paulbb

The pictues of the sample reflect what WILL be produced by Heljan. When I emailed Hattons about this they were adamant that their numbers were correct .. Hattons said "we are happy that it is the correct typeface and size for the locomotive; We believe that the pictures on the locomotive make it look very bold but this is due to the nature of the paint on the loco's... " The Hattons reply was handled by Dave Mylett who is involved in the preservation/heritage business. Must confess I am puzzled-the numbers look wrong.

The painted '14' bodies on Hattons look very nice....although the numerals look too large and have the wrong typeface. The 'D' prefix looks a little distant from the rest of the numerals too. Are they just samples too??

Just got a 17 from Modelfair- Heljan 1701 with replacement chassis (no. 8561). Its a little noisier than the Hymeks and Birmingham Sulzers by Heljan but you can reduce the noise by taking out the piece of beige plastic- the cab interior- and putting crew figures in to disguise the mechanism. After using an R8249 chip the beastie runs quite well, although not fast, but quietish. The prototypes were not that fast- you could use an older chassis and remove gears and motor and run as a dummy. Seen quite a few photos of them in pairs-especially on passenger trains- summer only and usually excursions

I think that the class 70's remind me of those early Cylon models in the SF seriesBattlestar Galactica. Cylons may be an approriate nickname?....

I would have thought that if Heljan were doing 'Great Diesel disasters of BR' that the NB class 21 would be a great choice to follow the Clayton as it had a much wider geograhical reach than th 23- they worked in East Anglia, London Burbs and of course all over Scotland. Perhaps Mr and Mrs Kernow could help us here?

As far as diesel prototypes go the real joker in the pack must be DHP1- the Clayton hydraulic (the mind boggles!). Mind you only about 10 people ever saw the beast and it only ran on a few goods lines around Derby. How about it Heljan!