Accurascale have a Manor underway

[Bigmet]

There have been hints that Accurascale would produce some OO steam locos, (and I hope some matching steam era stock) and they have now announced a Manor. https://accurascale.co.uk/blogs/news/to ... locomotive

There's a test shot from the tooling so clearly they have been working at this some time, and there's lots to like in the specification. Plenty of metal in the loco bodywork for a start, something Hornby are increasingly using, to the advantage of their models that have it. All the detail is in the announcement link; I am an interested bystander on this one, as an indicator of just what we can expect from subsequent steam introductions...

[End2end]

"There is also a flickering firebox light in the cab and in DCC this employs ESU’s intelligent flicker to synchronise the effect with the sound from the speakers."
Very clever and very tempting!
Thanks
End2end

[Bigmet]

I will wait for the 'unintelligent driver' option, forgot to put the blower on while coasting at speed into a small bore tunnel and has a cylinder of flame rocketing out of the firehole. Shame that you won't be able to see the effect because the loco is in a tunnel, but good to know that this event is provided for...

I must write to Paul Isles, now with Accurascale, about emulating Bachmann's screw locked adjustable spacing loco to tender drawbar. Easily the best method on offer in OO, as firstly the drawbar is where it should be, and it can be set to scale spacing if the layout curves permit, or as close as possible if they don't. So very simple, you'ld a thunk every manufacturer would have picked it up by now, but not so...

[Paul-H]

Was very surprised to hear they were using a 3 pole motor in it, thought 5 pole was standard these days or did I miss hear that in the Video (Quite possible these days).

[Bigmet]

Three pole motor: it is in print in the spec in the link in the opening post. And a good design of three pole motor is very good: I can make three direct comparisons of the same mechanisms fitted with five pole and three pole motors, and the on track performance seen 'blind' yields no clues which is which.

[Bigmet]

https://accurascale.co.uk/blogs/news/go ... and-update
Progress report. Intention to pick up on some areas for improvement, but overall already looking neat and tidy; though I am no expert on Swindon's doings so others may well see aspects I miss.

[Bigmet]

Promising a 'running on the rails' video of the production version in the near future, so we can have a good look at the smoothness achieved when the mechanism is working as intended. (They have shown an engineering sample of the assembled model on a rolling road, and it appears rotationally smooth enough; but with the usual visible 'wobbles' on the rollers, that are typically not evident on the rails.) As someone who won't be buying, my interest in it is as an indicator of what may be expected from subsequent products from this source.

[Bigmet]

Promotional video from Accurascale, with a good explanation of the 'why' of user optional parts around the front end of the loco: which may be fitted for more accurate appearance on a showcase queen, but if to be operated with these fitted requires larger radii (unspecified, but much larger than UK set track I should think). I like this approach, a good explanation of what the limitations are in making an OO model as accurate as possible and able to run reliably on R2; and the consequent compromises that have to be accepted, with a choice of user optional parts.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zIXFEu0h_4&t=515s

[Mountain]

It is actually a good decision to design a model in such a way that one can add or not add extra detailing parts according to ones choice, so if one has tight curves one can leave out the samll details, or if one wants it for a display, one can add the small details. Is an excellent solution.

[Bigmet]

Latest report, production underway so should be available this year. I am very interested to see how they perform, anyone buying? (There's so much more to get wrong on a steam loco mechanism, compared to the simple and effective 'centre motor with drive to both bogies' mechanism layout for post-steam twin bogie traction.)

[Bigmet]

Early reports from owners are overall good.

This is promising as the next steam models are the GER origin 0-6-0T's of LNER and BR classes J67, J68, J69. These are difficult by DIY due to their compactness, much as the Terrier was previously difficult: but now there's proven technique to make models of accurate dimensions and thus realistic appearance.