New Farish Class 44, 45 and 46 Models Cancelled

[robert shrives]

The Chassis is pretty bomb proof and apart from splitgearitus will stand the test of time. Adding DCC is a case of isolating motor from chassis and using chassis top screws - revrseing one as chassis connection points. IIRC  Express models do suitable PCB bounted headlamp/lighting kits suitable for use as well, or perhaps a dapol setup might work.
Ben Ando showed how to reduce size of bogie sideframe widths to improve appearances so no real rush to re chassis. The body looks the part. It is the 40 that needs the makeover.

Robert       

[PaulCheffus]

Is the chassis not going to be common across all models, or are they planning to make separate ones

At a guess I would agree with people who have speculated on a problem with the moulds - it sounds plausible.  Hopefully Farish will take the opportunity to re-do the chassis and offer more variants - the sealed beam headlight seems very obvious!

The Chinese don't typically use a common chassis across models so I would have thought the 40 will be all new.

Cheers, Mike

The 1COCO1 wheel arrangement was peculiar to the peaks, so the chassis wouldn't be suitable for anything else, n'est ce pas?

Hi

So how would you classify the wheel arrangement on the 40 then?

The two locos chassis have slightly different bogie centres which could be accommodated into the chassis block. The bogie arrangement is identical so would only require new bogie sideframes. It would I believe be possible to design a chassis to cover both.

Cheers

Paul

[steve836]

Is the chassis not going to be common across all models, or are they planning to make separate ones

At a guess I would agree with people who have speculated on a problem with the moulds - it sounds plausible.  Hopefully Farish will take the opportunity to re-do the chassis and offer more variants - the sealed beam headlight seems very obvious!

The Chinese don't typically use a common chassis across models so I would have thought the 40 will be all new.

Cheers, Mike

The 1COCO1 wheel arrangement was peculiar to the peaks, so the chassis wouldn't be suitable for anything else, n'est ce pas?

Hi

So how would you classify the wheel arrangement on the 40 then?

The two locos chassis have slightly different bogie centres which could be accommodated into the chassis block. The bogie arrangement is identical so would only require new bogie sideframes. It would I believe be possible to design a chassis to cover both.

Cheers

Paul

You're right---- How could I forget the whistlers. They used to run past the bottom of our garden and I cabbed D202 from Liverpool St. to Norwich?

[davidinyork]

If it is down to poor orders, the fact that all of them are weathered may have contributed to this - a lot of people don't want them weathered and weathered models do tend to hang around in the shops for longer which might well influence shop owners when deciding what to order.

Re the Mk1 SO - I had an email from Hattons saying that it's been cancelled too. Presumably they just put 'sold out' on their site as they don't have a 'production cancelled' category.

[davidinyork]

Is the chassis not going to be common across all models, or are they planning to make separate ones

At a guess I would agree with people who have speculated on a problem with the moulds - it sounds plausible.  Hopefully Farish will take the opportunity to re-do the chassis and offer more variants - the sealed beam headlight seems very obvious!

The Chinese don't typically use a common chassis across models so I would have thought the 40 will be all new.

Cheers, Mike

The 1COCO1 wheel arrangement was peculiar to the peaks, so the chassis wouldn't be suitable for anything else, n'est ce pas?

Hi

So how would you classify the wheel arrangement on the 40 then?

The two locos chassis have slightly different bogie centres which could be accommodated into the chassis block. The bogie arrangement is identical so would only require new bogie sideframes. It would I believe be possible to design a chassis to cover both.

Cheers

Paul

The Peaks and 40s are also unusual in that the bufferbeam is attached to the bogie, not the body.

[Mr PJ]

David,
Yes, I did notice that the proposed models were all weathered, and you are right about them not selling as well as pristine models. With the new 25's you can only get weathered ones easily now.

There are now no peaks on the Farish website. However the MK1 SO's are all showing still.
It may be a mess-up by Hattons, I will ask them and if no joy order them from someone else.
Cheers
Paul

[Thorpe Parva]

David,
Yes, I did notice that the proposed models were all weathered, and you are right about them not selling as well as pristine models. With the new 25's you can only get weathered ones easily now.
Paul

Agree with this; I don't understand why Farish offer so many weathered models.

I may have imagined this but until recently I thought that the Jintys all had an availability date around November. They now have no availability date quoted. Have they slipped or am I imagining things?

[davidinyork]

Agree with this; I don't understand why Farish offer so many weathered models.

They are doing it with OO gauge as well at the moment. Given that the weathering is sprayed on as he very last part of the process, it's difficult to see why they can't just have half the batch weathered!

[robert shrives]

As a guess it is due to requests for weathered locos sadly the factory splurge in track colour not what is need - I guess people aspire to a factory application to match the likes of Mercig for an extra £ (not much) on the price.
Removing the splurge not always easy without heading for a full respray which also defeats the object! but of course it makes for a cheaper starting point when they get discounted.
cheers
Robert   

[red_death]

Manufacturers weathering is sometimes done as a last step but sometimes done as part of the tampo printing process eg Dapol's lovely weathered silver bullets.

Right or wrong - Bachmann are firmly of the view that they provide weathered stock in response to market demand.

Cheers M

[geoffc]

I wonder if there is a big problem with Chinese factories. I collect Atlas Dinkys and subscribed to the two new collections they are/were bringing out for the UK market. Having received the first one of each collection I then received a letter stating that the rest of the two collections were being withheld due to production delays and untill they have everything perfect.

Geoff

[woodbury22uk]

I wonder if there is a big problem with Chinese factories. I collect Atlas Dinkys and subscribed to the two new collections they are/were bringing out for the UK market. Having received the first one of each collection I then received a letter stating that the rest of the two collections were being withheld due to production delays and untill they have everything perfect.

Geoff

Some of the recent partwork stuff is being made in the Indian subcontinent. Bangladesh is the new Guangdong.

[johnlambert]

There was a recent post on RM Web about a Bachmann coach where the tooling was broken beyond repair.  Maybe the 44, 45 and 46 tools are similarly damaged.

Note this is pure speculation and the two things may be completely unrelated.

[mark100]

News just in from Bachmann (email to dealers)
:

Due to unforeseen production issues that have arisen at the factory, the following items are being withdrawn from the Graham Farish 2015/16 range with immediate effect.

371-203 Class 44 44001 BR Blue Weathered

371-577 Class 45 45024  BR Blue Weathered

371-588 Class 46 D158 BR Green Small Yellow Panel Weathered

These products may possibly be re-introduced in future years, but until issues have been overcome it will not be possible to release products to market.

After reading all the posts, Only the peaks and 25/3 are the remaining models with the non DCC ready chassis and working lights,  it seems pointless releasing the Peaks amongst a range of other items that are DCC ready.
Hopefully next year's announcements will see DCC ready Peaks and a 25/3 in the catalogue before Dapol or DJM consider doing them, although if the latter 2 did announce them, then it's fair game if they are DCC ready like everything else popping up.

[MJKERR]

As discussed on another forum, I had a rather heated discussion with Bachmann at this years N Gauge Show

There are serious local issues with the factory in China, and they had hoped to have it resolved by the end of this year
They have had to revise production of many models, not just Farish
Timescales have slipped so a more basic range is now produced
This is quite obvious when you look at what has been released this year compared to previous, compared to demand

Equally, if you think price rises were bad this year, wait until next year!