Class 20 conundrum

Surely it's time to promote the Wrenn (ex H-D) model to the mantelpiece, the collectors item it is, and replace it on the layout with one of the above?

Ahh... but my Wrenn body has two cabs, has been repainted, glazed etc... It took a ages to turn it into a BNR heavy freight loco and so it has no collectable value. It also has a lot of sentimental value :)

: : Ahh... but my Wrenn body has two cabs, has been repainted, glazed etc... : It took a ages to turn it into a BNR heavy freight loco and so it has no : collectable value. It also has a lot of sentimental value :)

Then I suggest a Bachmann chassis..... of North American outline!

To get back to your original question, here's a general comment, based on my own experiments in fitting ancient bodies to new chassis.

The critical factor is scale dimensions. IF all three engines are scale length and width, then fitting the Wrenn body to a Bachmann or Hornby chassis is only a matter of chopping a bit of plastic here and adding a bit of plastic there so that the Wrenn body slips over the new chassis and rests at the right height. Same if the Wrenn body is slightly long. But if the Wrenn body's short, you can't do it without surgery on the chassis, which IMO is not advisable.

Tip: clean all bumps, pegs, mounting tabs, etc out of the interior of the original body. Makes it easy to add new mounting tabs, rearrange interior lighting, etc.

Cheers,

wolf k.

I would say if they are the *same* scale length and width, not neccessarily true scale implied by your statement.

With a class 20, even if the length matches, it's the scale width of the body, rather than footplate that will be crucial to clear the mechanism.

Was the wrenn tooling taken over by Hornby or Bachmann? If so, an older model may be a closer fit.

MBQ

: Was the wrenn tooling taken over by Hornby or Bachmann? : If so, an older model may be a closer fit.

As I said in another reply, Wrenn took over the old Hornby-Dublo tooling, so that models ancestry goes back 50 years! I suspect that much hacking and bodging will be needed to get a modern (can motor) chassis to fit, better luck might be had with the older Lima class 20 chassis if one can live with the old Ringfield type motor-bogie drive. Failing that, if a modern can-motor > cardian-shaft > bogie drive is needed then one might have to use Bachmann/Hornby bogies with scratch build a chassis frame IYSWIM.

In message , Gerald H writes

Got any pictures?

On 13/02/2009 15:53, Jerry said,

I thought the Lima class 20 had a central motor and cardan shafts?

I thought it was central motor driving only one cardan shaft?

(kim)

On 13/02/2009 19:02, kim said,

I don't have one so can't check, but a review of the Hornby Class 20 (ex-Lima) says that it only drives one bogie unlike the Lima version. Whatever, it doesn't have a ringfield motor :-)

I think the can motor/cardan shaft arrangement was necessitated by the extreme narrow width of the body?

Darren Sherwood wrote an article for Model Rail explaining how to upgrade the mechanism with a Branchlines kit (August 2002). It's still single ended but includes a Mashima motor and flywheel.

(kim)

: > I thought the Lima class 20 had a central motor and cardan shafts? : : I thought it was central motor driving only one cardan shaft? :

You might be well be correct... Slaps head, puts foot in one owns mouth! :~)

There's one here...

Hmmmm, try bodging a Hornby "58" chasis...

:-)

PhilD