I seem to spend a lot of time repairing old locos and trying to get parts for them. This is partly for sentimental reasons, partly because I hate throwing things into landfill sites and also because many new locos seem rather fragile and won't go round my curves.
I have the impression that many of the current locos are pretty much disposable once something breaks? Hornby parts seem to be much more available than Bachmann ones, does it follow that they are more repairable?
Can of worms your opening there ! Be interesting to see what some of our retailing contributors say - John, over to you...
Cheers, Simon
No, it follows that Hornby locos are more likely to be defective. ;-)
But mostly it's an effect of how modern model trains are made. The loco was jig-built to start with, so disassembling and reassembling it will be beyond most modellers' abilities. Also, there just aren't that many repairable or replaceable parts - many details are cast on or glued in place.
IOW, manufacturers do not stock repair parts, as a rule. Keeping track of parts is hellishly expensive. The overhead of warehousing, tracking inventory, and servicing and shipping small orders is amazingly high to the uninitiated. (That's why a car built from repair parts will cost you
5 to 10 times as much as new one.)Manufacturers try to have as many common parts as possible, eg, motors and wheels, and these are the parts most likely to be available for repairs. But they are also the parts least likely to break. However, if it turns out that some part (such as a gear) fails too often too soon, a manufacturer may arrange to have improved parts made. But that doesn't mean they will be available to the few modellers who want to potter about repairing defective equipment (I'm one of those, too, I speak from experience. ;-)
Thus, when you have a defective loco, it may be cheaper for the manufacturer to just replace it with another one, and do the repairs in-house than to handle small orders. (The cost of handling small orders is one reason most hobby shops no longer stock all those odd bits and pieces of yore.) You get a replacement loco, and yours will go into the "refurbishing" stream to be satisfy another customer's warranty claim. Or, as you fear, it may just get dumped.
All that being said, manufacturers will from time to time just send you a replacement part. Sometimes even at no cost, as it's cheaper to just bung the thing into an envelope than to process a sale!
HTH
Hornby definitely support their products with the exception of bodies but I have noticed that guys like Modelspares do break up some of the new units. Bachmann themselves provide a surprising range of spares but have reduced (rationalised) the number of chassis available and of corse no bodies. Spares for rolling stock are the most difficult to locate. The cannibal routine is the most successful IMHO.
Regards
"Gerald H" wrote
Both manufacturers provide a repair facility, so I'd say there's no repair problem with either.
John.
"Wolf K." wrote
In the words of that well known song:-
'You took the words right out of my mouth ...........'
John.
Gerald H said the following on 16/04/2008 23:00:
Certainly Hornby parts seem to be more available, and some might say (have said!) that they need to be!
I've just gone through an exercise of getting about 40 locos up and running for sale, dating from 1950s Hornby-Dublo through Tri-ang to
1980s/1990s Hornby. It's certainly the case that the older ones are much easier to get running smoothly (or they never stopped running) than the newer ones. My impression is that Hornby lost the way when they started using plastic :-)If I ever see an X-04 motor again though, it will be too soon!!
Indeed, it's taken over 40 years to get back to the smooth RTR locos that we had with H-D back in the early '60s, and that was on those old resistant-mat controllers!
Hmm, in my opinion, whilst the X-04 motor needs regular servicing, it is not so bad - that is compared to the abortion that replaced it, namely the 'Ringfield' motor. (Triang-)Hornby lost their way when they started to put the motor in the tender of their steam loco models...
:Jerry: said the following on 17/04/2008 10:42:
My test track (I model P4, so had to knock up a length of OO) is powered by a very cheap Hornby controller that is probably nothing more than a resistance mat! I figured that if the loco would run smoothly on that, it would run smoothly on anything.
I didn't mean to imply it was bad, it's just that I've seen rather a lot of them lately! As you say, they are actually quite nice motors.
The X04 was an excellent motor, way ahead of everything else available in Britain in 1948/50. IMHO it's the reason the Rovex/Tri-ang range florished for so long. (that and the excellent gears)
Hornby Ringfield was a straight copy of the successful Fleischmann drum motor - even the parts were semi-interchangable. A problem with copying German technology is that it doesn't neccessarily work as well when you lower the quality.
Regards, Greg.P.
Yes.
D800 Warships vs V200 series.
I have a Fleischmann model of each of those - I can't see anything to complain about other than there being no provision for fitting a second motor bogie :-(
Greg.P.
Imperial vs Metric. ;)
Fred X
I think Christopher meant the real thing?
(kim)
Yeah, I guess that's a possibility.
From what I've read (including/particularly between the lines) the German design was tailored for German conditions where high power, relatively short dash running with continual maintainance was the norm. If you were to put the V200s onto long distance continuous running routes with less than Germanic maintainance, or heavy drag operation as on the US Southern Pacific where there were high ambient temperatures and maintainance consisted of checking the oil monthly, kicking the tyres and flicking an oily rag over the radiator cap, the German design wasn't up to the job. Of course the German designers couldn't conceive of maintainance schedules that didn't include checking stress effects on all cotterpins daily and the like, so failure was guaranteed. Of course, the Webb Compounds sold to France and the USa also didn't fare well either.
Regards, Greg.P.
:-)
The hydraulics gave a better power to weight ratio than the diesel electrics of the era.
So the D800 Warships were 2000hp on only four axles, dating from
1960.All the other type 4 diesels being built at the time needed eight axles. They were still building class 40s until 1962, and Peaks until
1963.
Not really a strict comparison - if anything it demonstartes that simply squeezing a design onto a smaller space doesn't always work. In fact, the V200's had a severe speed restriction on them due to suspension problems - corrected by using the D800's design! After some initial problems the D800's were pretty reliable, having good availablility.
Cheers Richard
Yes, the only two problems the Western region really had with them as the lack of braking force compared to the heavier Type Fours (including the Westerns) and being none standard in the BRB's rush to have a one size fits all 'standard' diesel fleet...
Even the NB 63xx "Baby Warships" were not that bad a loco, they were let down by an under powered engine [1], and the typical BTC's "indecision in design".
[1] much like their bigger DE sisters were to start with, but without room for modification
Most
Not as good as 3300 on 6 axles
Needed to go to type 5
There were a few prototypes around then
To be honest the main reason 40s and Peaks were heavy was their construction.
The EE V16 fitted in DP2 and 50s at 2700 and 56s at 3250 The Sulzer P12 - 47s
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