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Model Railway - What's your latest acquisition?


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On 20/09/2024 at 18:55, Rana Temporia said:

That part on the cab roof is usually missing though!

The whistle and linkage/lever was on mine and a second was included as a spare should I need it. I'm now home and been giving it a good run today. Its fairly light compared to my Bachmann/Liliput SBB3/3 and Fleischmann T3 but is running well though it takes off with a bit of a start unless using the switches on my Duette. I'll stick a decoder in it soon.

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On 15/09/2024 at 21:53, Deem said:

I don't think his scoring is that accurate. Just my opinion.

I have fixed a lot of these, there are two issues I have found with them. One is the drive is at one end rather than being in the middle, so it seems to put more stress on the driving gear. You see many advertised with a broken gear. The other one is the valve gear, it is so fragile. When you take the loco apart the upper front pieces fall out of their mounts and if you are not careful putting the body on they get trapped and break. The earlier tender driven valve gear is not so detailed but is more robust. It does fit if you do a bit of filing to the centre section. As a model they really look nice but they are so delicate. As to Sam he doesn't always get it right, but generally he is ok. In this case it was the price that put him off. I have that loco he tested, it had a broken motor which I had a spare from all the issues I had from mine. Funny once I had it apart I suddenly remembered all the issues I had with putting the valve gear back.

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18 minutes ago, ColinB said:

I have fixed a lot of these, there are two issues I have found with them. One is the drive is at one end rather than being in the middle, so it seems to put more stress on the driving gear. You see many advertised with a broken gear. The other one is the valve gear, it is so fragile. When you take the loco apart the upper front pieces fall out of their mounts and if you are not careful putting the body on they get trapped and break. The earlier tender driven valve gear is not so detailed but is more robust. It does fit if you do a bit of filing to the centre section. As a model they really look nice but they are so delicate. As to Sam he doesn't always get it right, but generally he is ok. In this case it was the price that put him off. I have that loco he tested, it had a broken motor which I had a spare from all the issues I had from mine. Funny once I had it apart I suddenly remembered all the issues I had with putting the valve gear back.

Couldn't agree more with you Colin, very very fragile parts on body and if one is not careful, one can easily damage the valve gear component on this Britannia 7MT model. Driving Gear seem to be working fne at the moment and as I don't run my loco constantly or for longer period as yet, this one may work OK for me.

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40 minutes ago, Ratch said:

Jouef were distributed by Mettoy, where my dad worked, and also made items for Playcraft. My first train set was a Mettoy/Playcraft one, and when I saw this on e-bay the old nostalgia thing hollered out.

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The first OO model train I can remember having was a Playcraft NB diesel shunter which ran cab-first which I always thought was backwards but copied by Tri-ang with their clockwork diesel shunter! I had some silvery grey plastic track which I think was Mettoy and a couple of Playcraft wagons for it to pull. 

As a child I only had Playcraft and Tri-ang, and with a lot of the cheap sets designed as throw-away it’s amazing how many are still running today. Over-design perhaps? The 0-4-0 clockwork motor that Tri-ang used (and still use) is a direct copy of the Jouef ones used in the Playcraft sets. The Jouef/Playcraft clockwork loco wheels can be a bit of a pain as they are moulded in a soft plastic that can distort. 

The other problem that I have had is with those 1st radius (12.75”) curves, they straighten out slightly and don’t make a circle easily with eight as they should. The later ones with brass fishplates seem to be a bit more stable.

Personally I think Playcraft deserve more recognition in the history of model railways in the UK. They had a full range including operating mail coaches and discharging hopper wagons. OK so they only made two UK locos, the NB shunter and the class21/29 diesel but they caused big changes with Tri-ang and Hornby Dublo having to release cheap sets to compete with them. They were of dubious scale, nominally HO (The NB shunter is actually approximately 3.8 to 3.9mm to the foot) so could run with the Jouef Continental stock and were sold as Playcraft International as more of that range was added. 

I have a large collection of Playcraft locos and I think I have only ever come across one motor that I couldn’t get going. Great stuff!

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My latest addition is a non runner class 60 R2639 I bought from eBay, loco is almost new so I took a chance. Now come the good part, as it turns out it was just bogie gear was seized due to old grease, I just remove the bearing, put some oil on shaft, put the bearing back and it started move freely. Both side bearing were seized fully on gear shaft, now loco runs very very nice. Just installed HM7K with sound as well and all seem to be working very nicely.

Happy days.

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Edited by Deem
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@JJ73 The Midland Compound was a close relative of the 2P and the earlier 483 class with all having the 4-4-0 wheel arrangement but the compound was a three cylinder machine given a 4P power classification.  Both the 2P and Compound locomotives have been modelled by Hornby over the last 50 years. 

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