Hi, as mentioned in the welcome column the other week i would be asking questions so here goes with the first. At the BRM show at P'boro last Oct, I bought my young son Hornby class 59 201 (R2520). I dont currently have a working layout at the moment but both me and my boy regularly visit my friends layout which is something like a twin track 50ft running oval. Great fun yes? Well my boy got his new 59 out and was somewhat disapointed to find that it struggled to pull a mere 6 carriages, whilst my Hornby 25 whch is circa 1982 managed to pull 8 carriages with no effort at all. In fact all my old Lima's managed a better effort than the 59. Fortunately he had a Lima class 52 which had been bought for him last year also and that performed brilliantly, so the 59 was relagated to the sidings!!
Now browsing through many posts on here, i found a few posts regarding said loco and said poor pulling performance, but nothing jumped out about how to improve it. I gather it is a re incarnation of the Lima model anyway. But studying the 2008 Hornby catalougue its says for the 59 that it is twin bogie drive. However my boys version is driven from one bogie only. So my questions are:
Have I bought an early version which preceeded twin bogie drive?
Am i misunderstanding twin bogie drive and it actually means twin axle drive on one bogie???
Lastly can i improve its hauling capabilties simply by adding metal weight( like all my old Limas!!).
Its a DCC ready model, I didnt really want to pull it apart just yet to look inside, but I'm guessing there's not a lot of room inside for adding weight. Personally, I've never been a particular fan of Hornby's loco's hence i only have one in my ageing collection. The Lima's whilst possibly basic by todays standard, were better all rounders in the day. Thinking Hornby may have got their act together, this has done little to restore my conceptions.
Incidentally, I've bought Bachmanns for myself recently but feel they are too "fragile" for my boys hands at the moment.
Now browsing through many posts on here, i found a few posts regarding said loco and said poor pulling performance, but nothing jumped out about how to improve it. I gather it is a re incarnation of the Lima model anyway. But studying the 2008 Hornby catalougue its says for the 59 that it is twin bogie drive. However my boys version is driven from one bogie only. So my questions are:
Have I bought an early version which preceeded twin bogie drive?
Am i misunderstanding twin bogie drive and it actually means twin axle drive on one bogie???

Lastly can i improve its hauling capabilties simply by adding metal weight( like all my old Limas!!).
Its a DCC ready model, I didnt really want to pull it apart just yet to look inside, but I'm guessing there's not a lot of room inside for adding weight. Personally, I've never been a particular fan of Hornby's loco's hence i only have one in my ageing collection. The Lima's whilst possibly basic by todays standard, were better all rounders in the day. Thinking Hornby may have got their act together, this has done little to restore my conceptions.
Incidentally, I've bought Bachmanns for myself recently but feel they are too "fragile" for my boys hands at the moment.