Ozexpatriate Posted November 23, 2015 Share Posted November 23, 2015 Not in the books in this household, clearly 4 wheelers. Do you have a book handy Mike? After a quick Google, I can't find a definitive image, and I'm not sure they are four-wheelers. Of course it's possible that they are different in different books. If this image is from "Tank Engine Thomas Again" they would appear to be short bogie coaches as Awdry's original model seems to be. From my dim memory, many of the illustrations of Annie and Clarabelle are obscured by platforms and viaduct parapets, etc. The Bachmann models do look like the TV show though. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Steamport Southport Posted November 23, 2015 Share Posted November 23, 2015 Looking at Reverend Awdry's models. Annie and Clarabel are definitely suburban bogie coaches. I think it was the TV series that made them as four wheelers. I also always found it strange that the original model of Thomas was a standard E2. Yet the books and TV series depicted him as the later version with the extended tanks. http://www.pegnsean.net/~railwayseries/annieclarabel.htm http://www.pegnsean.net/~railwayseries/thomas.html Jason Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
andyram Posted November 23, 2015 Share Posted November 23, 2015 I seem to recall that Annie and Clarabel were surburban bogie coaches in the illustrations of the original railway series books. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 24, 2015 They ended up with Bachmann replacements which did actually look like the book characters. Mike Wiltshire I think you'll find that the Hornby range is more like the original book characters. The Bachmann range is solely based on the TV Models. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coach bogie Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 I think you'll find that the Hornby range is more like the original book characters. The Bachmann range is solely based on the TV Models. I think you are right there. Now the children are awake, I have had a quick flick through the various books and the characters do change over the years as one would expect as illustrators change. I have noticed that Duck did not always carry a number. As a legacy from my marketing days, I have a Britt Alcroft Thomas corporate guide somewhere that specifies how each character should look. Mike Wiltshire Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RJS1977 Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 I think you are right there. Now the children are awake, I have had a quick flick through the various books and the characters do change over the years as one would expect as illustrators change. I have noticed that Duck did not always carry a number. As a legacy from my marketing days, I have a Britt Alcroft Thomas corporate guide somewhere that specifies how each character should look. Mike Wiltshire There's an irony there, in that looking at Simon K's blog, Britt was very fussy about what Thomas etc should look like - yet in some instances, like the dimensions of Thomas, it was the TV company who'd got it wrong! Though I agree that the illustrations in the book aren't always terribly accurate either - both Henry and Thomas ended up having accidents and going away to the Works to be 'rebuilt' to correct errors in Dalby's drawings (Henry also wound up with Gordon's buffers in one picture - when a child wrote in to RWVA to point this out, rather than replying that "the artist made a mistake", RWVA wrote the child a story about how Henry had damaged his buffers and the Shed only had spares of Gordon's so Henry had to use those until his spares arrived!). The line in Branch Line Engines where Thomas calls Percy "a green caterpillar with red stripes" was originally used by RWVA to describe Dalby's drawings of Percy, which led to Dalby resigning from the series. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rexeljet Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 How do we know they are getting repainted faces? Where did you hear that? The 70th Anniversary metallic edition has Thomas with a repainted face: It's possible that this repainted face is exclusive to this edition of Thomas. As I said in my previous post, Hornby are just churning out the same old product images, so until someone shows the new models on camera it's too early to jump to conclusions. However, updates to the faces would tie in with the samples looking like they had new faces at the Great Electric Train Show. Gordon especially would benefit greatly from a repainted face. ADDENDUM I think you'll find that the Hornby range is more like the original book characters. The Bachmann range is solely based on the TV Models. It's complicated. If you compare, say, the Hornby and Bachmann Henry, then yes, the Hornby one is close to the book illustrations whereas the Bachmann one is a good approximation for the TV model. Gordon is similar. The Hornby model has distinct lines of a Gresley Pacific, as Gordon looks in the later books, whereas the Bachmann Gordon has the larger boiler and shorter length, as is the case in the TV series and earlier books. But Hornby have always tried to match the TV Series, not the Railway Series books. This is why Annie and Clarabel are 4-wheelers, why Oliver and Duck are a much lighter shade of green than brunswick, and so on. The Railway Series doesn't exist to them- the only reason why Bear (D7101) and Flying Scotsman were added to the range was because they were lifted directly from the ERTL diecast range, and required only minimal changes to models from Hornby's regular lineup. Sometimes, Bachmann is closer to the books. The Hornby Thomas is accurate to the class Thomas is based on, but the illustrations have never depicted him being quite so long, or looking much like the Brighton E2 tank at all. In fact, if it wasn't for the Hornby model, dare I say that the link between Thomas and the "E2" tanks would fly over most people's heads! If you look at any illustration of Thomas from the books, especially those by C. Reginald Dalby and John Kenney, Bachmann is often the closer approximation. And indeed, any illustration of Edward from the Railway Series will look far more like the Bachmann model than the Hornby one. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 24, 2015 Yes Gordon definitely would. Hopefully they have samples at Warley this weekend and someone can get pictures of them. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom J Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 I think you'll find that the Hornby range is more like the original book characters. The Bachmann range is solely based on the TV Models. That's a fair appraisal. For the most part it was a case of 'what is the nominal prototype for this loco? Do we make one of them? Good stuff, re-livery and add a face'. Bachmann took the TV models as their reference, entirely sensibly, but the move to CGI and greater consequential use of anthropomorphic attributes has distorted things again... My children only watch the old programmes based on the books. They are on our Apple TV and the DVDs have been hidden, so they are the only stories they think were put on the telly! What an ogre I am ;-) Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold PaulRhB Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Gold Share Posted November 24, 2015 The 70th Anniversary metallic edition has Thomas with a repainted face: It's possible that this repainted face is exclusive to this edition of Thomas. Thomas looks like rather surprised Does seem odd they were so cavalier about the shape in the early days especially when it was the toy side of the company that did it. The Olympics range kind of seemed to be from the same ethos. The current marketing method also seems to be from the bury your head in the sand and plod on regardless, at least they listened over design clever eventually. There does seem to be a need for someone with genuine imagination to take the helm in this range and across the railway range generally. No point just selling the same old stuff in a new way to get customers you need something showy to draw them in. I don't think the market now would justify new tooling but why haven't they added some accessories with real play value that include cars or even some of the old triangle ones they rehashed a few years back? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
No Decorum Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 That's a fair appraisal. For the most part it was a case of 'what is the nominal prototype for this loco? Do we make one of them? Good stuff, re-livery and add a face'. Bachmann took the TV models as their reference, entirely sensibly, but the move to CGI and greater consequential use of anthropomorphic attributes has distorted things again... My children only watch the old programmes based on the books. They are on our Apple TV and the DVDs have been hidden, so they are the only stories they think were put on the telly! What an ogre I am ;-) You're not an ogre. You are educating your children in the right and proper. Awdry based his books on real railway practice and incidents. Only Series 1-4 were based on the books, after which things began to become less railway-like. Add the flat and lifeless tones of Ringo Starr to the mix and that leaves only Series 3 and 4 as canonical. Purely an individual and idiosyncratic view, you understand. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy Y Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 I think you'll find that the Hornby range is more like the original book characters. The Bachmann range is solely based on the TV Models. My understanding of this is that the models Bachmann Trains (USA) produce are subject to strict licensing agreements and that all characters must comply with those as depicted in the TV series - as stipulated by initially Britt Allcroft and more recently HIT Entertainment. Failure to comply is not an option. Bachmann HO/OO models are not distributed in the UK and ROI (Republic of Ireland) - Hornby holding the license for UK/ROI. Bachmann have the necessary agreements in place to distribute the Large (G) Scale items from Barwell. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold The Fatadder Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Gold Share Posted November 24, 2015 Going to be interested to see if the chassis gets an upgrade. A decent running mech. Should be enough to convince me to buy new, rather than picking stuff up off eBay. My daughter is already taking a lot of interest in Thomas, and a basic Thomas train set will be a perfect third birthday present. Just leaves me a year to get everything and get it built... Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 24, 2015 My understanding of this is that the models Bachmann Trains (USA) produce are subject to strict licensing agreements and that all characters must comply with those as depicted in the TV series - as stipulated by initially Britt Allcroft and more recently HIT Entertainment. Failure to comply is not an option. Bachmann HO/OO models are not distributed in the UK and ROI (Republic of Ireland) - Hornby holding the license for UK/ROI. Bachmann have the necessary agreements in place to distribute the Large (G) Scale items from Barwell. Interesting to know. Thanks for that Andy. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 24, 2015 Going to be interested to see if the chassis gets an upgrade. A decent running mech. Should be enough to convince me to buy new, rather than picking stuff up off eBay. My daughter is already taking a lot of interest in Thomas, and a basic Thomas train set will be a perfect third birthday present. Just leaves me a year to get everything and get it built... A lot of the locos that characters are based on, Gordon and Henry just to name 2, now have loco drive models in the railroad range. As these are both railroad standard models, I sincerely hope they have at least made the switch to loco drive. A new mechanism in all would be great. Perhaps this is why they have only released 6 locos to start with? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
MGR Hooper! Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 https://railsofsheffield.com/r9283-Hornby-thomas-the-tank-engine-electric-train-set-r9283-thomas-the-tank-range-JJJA28099.aspx Images of Thomas' face can be seen here. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 24, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 24, 2015 Definitely looks like the face is a different shade from what it used to be. Will have to get a definitive side by side view of the old and the new to see any real difference. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Coach bogie Posted November 24, 2015 Share Posted November 24, 2015 My understanding of this is that the models Bachmann Trains (USA) produce are subject to strict licensing agreements and that all characters must comply with those as depicted in the TV series - as stipulated by initially Britt Allcroft and more recently HIT Entertainment. Failure to comply is not an option. You are spot on. I used to have to negotiate with Britt in the early 1980's with various toy licences, though negotiate is perhaps the wrong word. At the time Britt got what she wanted, though she later left her own company! When the company became Gullane there was more flexibility on the 'look' of the characters. Mike Wiltshire Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 28, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 28, 2015 So do we have any samples at Warley and did anyone manage to get some pics? Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sawyermodels Posted November 28, 2015 Share Posted November 28, 2015 Didn't manage any pics sorry only got five mins off my stand to run and have a look. The tender on Gordon had NEM pocket, like on hornbys railroad county, compound etc with large tension lock in it so looks like you can change the coupling to kadees etc if you wish. Faces looked new The tender wheels were not the standard ringfield motor wheels. I couldn't tell if motor was in loco or tender. Loco and tender were permanently fastened together with a red and black wire going from below Gordons cab to the tender. James had the same as Gordon. I'll try tomorrow if I can to get pics but depends how busy I am on stand. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 28, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 28, 2015 That would be great. I've seen a few images on the Warley thread but I could really see if it it was loco or tender drive. Gordon's face especially looks as if it is different, however that may just be the paint job on it. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 29, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 29, 2015 Looking at Gordon, they still have those two boiler bands unpainted. I don't get why. It looks ridiculous and will be touched in straight away when I get them. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
sawyermodels Posted November 29, 2015 Share Posted November 29, 2015 Just spoke to Hornby. Locos are still tender drive but powered by 5 pole skew wound motor not ringfield. There is also a DCC socket in the tender they said. 0-6-0 and 0-4-0 not dcc ready. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Premium Hilux5972 Posted November 29, 2015 RMweb Premium Share Posted November 29, 2015 Good to know that the bigger locos are DCC ready now. The smaller ones can be hard wired if needed. Shame they are still tender drive though when there are decent loco drive models of the A3 and black 5 etc Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
RMweb Gold PaulRhB Posted November 29, 2015 RMweb Gold Share Posted November 29, 2015 Faces look the same as ever to me. Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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