Old Wrenns

It has long had its' day. Wrenn were a downgrade from Hornby Dublo, in that there was no advance on H-D; modelling standards and mechanisms in fact retreated from H-D's standards. It is a shame that the Meccano empire was mismanaged, and the UK lost H-D. Had they survived then the UK might have had a Marklin or Fleischmann to fly the flag for a quality choice in RTR through the sixties and seventies.

But now we have decent quality UK RTR models, Wrenn and H-D is strictly a 'might have been' nostalgia trip for those who enjoy that. Nothing wrong with this, but given the choice between the best H-D or Wrenn item and its' modern equivalent, I would take the modern product every time. Take the H-D 8F or 4MTT, by general consent two of the best locos in the range: compare to the current Hornby and Bachmann equivalents. Good quality toys of the time, versus reasonable (Hornby 8F) and fine (Bachmann 4MTT) models. No contest if modelling is the interest.

*** But reality is that Wrenn really never ever developed anything really, and while they are a reliable tough toy & a pleasant trip down memory lane for many including me, as scale models they were comparatively good to very good in Hornby Dublo days, well past their prime by the time Wrenn collapsed... and are horrid now.

All Wrenn core product - (and certainly the best of it) was made using tooling and technology developed by Hornby Dublo, bought at a fire sale price. Lines brothers also aquired Wrenn and put the two together to re-release the Dublo product as Wrenn.

The only change they made really was to add their name to some of the castings - and then made/painted/assembled them not quite as well as they were made in the best days of Hornby Dublo.

As happened to Dublo, the last of the Wrenn ex Lines brothers was unceremoniously dumped on retailers at fire sale prices, then the last few bits / parts were picked up by a couple of very clever chaps who re-released them in dribs and drabs to send the collectors price sky high.. which is where we are now.

I'd agree with the point you made if it was "It is a pity it wasn't Triang that died and hornby dublo have hung on and kept evolving".

Hornby Dublo was always streets ahead of Lines brothers and triang accuracy and performance wise, and given some of the really nice stuff they started to do at the end in their super detail range, I do wonder if UK modelers might not have had a far superior RTR model railway selection now if triang had been the casualty and/or that Hornby Dublo had just kept going, so we would have had REAL Hornby products now, not evolved triang with another name!

regards

Richard

. QUOTE (Mike H. @ 12 Jan 2009, 01:18) <{POST_SNAPBACK}><Snip> The pity is that Wrenn did not survive and that these excellent models were not developed further. The last of the Wrenns were actually pretty 'modern' machines and a glimpse of whatmight-have-been.

To the consternation of collectors- or their secret pleasure, as I'm increasing the value of their collections, I run Wrenn locos every day. The 2-6-4T will pull 12 coaches up 1 in 66, and the problem is the first coach on the curve at the top, not the loco's adhesion! I've just sourced a donor chassis for this as the motion seized & burned out the motor on the original after 40 years...I've a Barnstaple which is also 40 now and still running fine. R1s shunt about too. They are great working models, nothing to fall off and with a little bit of work to make them individual well worth their place on the roster. When pals call, out comes the finescale, and back comes the slipping, that loco can only take 3 up and not if they're Bachmann Mk 1s...etc etc but for me, I'm happy to run the old locos- correct for the era, too, most of them were designed in the late fifties, so the model is truly following the prototype!