I just received several James the Red engine and eight pieces of new rolling stock. James is very well made with polarity switch under the cab (quite small, you need to really look for it). The loop part of the couplers is around 50% bigger than comparable loop couplers we have seen in the past. The hook part of the coupler is ‘huge’, far bigger than other manufacturers hooks. Apart from that, I really like it. It ran very smoothly out of the box. The eye movement is a lot slower than the Thomas or Percy locomotives. A look at the schematic of the drivetrain for the eye movement looks very much like the internals of a Swiss watch!
Now the rolling stock is a slightly different matter. The coupler loops are the same size as other manufacturers, but the hook part is quite large. I was unable to couple rolling stock by pushing together. The vertical height of the hooks prevents them coming together. On earlier models the contact faces when engaging the couplers was sloped backwards so the hooks slip down under the loop enabling coupling. On the later models, the oversize hook contact faces when attempting coupling, are vertical, so coupling very difficult.
The tanker waggons are no where in the quality of the open waggons released in 2009. They look cheap. The previously released open waggons had a distinct look of quality and relation to the prototype. The tanker waggons look like something you would buy in a kiddies trainset at the local discount store. I purchased five tankers (3 milk and two petrol waggons) and am not impressed. They need a lot of work to look reasonable. I did intend buying four more to repaint to look like the ‘TAR’ and ‘OIL’ waggons in the Thomas series, but am not interested now. The paint schemes, most likely due to licencing requirements, do not look anything like the series rolling stock.
The green open waggon with simulated coal load is excellent. I will be getting more of them, as also is the brown cargo open waggon. Now all we need are a boxvan, cattle waggon and guard’s van, although I think that Bachmann will be getting their money’s worth out of the oil tanker mouldings before retooling for another type of car. I really think that they missed the mark on the tankers. All they did was upscale the ‘OO’/‘h.o.’ model.
