What cries for a retool or upgrade?

[JeremiahBunyan]

The signals definitely need changing, not retooling but starting from scratch, they're more suitable for something between OO and O gauge.  

 

Interesting what JBM said about the track, concrete sleepers on track and points would be a good idea. I've noticed on our local line that although the track uses concrete, most of the points have wooden sleeper and they are brand new. Wooden sleeper to tend to be black even if they're brown when new. I've got some in my garden and they're as black as night. 

That's an eye-opener then, I always wondered why the colour black was chosen. All American sleepers that are wooden usually are a greyish brown.

 

 

[walkingthedog]

I suppose it depends how old the sleepers are supposed to be. I have Peco brown sleepers but tend to splash all sorts of dirty colours on them depending where they are on the layout. 

[Buz]

I suppose it depends how old the sleepers are supposed to be. I have Peco brown sleepers but tend to splash all sorts of dirty colours on them depending where they are on the layout. 

It does brand new ones are coverd in the black gunge they pressure treat them in its not good for you.

older ones are brownish real old ones are grey and dead old ones are almost silver and termite or native wood eating bug eaten.

regards John

[walkingthedog]

Not on our line (Chiltern Railways-Aylesbury to Marylebone)  The new ones are brown. The old ones in my garden are as black as you can get with a few bits of green moss scattered about. 

[The son of Triangman]

I'm ahead of market with the hydraulic buffer stop, I used to sell working LED lamps that directly replaced the dummy ones fitted to the buffer stops.

Yup the track system needs a full revamp.

 

[The son of Triangman]

The signals need to be replaced, they have been around since 1978 and are almost O scale. The signals that were around before them were more closer to scale and should return.

 

[The son of Triangman]

Hydraulic buffer stop with working LED lamp.

/media/tinymce_upload/8e59ca2937e0a2333031be6217b81b9a.JPG

[Fazy]

There was a topic on RMWeb about new track. And boy did it get confusing. Every body seemed to agree on new track was needed.  But then came what sort! Do you keep the HO look at least the track looks like standard gauge. Or do you want a more realistic sleeper width.  And spacing but this can make it look like narrow gauge. The colour? What rail to use. Do you keep the train set angles.  Do you keep the non electric frogs. Should we keep the old track in production.  Should the new track be able to be easily used with the old track. And should the standards be ooem which then rules out all old stock pre Chinese products. I ended up giving up. Not to mention what chairs. 

[LCDR]

The problem for Hornby and others in making track with a variety of fittings (i.e. concrete, steel & wood sleepers / flat bottom and bullhead rail / chairs or baseplates) is that whatever you choose they will at some point look wrong. Anyone modelling pre-1939 railways should not use flat bottom rail for example. This can be difficult for anyone using ready made track because nearly all is code 100 flat bottom. Even code 75 flat bottom rail is incorrect for any layout based on the UK before 1950, unless you are modelling a light railway. Nobody makes a complete range of RTR bullhead track.

 

Steel sleepers are a comparatively new phenomenon on main lines in the UK although they were used universally in tropical countries, and on industrial lines for ages. Even these have changed.

 

Concrete sleepers too  have changed in appearance over time. Until the 1960s these were thin, and had cast iron chairs bolted to them to support bullhead rail, and were only to be found on branch lines and in sidings and then only in tiny quantities. After the 1960s they appear nearly everywhere.

 

The difficulty will be who is it you exclude, because it would be uneconomic to make more than one style to go with your train sets. Modern track is inappropriate for historical modellers and vice versa, so there has to be a compromise. So although I would have personally preferred to see Super4 return, I am a realist, and recognise that code 100 flat bottom rail on HO scale wood sleepers is here to stay.

 

Track, like goods wagons, are amongst the most ignored subjects in the model railway world. Few people ever make the effort to get their track correct to match the period they are modelling, even those posh layouts in the modelling magazines month after month ignore the fact that their lovely GWR Churchward  'City' class and clerestories from the 1900s, or LMS Fowler Royal Scot in crimson lake of the 1930s  (etc.) are running on track that did not appear until 1950, long after they were scrapped or rebuilt!

 

C'est la vie!

[david_abramczyk]

I'd like to second the mention of the Holden B12 that someone made; I had a look, and I was stunned to find that for the most part, the B12's they make today are almost completely identical to the originals, from back in 1962.

[GreenGiraffe22]

A super detail E2 :)

[JeremiahBunyan]

A super detail E2 :)

Hear hear!

 

PS: To me it's sort of funny that no one has taken up the LB&SCR E2 to do to today's standards. Is the prototype not popular as such? I would've thought the LB&SCR E2 was a famous loco.

[GreenGiraffe22]

The one I have looks so naff next to its super detail track mates, it has become an experimental re-paint / weathering engine.

[LCDR]

 The LB&SCR Billington E2 was a tiny class of ten locos, and there were two batches with different length side tanks. 100 to 104 had side tanks which finished halfway between the leading and centre driving wheels, but on 105 to 109 the tanks extended to the start of the smokebox, over the centre of the leading drivers. They certainly looked handsome and modern, and were popular and useful too. Latterly a  few worked in the London area, some at Dover and others at Southampton, which was a wide allocation for such a tiny class.

 

The E2 was the 'model' for the Rev. W. Awdry's 'Thomas'. This was originally a mistake. The Rev. once told me that he had wanted 'Thomas' to be similar to  a LMS Fowler 3F 'Jinty', but the artist had drawn him as an E2 and the drawing stuck!

 

However his earliest 'Thomas' model had a straight footplate, large wheel splasher with sandbox and short tanks, looking more like a 3F, but his later 'Thomas' model was most definitely a long tank E2 withsmall splasher and footplate that gracefully drops to the buffer beams.  There are however at least two different 'Thomas' locos in the books too. The footplate with drop to buffer beam or straight throughout appears throughout the book series.

[Postman Prat]

I'd like to second the mention of the Holden B12 that someone made; I had a look, and I was stunned to find that for the most part, the B12's they make today are almost completely identical to the originals, from back in 1962.

The B12 in 1962 was a very good loco, by the standards of the day. Even now, as you say, the 1962 model has held it's own against the latest stuff. You'll get wire handrails, brake gear and doubtless a modern paint job.

 

I just wish they'd do something about the vertical fitting, what ever it is, beneath the side of the somebox (left hand side). I seem to recall it caused a great deal of intrest (!) in 1962. Regrettably I cannot remember the outcome.

 

[Postman Prat]

My post above  -  2nd para, third word, second line.   Read as smokebox not somebox

[JeremiahBunyan]

My post above  -  2nd para, third word, second line.   Read as smokebox not somebox

Just ask Adam to edit it for you and then delete our unecessary posts about it. Much easier.

[Fazy]

Has anyone mentioned the princess royal! Needs a full upgrade

[Postman Prat]

Has anyone mentioned the princess royal! Needs a full upgrade

 

You have (very often) and to lend a bit of moral support, I have.  😆

[Fazy]

Cheers PP always thought you were a man of taste!

 

The Only LMS loco I think  is probably cost effective for Hornby to upgrade is the Princess Royal.  Has the others are good models (black 5 8f or are already available else were in a higher detailed version. So I am going to keep banging the Drum. Even if I finish my kits frist that still leaves 6 more I could buy from Hornby! Any other locos I can think of are completely new models and don't belong on this topic. 

[rayarpino]

Virtually all the old 'so many' planks wagons, most of them bearing the private owner paint schemes.

And when Hornby get round to this, let's have some of these wagons in their original pre-grouping or grouping livery. 

Instead of turning out countless renamed editions of steam engines, particularly the A3 and A4 families, perhaps the money could go into the wagons. I am personally fed up with these renamed versions. If you want another name and number, do it yourself since you're supposed to be a modeller.

[LCDR]

 The 'trader' wagons do re-appear with considerable variety, but what is missing are appropriate guard's vans from the period to finish off an authentic goods train. The LB&SCR guards van has made a come-back this year, but is still the same old 1970s model in a new paint job.  Given the number of LS&WR and GER  locos in Hornby's stable a new goods brakevan from each of these railways would be a great idea.

[Fazy]

To right LC&DR the breakvan is often overlooked by the RTR manufacturers.  And to be honest breakvan helps to set the period and location of the layout after the locos and building's

[GreenGiraffe22]

Just a thought, to add to my comment about a super detial E2, perhaps a Super Detail version of the old Hornby Dublo R1 as well?

[96RAF]

All the 0-4-0s - make them close representations of real locos like the latest little Peckett W4 gems and Sentinal and rework the chassis for acceptable slow speed control.