Dapol BR Mark 1 Coach

richard carr

Western Thunderer
I received my Dapol Mark 1 Coach today, a green BSK, green as this is the only livery available at the moment and the main point of obtaining one, is to see how easy or difficult it is to convert to S7.
I'm sure though that plenty of you would like to see one even if it is going to stay fine scale.

I have to say that I think the coach body is excellent, it really captures the look of a mark one, there is some good interior detail, probably more than I would put in a kit built one and the side profile is very good.

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Get to the under frame and it's not quite so good, it's not bad the dynamo is good size and the brake detail representation isn't bad either.

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But get to the bogies and it's not so good , it is ok from the side but there is little of the frame details, but for the price I'm not complaining I think these are excellent value for money and it has working lights too.


The main reason for me posting this though is how easy is it to convert to S7.

That depends on how you do it, I tried some Peartree wheels first, this would work except that the distance over the centres of the wheels is about 1mm too wide so although you can force the the bogie back together the wheels won't turn.

For the bogie on the right I have reused the supplied finescale wheels, these are reasonably close to S7 being 3.5mm thick with a 1mm flange, they run ok through my test track, so this is an easy cheap conversion as you can easily change the back to back to 31.2mm and this nicely removes what I consider to be excessive sideplay in the bogie for finescale.

I then tried some slaters wheels, these need some additional bearings and the pin point part of the axle needs to be cut off. I made my bearing from some 2.5mm outside diameter tube drilled out to 1.9mm internal diameter, these need to be about 4.5mm long. These the slip over the ends of the cut down slaters axle and fill the bogie bearing nicely. Ideally it would be nice to get some proper bearings machined up, but these will do for now.



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I'll certainly be getting a good few more of these in maroon and blue and grey.

Richard
 

Dog Star

Western Thunderer
The main reason for me posting this though is how easy is it to convert to S7.

That depends on how you do it...
Or use the Dapol-Slater's axle from the S7 Store which is a Slater's axle with the pin-point cone and axle length of the Dapol axle - fit the D-S axle with Slater's S7 wheels and the resulting wheelset ought to fit into the bogie without further work. I say "ought" because there is no guarantee that the Mk1s have followed the design specification of the wheelsets which are fitted to the GWR Autocoach, the current PO wagons or the BR standard wagons / vans.

regards, Graham
 

Dog Star

Western Thunderer
Do you have a part number for the axles as I cannot see them listed?
As far as I know, Paul Stokes has not added the Dapol-Slaters axle to the stores list - send Paul (@pcalkel) a WT-PM and ask about supply.

To recap, the item is produced by Slaters for the S7 Group (so not in the Slater's catalogue) and is available only from the S7 Group. The axle has the same pin-point cone and overall length as the axle made by Dapol and fitted to (at least) the GWR Autocoach, the BR vans and opens plus the PO wagons which use the Lionheart underframe design (rocking beam behind solebar). The centre portion of the axle is the same length as the standard 0-FS / S7 axle from Slaters hence fitting Slater's S7 wheels to the D-S axle gives a S7 wheelset that fits Dapol stock (as noted previous) without modification to the Dapol product.

Cautionary note - the D-S axle is not usable with either the HAA wagon or those Dapol wagons which were designed before the merger of Dapol and Lionheart. I have no knowledge of compatibility of the D-S axle and the Dapol bogie bolster / turbot / brakevans.
 

daifly

Western Thunderer
Ahem ... item X710040S is in the online catalogue. Paul just provides the photos (sometimes!) and the downloadable list and order form which is only accessible by members.
Dave
Snap Tim!
 

Focalplane

Western Thunderer
Thank you, Richard for a useful report with photos. I think I have a maroon BSK on order and look forward to receiving it. I know I also have two brown and cream coaches on order to complete my 75% first class dominated rake of brass Mk 1 coaches. I feel sure they will be a success for us 7mm scale modellers. The supplied couplers are innovative as well.
 

richard carr

Western Thunderer
Since the first post I have now converted one bogie by drilling out the dapol brass bearing to 2.6mm so that the slaters top hat bearing will fit inside it. Just drill gently through the bearing into the side frame by say 1mm you will see the swarf change colour to silvery.
You then need to chop off 2mm from each end of the slaters axle so that it fits. Don't waste your money paying for additional axles that you don't need.

I would also advise you to check the back to back of any Slaters coach wheelset with a GO gauge as they tend to be a tiny bit on the narrow side.

Richard
 

Osgood

Western Thunderer
Very useful.
Have you sampled the Darstaed Mk1 mainline coaches yet, Richard?
If so, would you be prepared to offer a comparative critique between the two?

I've just received some Mk1 Suburbans from EC and the build quality looks excellent - they certainly look like Mk1 Suburbans, with the thin body shell working well to create realistic flush glazing, although I don't know how they compare accuracy-wise.
 
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Eastsidepilot

Western Thunderer
Very useful.
Have you sampled the Darstaed Mk1 yet, Richard?
If so, would you be prepared to offer a comparative critique between the two?

I've just received some Mk1 Suburbans from EC and the build quality looks excellent - they certainly look like Mk1 Suburbans, with the thin body shell working well to create realistic flush glazing, although I don't know how they compare accuracy-wise.

I believe Tim, @ Mudhen has some MK1 Suburbans from Darstead maybe he will be along in a while :)

Col.
 

richard carr

Western Thunderer
Osgood

No I haven't bought any of the Darstead MK1s as I believe they have a few issues with wheel size and the roof curvature.

The suburbans though are lovely coaches.

Richard
 

Tim Humphreys ex Mudhen

Western Thunderer
I'm very pleased with my Suburban coaches. Converting the wheelsets to S7 is straightforward and compensation is part of the bogie design. My only issue is that of the door grab handles being a little large and not quite the correct shape, but not enough of an issue to stop me from buying 5 :)
I'm not keen on the Mark 1s, they ride too high with the error being I reckon in the roof as Richard states.

Tim
 

richard carr

Western Thunderer
A couple of maroon BSKs turned up this morning.

I wouldn't read too much into the colour as the phone camera I have used has not captured well at all, it is quite a bit darker than this and a bit more maroon, to my eyes anyway.
Some more lovely coaches though, I just need half a dozen SKs to go with them.


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pricei

Western Thunderer
Very nice coaches, Richard. Am I right in assuming that the internal lighting is controlled by a DCC decoder that responds to a loco address? Presumably, if you have several coaches in a rake, you set them all to the same address in order to switch the lighting on/off for the entire rake?
Ian
 

3 LINK

Western Thunderer
Hi Richard,

I ordered some of these Dapols from Towers a couple of years ago at Telford. I have heard nothing since, did you contact them or they got in touch ?

Cheers,

Martyn.
 

Pencarrow

Western Thunderer
My BSK in green arrived earlier this week.

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Green not quite right in the photo but, to my eye, spot on in the flesh.

I bought a BCK from Darstaed at the last Telford show. Comparisons? The Dapol is much better all round IMO. The Darstaed is far too high (combination of wheel size, bogie gap and roof line?) and stands proud against other coaches. Detail on the sides and ends is a grade or two better, with lots of relief where needed. The interior of the Dapol looks great through the windows.

Very pleased with the Dapol. The Darstaed will be sold on.
 

richard carr

Western Thunderer
Martyn

Yes they phoned last week for the green one and then this week for the maroon ones.

The lighting can be DCC controlled but it doesn't have to be there are a bank of 4 switches in the underframe that control the lighting on DC.

I will try that on DCC with the power on to see what happens.

Richard
 
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