornby should have started with or what they should be making now.

There is a Castle and a 57xx in the catalogue (the 57xx was subsequently brought forward into Phase 4) but there have been a lot of production delays to the original schedule and these are still years away by the looks of things. But then Hornby aren't the only ones hit by production delays.

2 minutes ago, Michanglais said:

That appears to be for OO - I can't find the TT April one, either!

 

Thanks! Maybe this one,,,?

The Q&A liink should be here (I hope!)

EDIT: apparently that was 00 - try this one:

The Q&A link is here (I hope!) in case anyone hasn't found it yet

2 hours ago, jonnyuk said:

new container wagons to go with the 66's

Those container liveries have already been announced by Arnold as a second run of those wagons so those were a bit of a cheat. However, a lot of people won't know about Arnold so it will probably boost sales, especially in shops if they are reboxed as Hornby.

47 minutes ago, Legend said:

I’m puzzled as to what people expect. This is not OO .  I thought the announcements were fine . There’s a prebiously unannounced loco , the J50, some container wagons and renders of the new 37 . A few re liveries . Looked pretty good to me . I do like the signals . 

I agree with all that except I think people were perhaps expecting to hear more about the Phase 3 stuff already mentioned in the catalogue. I'm hoping that will be this afternoon - it sounds like it is a Q&A so I'm hoping that is the whole point of it and maybe doing it at lunchtime will allow more people to join.

As for the containers, those liveries were already announced by Arnold. It will be interesting to see whether they rebox them into Hornby boxes or whether they send them out in the Arnold boxes to try to increase brand awareness for Arnold - although leaving them in the Arnold boxes might just cause too much confusion amongst some customers!

1 hour ago, Hobby said:

That's Social Media for you! ;)

But AFAIR Hornby said that they were delaying the digital publishing of the Club magazine because of this announcement. I can understand them not wanting to wait for the next issue to include these items but I think that will have added to the expectations

The magazine doesn't seem to have been uploaded yet so maybe there will be more information on the Phase 3 and 4 items this afternoon.

However there are existing items to be released up right up to the end of the year (Class 50, Duchess, Class 66, green 08 and maybe now the J50, Mk3s, Mk2s, 21T minerals, more coaches maybe) so I'd guess that the Phase 3 items won't get a look-in until next year (and Phase 4 the year after?), although they could still give progress updates on these.

The new items mentioned are on the website already - J50, HST set, signals, level crossing - pre-order only, obviously

That was slightly underwhelming considering the buildup.

If I've understood it correctly there will be a Q&A at 1am so hopefully more will be revealed in that.

21 minutes ago, moawkwrd said:

I believe that's a website error - when you go on the actual product they still show as preorder.

Sometimes this sort of website activity is a sign that items are about to arrive in stock or ship to customers, although the coaches are still showing 'Summer' rather than 'Spring'.

Or maybe they're just trying to generate some extra excitement for tomorrow's announcements 😂

On 29/03/2024 at 20:22, Stefan88 said:

2 things of interest to note lately:

 

1. My latest Roco spare parts order was delivered by Fedex, previously it was posted with Deutsche Post and delivered by Royal Mail. Total including postage was below the equivalent of £135 so can't comment on the recent possible trend of postage being included in this amount. It took 2 and a half weeks from placing the order to parts arriving - just under 2 weeks from order to parts being posted. I can only assume the spare parts are being warehoused in Slovakia (they seem to have their European distribution centre there) or Romania (last remaining European production facilities) and sent to Germany before then being posted to the customer, hence the relatively long turn-around time.
2. Modellbahn Union seem to have hiked their postage rates to the UK at some point recently - it used to be around 9 Euros for the UPS option, now there is only a DHL option for around 21 Euros. Still not hugely expensive but far from the cheapest now.

I can give an update on the postage situation with regard to the £135 limit.

My latest package from Modellbahnshop-Lippe was ordered on the 10th March and arrived on 20th (there was a delay of a couple of days in that time because they notified me that the wagon I'd ordered had become unavailable and I had to let them know of a like-for-like replacement).

The order cost was €153,59 after German VAT was deducted (so approx £131) and the postage was an additional €9,90, giving a total spend of €163,49 (so approx £139 to £140) - to date I have not had a request/demand for UK VAT to be paid - fingers firmly crossed!

Modellbahnshop-Lippe use FedEx end-to-end and from what I remember reading here previously it seems that if the Post Office/Royal Mail are involved at the UK end then the postage is included in the £135 whereas FedEx don't currently seem to do that.

Others will probably come up with some ideas but would Peco's small radius points give you more space in the fiddleyard? More expensive, I know, but it might give you more space to work with.

I don't know where you were looking at Tillig prices but if you buy from Germany then they deduct German VAT and if keep your spend below £135 (excluding postage) then UK VAT should not be applied (although this isn't universally guaranteed - it seems to depend on the courier but I've been OK so far with Modellbahnshop-Lippe who use FedEx).

For example the small double slip here works out at around £29 (still not cheap but better than UK prices at around £40-£50). Shipping is around 10 Euros which wouldn't save you much on that one item but if there is anything else you need (like curved points or a 3-way point) then the savings are better. Tillig frogs aren't the best (some look like solid lumps of aluminium while other are plastic like Hornby's) and they don't have locking springs but if you're looking at using point motors anyway then that shouldn't matter. Another thing is that the tiebars don't seem very robust so a slow-motion point motor or a servo might be better than the 'thump' of a solenoid point motor.

I shall be following your thread with interest as I'm also strapped for space.

29 minutes ago, Roy L S said:

That eight differently numbered coaches are being made is a fair comment and you would think it might point towards the intention of a full length train for those with space, but something has clearly gone awry if the reality now hitting consumers like Michael is that the coaches are too "draggy" to allow that or if that is how they are intended to be (seems doubtful) the power car is not sufficiently capable.

 

I guess the big question is are all the TT120 Mk3s like it? If it turns out they are, pointing to an issue in manufacturing or assembly  then there are likely to be a fair few disappointed purchasers if Michael's experience is typical. It will be interested to know what others' experiences have been, and if widespread what Hornby have to say, assuming they tested the power-car to and beyond the expected maximum load with these coaches.

 

To be fair, the issue isn't unique to Hornby or TT120, immediately coming to mind in N are the Rapido Conflat Ps and NGS Ferry Vans, both having similar issues and manging to get past QC into the hands of consumers, and I recall the Revolution Mk5s also had some issues.

 

Roy

But none of those things are designed that way. As I said before, these days you wouldn't get away with deliberately designing an HST to run as a 4-car set. It would be the same if someone decided to use a generic chassis for a number of steam locos - that would be unthinkable, and to me a 4-car HST would be the same, regardless of the fact that most people won't be able to run an 8-car set anyway.

And as I mentioned already, Hornby had problems with the Mk1s and these were easily sorted. I like to think positively and say that any problem with the Mk3s would be equally minor. These things go through a lot of testing and hopefully any problem will be an assembly error rather than a fundamental design issue.

3 minutes ago, Roy L S said:

"...it does beg the question was the power car designed to run with a full 8 car set? ".. 

I know you have some TT:120 but that thought wouldn't even have crossed my mind - not designed to run anything less than an 8-car set, not these days.

After all, they are selling 8 differently-numbered coaches in two of the liveries - presumably they expect some people to buy all of them so why would they deliberately design it so that the powered car couldn't pull them all together?

15 minutes ago, Michanglais said:

Curiosity got the better of me and I unpacked a rake of seven Mk1s.

 

My HST is now happily purring around with the Mk1s and the dummy at the rear. Functioning fine at all speeds.

 

Notably, the Mk1s are much freer rolling than the Mk3s so I'm thinking the Mk3s are what's causing the issue. Perhaps I need to apply some graphite to the axle points on the Mk3s or, even more drastically, loosen the axle 'boxes' on a few coaches so that there's less drag.

 

Bit of a pain but worth a try, I guess...

That's interesting. No wonder mine was running freely - I didn't have the correct coaches for the test! Good to know that your power car is running OK, at least, and hopefully you'll get to the bottom of what's happening with the Mk3s.

I seem to recall that there was a problem with the early Mk1s where a stub of plastic was left on the underside of the coaches (IIRC it wasn't meant to be there - it was something to do with the assembly process and should have been removed) and this rubbed against the wheels but only when the coaches went around a curve.

It has since been fixed on the Mk1s but given that you were running a long formation on a loop of track could it be something like that? Maybe at some point you could you try the HST and the Mk3s on a straight length of track to see if they are OK on the straight and therefore whether it is something that only happens on curves?

And good luck with your house move - I hope it all goes smoothly!

Hi Andy - I don't comment often but it was good to see another video and nice to know that Tonleigh Bridge went to a good home even if it wasn't what you'd planned. Best wishes to Mrs. P and I hope she is improving and that the building works won't be too disruptive. I always enjoy your updates and along with everyone else I'm looking forward to seeing your next build develop!

5 hours ago, Michanglais said:

Just wondering whether anyone else was having this problem.

 

My HST has terrible wheel-slip issues hauling a full 8-car set. It just grinds to a halt with the wheels spinning. When I detach the power car from the train, it runs just fine. 

 

I'm wondering whether it wouldn't benefit from a couple of the dreaded traction tyres. 

 

I'd like to hear pointers and opinions.

 

Cheers,

Michael

Hi Michael,

I'm sorry to say that you might want to return your HST to Hornby for them to take a look at it if fitting it with DCC doesn't cure its problems (and I'm also doubtful that it would cure it but it must be worth a try).

After seeing your post I thought I'd give mine a test as I currently have a running-in loop of track on my dining room table (much to the delight of the Domestic Authority). The loop is a full circle of Tillig bedding track of radius 396 (so equal to Hornby's R4) plus only four 166mm straights, laid out with two straights per side (so the circuit is an oval rather than a 'square').

I don't have any BG Mk3s (they're not out yet) so I tried my HST set with three unlit Pullmans from the Scotsman set and three Mk1 from the Easterner. My HST set is DCC and it came pre-fitted.

The 'train' was long enough to cover almost half of the circuit so a considerable amount of it is always on a curve yet it pulled away at the lowest speed setting (i.e. '1' on the app) and continued crawling at that speed without any problems for a full circuit.

Then I noticed that you said you were running 8 coaches rather than the six that I had. The only bogie vehicles I had left to try were three Arnold container wagons so I added those to give a total of 9 vehicles plus the dummy power car. I think the Arnold wagons are a bit heavier than the coaches, plus the 'train' now covered more than half of the circuit, so it was even more demanding. However, the result was the same with the HST starting at '1' and continuing to crawl around at that speed for a full circuit.

I have to say that my three steamers (Blink Bonny, William Whitelaw and Trigo) didn't show the even slightest interest in pulling the six coaches plus the dummy HST car at the same low speed as the HST. Even at speed setting '10' Trigo would stop and wheelspin frequently. However the steamers weigh a bit less than the HST so maybe they'd benefit from a bit of extra weight (and maybe a bit of wheel cleaning, too).

Finally, I have to say that if the TV series 'Hornby: A Model World' is even faintly true to reality then I think the idea that Hornby would settle for a 4-coach HST as a 'maximum' because "TT:120 is for smaller spaces" doesn't really hold water. There is no evidence for them thinking that and on the TV series they seemed just as enthusiastic to see a loco pulling a realistic rake of carriages or wagons at speed as the rest of us.

On 19/03/2024 at 11:09, Porfuera said:

As a continuation to the above, five of the GWR Mk3 coaches are showing an availability of "Spring" (all look like TSOs) while three are showing an availability of "Summer" (these are Buffet, TF and TGS).

 

For those with Spring, the "product:availability_date" is showing as "2024-03-28T00:00:00+00:00" so we will be able to see whether this happens on the 28th March or not (assuming the date doesn't change).

 

For those showing "Summer" the date is showing as "2024-07-02T00:00:00+01:00".

The five GWR Mk3 TSOs in the online shop that that were recently showing "Spring" are now also showing "Summer", with metadata dates of 30th July.

Therefore all the outstanding BG and GWR Mk3s are now showing "Summer".

Hopefully these will change to earlier dates at some point - my HST pack arrived today and I would very much like to have some coaches to run with it!

I think Hornby will get some stick if the Mk3s don't arrive until June/July. Maybe we will hear better news on 2nd April.

There is a post on the Hornby Bluetooth decoders thread saying that the sound profiles for the TT:120 Duchess, Class 50 and Class 66 are due to be released by the end of the month (although I haven't checked this myself).

However the shop is showing 'Expected' dates of Summer (for the Duchess and Class 50) and Autumn (for the Class 66) for the locos.

If they're releasing the sound profiles soon then maybe the shop dates for these locos are being pessimistic. Fingers crossed!

EDIT: Or maybe it is the easiest way for the factory in China to get hold of the profiles to preload them onto the sound-fitted locos, which are due to be released at the same time as the DC locos...?

On 19/03/2024 at 18:50, Bob83a said:

TT.      Class 50,  Class 66,  Duchess

 

But anything announced for later in the Year could appear and of course there is also the possibility that there may be unannounced sound profiles.

It is interesting that they are getting these out so early because (according to the shop pages) the TT:120 Duchess and Class 50 aren't due until Summer (possibly end of May and end of June respectively) and the Class 66 isn't due until Autumn (possibly end of November) at the earliest. Hopefully the shop dates are being pessimistic!

8 minutes ago, andrewshimmin said:

What we don't know is whether that is just the data someone's entering to get the website to display, or whether it's linked to any actual supply chain delivery data.

Until now it's not been wildly reliable (the LMS carriages were shown as autumn all summer and winter all autumn) so I suspect the former.

This is why I put "the only way we'll know for sure is to check these dates against something that will be released in the near future".

I'm not sure I agree about the dates. Just because 'long' dates frequently slip, it doesn't mean that near ones are unreliable. Hornby must have a good idea when stock is going to arrive so that they can send lists out to dealers.

However, going by how quickly the Swallow-liveried Mk3s were sent out after the power car packs you'd think the BG and GWR Mk3s would be here already but who knows?

And I've just had my notification email for my digital BG HST (or rather SWMBOs HST!) so I'm as keen to see the Mk3s as anyone else, otherwise I'll be running it with Pullmans!

10 minutes ago, jonnyuk said:

i got an email from Rails yesterday saying the blue ones are in stock

Well that blows my theory out of the water! 🙂

EDIT: I've just checked and it look like it is only the power car packs so maybe I'm safe for now...