[DriverSam]

The Hornby TGS body is the same as the Lima tooling so the ends come off in the same way. However the roof on the Hornby one is more difficult to prize apart from the body. This is because of the thicker glazing. The windows and roof are moulded as one unit.
A credit card is too thick but if you have a mobile phone top-up card or similar you can ease this between the roofline and body to free the windows from their apertures. Start from the corners and slowly work your way along the coach. It helps if you have more than one card. You need to be gentle but it works well.
I had to do this because the idiots at Hornby have never bothered to get their act together with the HST and this time they have incorrectly put white seats in the TGS when all the other BR Blue and Grey coaches they made had blue seats. (Actually they should have been orange for first class - a colour Hornby already make for their Virgin Mk3s. It wouldn't have beeen difficult would it?)
They have also messed up their latest 'swallow' livery INTERCITY version with wrong colour seats again and inconsistent running numbers! The additional coaches for the Train Pack are numbered as loco-hauled Mk3 and not HST Mk3 coaches!
Which livery TGS do you have? If it is the BR Blue and Grey version then the toilet windows are also upside down and the livery is wrong at the ends. I don't think Hornby bother to research pictures, they just seem to guess.
If I write to Hornby do you think they will supply me with some spare correctly coloured blue seats if I send them the white ones I don't want?

 

[DriverSam]

Hi cbpete,
Good luck with the detailing on your Midland Mainline HST. I shouldn't worry too much about sprung buffers on the coaches though. The real HST Mk3 coaches were never fitted with buffers, so I don't know why Hornby insist on fitting them.
Only the prototype HST class 252 set had buffers fitted and some specialist conversions for specific purposes (for example the Network Rail New Measurement Train). None of which Hornby make so there is no need for for them to keep fitting these.

There are some good clips on YouTube of Lima HST Power Cars fitted with sound chips and directional red and white lighting. They look great, and together with the two-tone horn they sound great powering up and accelerating away with that Paxman Valenta scream! Only thing missing is the twin plume of black exhaust.

What next, working windscreen wipers? Why not, we've already seen opening doors and rotating roof fans on models, it could be the next logical step.
I would really like to see coaches with close coupling mechanisms as standard instead of those horrid big tension lock couplers. Also its about time they came up with some kind of flexible corridor conections between coaches to fill the silly gap and stop our model passengers risking death from a nasty fall as they try to leap from one coach to another!

I did a conversion job on a Lima HST Power Car a few years ago. It is now running as a prototype. I numbered it 41 001 (a class 41 loco as delivered) on one side and W43000 (as later renumbered to a unit) on the other. It carries the set number 252001 on the front. The front cab has been completely modified and re-angled. It now has the twin windscreen and roof mounted air-horn grille. The front buffer cowls were crafted using Bic biro tops to get the shape and blended into the valence with filler. The rear end now has has the correct recess around a Joueff Mk3 corridor connection. The 8 extra bodyside grilles were made by cutting up the large grilles from a redundant Hornby Hymek bodyshell. All the extra pipes and equipment boxes have also been added as well as alterations to the driver's and guard's doors. I could have changed the large bodyside grilles and cantrail slats but this would have been very fiddly to do and would have weakened the plastic bodyshell too much so I decided to leave them.
It was done a few years ago and only to test my skills and see just how much work was needed for this conversion. There's a lot more to do than meets the eye. I wanted to do both 41001 and 41002 and I have a shell ready for 41002 which I have started. There are differences between the two Prototype Power Cars and I will have another go at 41001.
Eventually I will do a complete set. The two prototype Mk3 buffet cars are another challenge though!

I have some pictures but I don't know how to post them here.