4-6-0 thread

[Bigmac]

Dapol have dropped their controversial cardan shaft. ... ... ... (I wonder who was responsible for the cardan shaft at Dapol?)

I paid two deposits with D.J. for Kings.

The very same DJ was Product Designer at Dapol through most of that period...
It was amusing that as soon as he parted ways with dapol, some of his most vocal supporters slated the very designs he was responsible for!

Theres nothing inherently wrong with the principle of the motor in the tender with a cardan shaft driving the loco wheels - it's the flavoured layout for 2mm finescale locos; just that to make it so locos would go around train-set corners, Dapols design had to have sufficient 'slop' in it that with rough handling the shafts were liable to pop out of the sockets.

At a toy fair a few years ago I saw an o gauge Merchant Navy running  a train of Pullmans using a cardan shaft. It is not than many years ago in the big scheme of things that the smallest motor available did not fit a locomotive body but could be squeezed into the tender. I do not personally mind tender motors or tender drive so long as the locomotives wheels are free to run. My first n gauge locomotive was the Lima 4F tender drive. People without model railway knowledge never knew the tender was doing the work until I pointed it out to them.

I think the first motor in tender with shaft drive into loco was the Arnold P4, 4-4-0 . I had one, about 40 years ago .