Anatomy of a dinosaur

[belstone]

The Farish Pannier:  first British-made N gauge locomotive, and the first British outline model to have a purpose-built chassis (everything before that had been based on existing Continental mechanisms).  Launched mid 1971, price £5.99 (around £75 at today's prices).  In continual production all the way through the Poole era and beyond, not sure when the last examples came out of China but this must be the longest production run for any N gauge locomotive.



This is what your six quid bought you. 



Numbers to cut out and glue on.  I love the instructions: "If the numbers are wrong for a particular locomotive, don't pester us about it."



German made "can" motor, as far advanced back then as coreless motors are now.



Beige thing is a capacitor to prevent interference with your black and white television.



Lots of gears.  Motor drives a worm gear via a 1:1 spur gear set, this in turn drives a gear between the first and second axles, with the second and third axles geared together.  The front axle is driven off the connecting rods.  Very, very noisy.  I suspect it might work better if you removed the gear between the second and third axles but I'm not going to start experimenting with this one.  I cleaned the wheels with IPA and put a few drops of soothing loco oil on those ancient, brittle gears.  It runs, but has a bit of a limp (possibly a wheel off centre) and sounds like an accident in a cement mixer factory.  And it doesn't much like Code 55 pointwork.



1971 original on the right, late Chinese production on the left.  At first sight they look identical apart from the wheels.



But at some point the body tooling must have been redesigned.  There are dozens of small dimensional differences between early and late models, and a lot of extra cast-in details on the late version.  However the chassis mounts appear the same, and I am pretty sure a late production chassis will fit the early body.

This little Pannier isn't going to get much use, but I might build a short oval in Code 80 for it to amble round occasionally, and perhaps try to pick up a few early Farish wagons to go with it.  This model is where British N gauge really started: that is why I bought it.

[Bealman]

Cool... I think I have a late 80s version somewhere... might dig it out! 

[D1042 Western Princess]

Early N Gauge wasn't bad, and far more robust than modern equipment which sometimes seems to fall apart if you look at it too hard. The cab steps fell of my D95XX when I was taking it out of the box once.
Only last year did I send a GF 08, purchased in 1979 and my first N Gauge loco, into retirement when it finally stopped working and no amount of coaxing and repairing seemed to enable a restart.
To my regret she was scrapped without ceremony; I should have kept it, but there we are.

[Bealman]

My Poole 08 is my favourite loco for testing track and pointwork, and, apart from the lack of outside frames, I don't think it compares too badly to the new model.

(I did a comparison with photos a couple of years ago, but can't post a link 'cos I'm on me phone at moment and don't know how, and can't remember where I posted it anyhow) 

[D1042 Western Princess]

My Poole 08 is my favourite loco for testing track and pointwork, and, apart from the lack of outside frames, I don't think it compares too badly to the new model.

An NO gauge clearance problems as with the newer one which is famously too wide. On balance I think I preferred the lack of outside cranks and greater flexibility of having a correctly gauged loco. It didn't look so good but for operational reasons was (in my opinion) the better model.

[Dr Al]

Lots of gears.  Motor drives a worm gear via a 1:1 spur gear set, this in turn drives a gear between the first and second axles, with the second and third axles geared together.  The front axle is driven off the connecting rods.  Very, very noisy.  I suspect it might work better if you removed the gear between the second and third axles but I'm not going to start experimenting with this one.  I cleaned the wheels with IPA and put a few drops of soothing loco oil on those ancient, brittle gears.  It runs, but has a bit of a limp (possibly a wheel off centre) and sounds like an accident in a cement mixer factory.  And it doesn't much like Code 55 pointwork.

Lightly lubricating the motor bearings will help, as well as the gearing and bearings for the shafts.

The stiff point could well be quartering - it was always a problem on the various plastic chassied models Farish made.

The motor is an Arnold unit I believe and can be found on some of their diesels. Because of its size the body was blown up a little all round as you've seen and the old chassis won't fit a new body, but the new ones will fit the old bodies as you hypothesise.

is a very tidy example - worth keeping in like that!

Cheers,
Alan

[Dr Al]

Early N Gauge wasn't bad, and far more robust than modern equipment which sometimes seems to fall apart if you look at it too hard. The cab steps fell of my D95XX when I was taking it out of the box once.
Only last year did I send a GF 08, purchased in 1979 and my first N Gauge loco, into retirement when it finally stopped working and no amount of coaxing and repairing seemed to enable a restart.
To my regret she was scrapped without ceremony; I should have kept it, but there we are.

It's always worth keeping and investigating these - most of the spares are still available, so they can ususally be refurbished unless they are completely worn out (chassis block wear and axles which can wear).

Cheers,
Alan

[SidmouthJunction]

Great to see an immaculate example of what is undeniably a major part of N gauge history. I have my own example somewhere, without a box and with faded paintwork, still plodding along!

However, wouldn't the Lone Star Baby Deltic and class 24 pre-date it as the first British-made, British outline rtr locos?

[belstone]

Great to see an immaculate example of what is undeniably a major part of N gauge history. I have my own example somewhere, without a box and with faded paintwork, still plodding along!

However, wouldn't the Lone Star Baby Deltic and class 24 pre-date it as the first British-made, British outline rtr locos?

Yes and no.  Lone Star was 8.25mm gauge which turned out to be a dead end.  But I think it was the first ever 2mm scale commercial system, beating the Germans to the market by several years.

[Roy L S]

Great to see an immaculate example of what is undeniably a major part of N gauge history. I have my own example somewhere, without a box and with faded paintwork, still plodding along!

However, wouldn't the Lone Star Baby Deltic and class 24 pre-date it as the first British-made, British outline rtr locos?

Yes and no.  Lone Star was 8.25mm gauge which turned out to be a dead end.  But I think it was the first ever 2mm scale commercial system, beating the Germans to the market by several years.

Wasn't Lone Star 000 9.25mm i.e. very slightly larger?

Regards

Roy

[Roy L S]

My Poole 08 is my favourite loco for testing track and pointwork, and, apart from the lack of outside frames, I don't think it compares too badly to the new model.

An NO gauge clearance problems as with the newer one which is famously too wide. On balance I think I preferred the lack of outside cranks and greater flexibility of having a correctly gauged loco. It didn't look so good but for operational reasons was (in my opinion) the better model.

Afraid I can't agree with that. Aside possibly for the width compromise to fit outside frames and cranks the new loco is in a totally different league in terms of fidelity, detail and running quality.

Roy

[Roy L S]

The motor is an Arnold unit I believe and can be found on some of their diesels. Because of its size the body was blown up a little all round as you've seen and the old chassis won't fit a new body, but the new ones will fit the old bodies as you hypothesise.

Cheers,
Alan

Quite possibly Alan, I think Matt Richter whose Dad worked in Farish way back then said the motor was made by Buhler. I also believe I'm correct in saying the body was to have been part plastic but tractive weight problems put paid to that plan!

Regards

Roy

[D1042 Western Princess]

An NO gauge clearance problems as with the newer one which is famously too wide. On balance I think I preferred the lack of outside cranks and greater flexibility of having a correctly gauged loco. It didn't look so good but for operational reasons was (in my opinion) the better model.

Afraid I can't agree with that. Aside possibly for the width compromise to fit outside frames and cranks the new loco is in a totally different league in terms of fidelity, detail and running quality.

Roy

Until you try to take it into a correctly positioned platform (so as passengers don't have a huge gap to leap) and find the coupling rods hitting the platform top  .

All the good looks in the world count for nothing if you can't run the loco properly, in my view.

[belstone]

Read the small print.  Guaranteed for one month from date of purchase, except for mechanical breakage of any kind, or motor failure. I think that covers just about everything except the chimney falling off.  Not sure Farish themselves had a lot of faith in these early mechanisms. 

[Newportnobby]

I still have 2 x 94xx Farish panniers (ref 1105) and they still run, although I have to keep an eye on the connecting rods which sometimes come off and cause the loco to do the pole vault
If I recall, the 94xx and their class 101 DMU were the first Farish items I ever bought.
Ergo - a dinosaur buying a dinosaur