[chengin]

Hi all, just looking at very impressive pictures of the Gresley beat in last months edition of BRM. Something that really caught my eye (amongst other things!) was the Gresley W1 'hush hush'.
Since I have only recently gotten back into modelling and haven't been following developments until recently, does anyone know if Hornby ever made the 'hush hush' in 00?

I guess this has now become top of my hornby wish....I guess i'm truly hooked now!

 

[spongebob]

The only way to get the Hush hush is in kit built form as a one off loco I dare say hornby would consider it uneconomical to build. A pity but thats life. They occasionally crop up on ebay but fetch silly amounts and you are pretty much at the mercy of whoever built it as to how good a job they made.

 

[Ozzie21]

SouthEastern FineCast make one or actually two. The make W1 in it's original form and in it's rebuilt BR form. Personally I prefer the original form as it was the only "Hudson" type wheel arrangement in the UK on standard gauge. Althouth the G&SWR had 4-6-4 tanks but for some reason their called Baltic tanks.. Why I don't know.

Ozzie21

 

[chengin]

Hi guys,
thanks for the replys. They pretty much answered my followup questions. Thanks ozzie21 for the SE Finecast information. I've had a look at the webpage and am wondering how tricky these kits are to build? Are the instructions pretty clear and straightforward or is there a fair degree of tweaking/skill involved? I guess my worry would be that it might look like I had built it!
Is the finished product well detailed in comparison to say for example an off the shelf hornby/bachmann etc. model.

With these kits I see it is necessary to purchase a motor pack. Is this all that required, or would I also need to purchase wheels, tender kit, couplings, detailing etc..?

Thanks in advance!

 

[cig1705]

QUOTE (chengin @ 5 Apr 2006, 13:35)Hi guys,
thanks for the replys. They pretty much answered my followup questions. Thanks ozzie21 for the SE Finecast information. I've had a look at the webpage and am wondering how tricky these kits are to build? Are the instructions pretty clear and straightforward or is there a fair degree of tweaking/skill involved? I guess my worry would be that it might look like I had built it!
Is the finished product well detailed in comparison to say for example an off the shelf hornby/bachmann etc. model.

With these kits I see it is necessary to purchase a motor pack. Is this all that required, or would I also need to purchase wheels, tender kit, couplings, detailing etc..?

Thanks in advance!
<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

A lot of the kits are ex-Wills, don't know about the W1 but generally they are good, solid models. However, you might want to build something a little simpler first. Instructions are quite good on the whole, but sometimes can be hard to follow.

You might need to purchase couplings, paints etc. However, I am not sure about the wheels...

Kind Regards,

RM

 

[60134]

In the UK 4-6-4 locos (most were tank engines) were referred to as "Baltics" - logical when you consider Atlantics, Pacifics, etc. In fact, was the W1 the only tender 4-6-4 to run in the UK?

60134

 

[bazza]

Hi there!
To be a little more accurate, the hush- hush and rebuild into W1 were not 4-6-4 but 4-6-2-2. The rear wheels were actually 2 separate Cartazzi trucks. Looks like a 4-6-4 though. A very impressive looking loco in either guise, I well remember seeing 60700 many times at Kings Cross but I am too young to have seen it in it's Hush Hush form. There is a lot of information about it in the railway museum at Darlington, worth a look in on your way to the NRM outpost at Shildon.
Bazza

 

[60134]

Bazza, you're quite right, a 4-6-2-2! She was involved in a slow speed derailment at Peterborough when the bogie frame broke as well.....

60134

 

[pedromorgan]

sorry folks but the Whyte numbering system does not diferentiate between seperate cartazzi trucks but rather simply lists the nimber of trailing axels and so the W1 was a 4-6-4 hudson/baltic. in order for it to be a 4-6-2-2 the first of the trailing axels would have had to be powered and it isnt.

"With these kits I see it is necessary to purchase a motor pack. Is this all that required, or would I also need to purchase wheels, tender kit, couplings, detailing etc..? "

my model is about 1/2 complete
i got a hefty O gauge motor from branchlines. the SEF W1 has a shed load of space for the motor and i have got a huge mashima and a chunky flywheel!
the tender kit comes with the loco although i found this to be the part of the model that required the most fettling it still came together satisfactorialy.
SEF also do a wheel pack that has all the correct wheels. they are markits. and are the correct LNER pattern (as opposed to the older generic wheels)
i seem to recall that couplings are included but i dont think i will be using them. i prefer to fit smityhs to all the nicer loco's
if i can figure out how to post pictures then i will but for the time being you can find them here

http://www.railimages.com/gallery/petermorgan

the W1 images are near the bottom.

since that pic was taken i have fitted the motor and the tender is just about complete.

Peter

 

[Ozzie21]

Peter, now that I seen yours I'll have to get one. It'll look a bit odd among my BR locos but I'll come up with a real good excuse like "it's my railway I'll rin what i want"

I wonder how my Allegheny is going to look or my Texas.

Ozzie21

QUOTE (pedromorgan @ 18 Apr 2006, 16:17) <{POST_SNAPBACK}>sorry folks but the Whyte numbering system does not diferentiate between seperate cartazzi trucks but rather simply lists the nimber of trailing axels and so the W1 was a 4-6-4 hudson/baltic. in order for it to be a 4-6-2-2 the first of the trailing axels would have had to be powered and it isnt.

"With these kits I see it is necessary to purchase a motor pack. Is this all that required, or would I also need to purchase wheels, tender kit, couplings, detailing etc..? "

my model is about 1/2 complete
i got a hefty O gauge motor from branchlines. the SEF W1 has a shed load of space for the motor and i have got a huge mashima and a chunky flywheel!
the tender kit comes with the loco although i found this to be the part of the model that required the most fettling it still came together satisfactorialy.
SEF also do a wheel pack that has all the correct wheels. they are markits. and are the correct LNER pattern (as opposed to the older generic wheels)
i seem to recall that couplings are included but i dont think i will be using them. i prefer to fit smityhs to all the nicer loco's
if i can figure out how to post pictures then i will but for the time being you can find them here

http://www.railimages.com/gallery/petermorgan

the W1 images are near the bottom.

since that pic was taken i have fitted the motor and the tender is just about complete.

Peter

 

[John Webb]

I've got a copy of 'Railway Wonders of the World' inherited from my father. This was published in the mid-1930s as a set of weekly parts, which my father had bound together. When describing the 'Hush-hush' Gresley, it uses the notation 4-6-2-2 "as the fire box is carried on two fixed axles, and not on a bogie." to quote the article.

Other notable features were high (450psi) boiler pressure, a water-tube boiler and compounding - two high-pressure and two low-pressure cylinders. I recall reading somewhere that it was the boiler that eventually failed and it was subsequently rebuilt with a more standard boiler.

Regards,
John Webb

 

[60134]

Both the LMS ("Fury") and the LNER experimented with marine-style high-pressure, water-tube boilers. Neither were that successful and the LMS loco (an over-grown "Royal Scot") was involved in a very nasty footplate accident when one of the tubes failed. I assume that a Gresley 3 cylinder front end was applied to 10000 when she was rebuilt.

60134

 

[pedromorgan]

"I've got a copy of 'Railway Wonders of the World' inherited from my father. This was published in the mid-1930s as a set of weekly parts, which my father had bound together. When describing the 'Hush-hush' Gresley, it uses the notation 4-6-2-2 "as the fire box is carried on two fixed axles, and not on a bogie." to quote the article"
unfortunatly the author is in error here (as are many authors over the years) the numbering system does not make this distinction. it dosent matter if one of the axels is tied on with rope! it would still be a 4-6-4. the last digit is the number of trailing axels regardless of how they are attached.

"Peter, now that I seen yours I'll have to get one. It'll look a bit odd among my BR locos but I'll come up with a real good excuse like "it's my railway I'll rin what i want" I wonder how my Allegheny is going to look or my Texas."
ozzie i think simply wanting to run a parrticular engine is a perfectly good excuse for wanting to do just that. i saw your post yesterday and went home and counted the nimber of countries loco's i had.
chinese steamers diesels and electrics.
american steamers and diesels
german electrics
english steamers ranging from the 9F to the stephenson rocket diesels ranging from voyagers and 66's to warchips.

as soon as you start saying things like "i model BR from 1953-1968" you exclude so many truly fantastic loco's and stock. its your layout so why not run what you want on it.

Peter

 

[John Webb]

Those in the mid-1930s were much closer to the originator than we are; Whyte's wheel notation was put forward around 1900, I understand. I suppose at the time no loco had been fitted with Cartazzi-type mountings - none of my reference books tell when these came in - so Whyte presumeably did not see the need to make any allowance for separately mounted trailing wheels. The author or editor of the work I quoted (or even someone in the LNER?) obviously felt there was a need to differentiate, and did so. Amazing how people, even those closer to the time, can interpret a 'Standard' in different ways!

I quite agree with Peter's comments about running what you want - for that reason I've chosen to model a 'Preserved Railway' - I can run what I like. Even if a loco was never preserved in real life I can always say someone did preserve one - or built a replica as with the current A1.

Regards,
John Webb

 

[54a Sunderland]

Hello. I built a W1 when Hornby first produced their A4 60022 Mallard in the late 1970s. It still runs very well after all this time. There was an article in the Railway Modeller at the time called 'Mutilating Mallard'. Interestingly, in the article, the builder decided to scratch-build the tender body as, quite rightly, he decided that by simply removing the corridor paraphernalia from the tender the result would be dimensionally inaccurate. This is because the corridor tender and the non-corridor streamlined tender had different size bodies. The corridor tender is wider in order make up the coal-load lost by running the corridor through the tender. If you look at the latest Hornby A4 offering and compare the corridor and non-corridor tenders you will see that the width of the tender bodies is considerably different. This is prototypically accurate. I have decided to build another W1 with loco drive rather than the earlier tender drive vesion that I have so I was going to build the rebuilt W1 from a SE Finecast model but alas there is a problem. When 60700 ran with the side valances she was coupled to a corridor tender but later, when the valances were removed, she was then coupled to a streamlined non-corridor tender. The SE Finecast tender is the wide tender with the option of simply omitting the corridor paraphernalia so if you elect to build the rebuilt W1 in its later guise and omit the corridor paraphernalia you end up with an incorrectly dimensioned tender as it is too wide.

If you want to build the rebuilt W1 in its early guise with valances and corridor tender then the SE Finecast option if fine but if you want to model 60700 latterly without valances and with non-corridor tender then the best option is to get hold of SE Finecast's conversion kit for £16 and get hold of a Hornby R2721 60018 Sparrowhawk loco-drive A4 which has double-chimney and streamline non-corridor tender. This will save a lot of grief on the tender alone.

 

[7113]

There was an article in BRM on modifying the Hornby A4 to the W1 sometime in the last 12 months. Can't remember which one though.

Regards

 

[Bigboy]

Regarding the Hudson/Baltic thing.

In the USA the use of tank engines out on the running lines away from workshops and loco sheds was extremely limited. The only locomotives of the 4-6-4 wheel arrangement built were tender locomotives used on express services. The first ones were used by the New York Central largely for their services along the HUDSON River, their famous water level route. A (very) few other roads took up the wheel arrangement, most notably the Milwaukee which at that time were using them on their world famous 'Hiawatha' trains which were among the fastest timed in the world at that time, frequently exceeding 100 mph.

In Europe the 'Royal Prussian Railway Undertaking' (KPEV) one of the constituents of the later German State system built a large class of about 500 4-6-4 tank engines which were used on high speed suburban and medium distance services. They were also used successfully on freight services. The class was built starting in 1914 and many were still running at the end of German steam in the 1960s. This was the KPEV's class T18 and the later DR's class 78. Part of the reason for the longevity of this and similar Prussian locos was their design principal of keeping working stresses low to reduce wear and tear and hence running maintenance costs.

As the 4-6-4 wheel arrangement gave symetrical guidance which enabled the locos to run equally well forwards and backwards this eliminated the need to turn them.

Thus there were very many more European Tank engines than American Tender engines.
And the BALTIC name? The KPEV's services ran all the way along the southern shore of that stretch of water from the Danish border to well into what is now Poland, the eastern end of that area of course becoming very disputed in WW II.

And the use of different names on either side of the Atlantic? Probably an early example of the 'Not invented here' syndrome.

Hope this helps,
Alex

 

[kristopher1805]

I gotta have one, father travelled on this loco from Doncaster to Peterborough, driver simply opened regulator and it pulled like a train! I sqaw an article on how to turn an A4 into a W1 but would prefer a kit, so good news.

PS I think the Tornado people should build a W1 next!

 

[54a Sunderland]

The BRM issue which was referred to was June 2010 and the article was called 'Stretching a Streak'. I dug out my original Railway Modeller when I 'Mutilated Mallard'. This wasn't late 1970s as I thought but was December 1982. I was 28-years old - a mere lad. So there you go!

 

[MrBemo]

I had never heard of an LNER "hush hush" until now, I had to google it. Obviously, you lot have kept very quiet about it. (hat and coat).