How bad, really, are Dapol and Farish

[scruff]

Well, I had a quiet afternoon so I thought I would test my fleet and make sure that all was well with their motors and lights.

The fleet comprises
6 DMU Dapol 2 Farish 4
3 HST all Dapol
2 DVT Dapol
38 loco's 18 Farish 20 Dapol.

I sat and tested all of them because they have been stored for the last 18 months due to a house move. Most have hardly been used and all are in mint condition.

These are the results:
No light failures at all..
Running failures=2
I had a quick look at the failures and found that both the class 47 and 60 by Farish have split gears.
So that is a failure rate of 9% for Farish and 0% for Dapol.

So you could say I'm not very impressed with Farish especially after all the Dapol "knockers" here have said.

Cheers
Mark

[Dr Al]

I had a quick look at the failures and found that both the class 47 and 60 by Farish have split gears.

This seems to be getting common particularly on the new tool class 47s - pulled one of mine out last week and heard the characteristic clunking of a gear on the way out.

Cheers,
Alan

[DesertHound]

Are they "failure" locos UK or Chinese Farish Scruff?

[EtchedPixels]

If it is to pre-warn the rival company that you are releasing a specific item then its stupid, it would be better if Dapol and Farish did release the same loco classes as long as they looked identical

The market isn't big enough for that in the UK. If it kept happening I imagine one or both would simply go under.

Alan

[Karhedron]

This seems to be getting common particularly on the new tool class 47s - pulled one of mine out last week and heard the characteristic clunking of a gear on the way out.

I wonder if there is enough demand for and after-market manufacturer to offer replacement brass gears? Are Farish's modern diesels sufficient similar under the hood for this t work or would new gears have to be tooled for each class?

[Dr Al]

I wonder if there is enough demand for and after-market manufacturer to offer replacement brass gears? Are Farish's modern diesels sufficient similar under the hood for this t work or would new gears have to be tooled for each class?

All the gears on the axles that I've seen split (37,47s) are the same as the original Farish - 16 tooth, so have been replaceable with generic spares. Note, that the wheelsets aren't the same so can't be replaced with the generic spares (these spares being too small diameter).

Given that the number of splits on new tool stock seems small (so far), I don't know that there'd be a great market yet for them.

It is concerning that some splits are occurring on steam tender drives too - had a B1 with one gone (fortunately it was on the 'spare' wheelset in the bits bag....).

Cheers,
Alan

[scruff]

The loco's that failed are both china built.

Class 60 60078 mainline blue 371-351 centre axle on one bogie (about 2 hours running done)
and
Class 47 47474 parcels red 372-242 coupling end axle on one bogie (loco only ever test run)

Anyone know where I can purchase replacement wheelsets? I found BRlines and Peters spares don't have the correct wheelsets as far as I can tell.

cheers
Mark

[Dr Al]

Anyone know where I can purchase replacement wheelsets? I found BRlines and Peters spares don't have the correct wheelsets as far as I can tell.

If they are still under warranty Bachmann should supply these FOC.

Otherwise Bachmann spares dept is first call, or beyond that BR Lines. You can't use the generic spare Farish wheelsets as the locos now all have specific diameter wheelsets appropriate to their given prototype. You can still replace the gears on the original wheels as they are the standard 16 tooth type.

HTH,
Alan