Enjoyed your review as always, Chaz! The Express coaches look great and as you said, Gordon finally looks complete with them. They hit the spot in the right places, and almost make me want to give N Scale another go. I'm curious to see how they'll look and perform behind James, but as you said, that'll be for another day. Your club also looks like a fun place. Always nice to see any scale of Bachmann Thomas against detailed scenery, British or American.

Either way, sounds like they're recommended. I wonder if the red ones will use the bright white and red livery seen in S2 and with Scotsman in CGI or if they'll have the blood and custard livery of S3-12. If they go with the latter, the upside will be that they'll have the same livery as the Maunsell basis had during BR ownership.

I wonder if the Bachmann HO scale James will get resolved too.

With Gordon's express coaches finally existing in N Scale, Gordon's presence feels more complete. Took two years after Gordon himself hit store shelves. Other liveries are also possible, with the red express coaches already on the horizon for N Scale. If they really want to do a model series look, they can also make the black and white express coaches from Season 2, especially fitting for a Season 2 tooling. Another idea, but not seen in the show are ones with a blue stripe, as we sometimes do get repaints not seen in the show. I did mention the special coaches, which can be modified from the same tooling, and can be pulled by Spencer, whenever he's announced. One more that's from the show are Gordon's special coaches, which are highly requested for HO Scale.

Another interesting fact is that they're the first N Scale rolling stock to have bogies.

Well, here we are: the N scale Gordon Express Coaches. I have genuinely been really excited to get these, and now that I have DCC in some of my Thomas models, I was able to give Gordon a run with the coaches on the N scale club layout. So, I'll just give you guys my thoughts as usual.


Right off the bat, I want to talk about the overall design of these coaches. The CGI Express Coaches were never anyone's favorite design, and Bachmann knew this going into production of the coaches. They are way too thin and narrow and completely disproportionate to the rest of the engines and rolling stock in the show. So rather than going that route, I actually think that Bachmann made the right choice by creating new body shells that better capture the classic appearance of the Express Coaches.


The appeal for the CGI-style coaches would have been much more limited, and people would have looked into other alternatives. Instead, I think Bachmann has managed to create something that fits much better with the overall Thomas range. I personally think that these look a lot better this way than sticking with a design based directly on the CGI series.


Now, all of that aside, I really like the overall appearance of the coaches with Gordon. They really do capture the classic design that many fans know and love. Even though the livery is meant to represent that of the CGI series, I feel those who appreciate the classic seasons will also appreciate these as well. I have classic faces on my Thomas engines, and having a modified Gordon pulling these feels like a perfectly natural fit.


The modifications to the brake coach look especially well done. I appreciate how Bachmann managed to get the correct spacing on the far windows, indicating the brake coach. It's a simple modification, but I feel it's pretty effective.  I especially appreciate how Bachmann kept the shapes of the windows the same as they have on the show with larger windows on one side and smaller on the other.


In terms of performance, the Express Coaches run beautifully behind Gordon. The metal wheels not only look great, but they also perform very well while running on the club layout behind Gordon. The rest of my engines do not have DCC fitted to them, but when they do, I am looking forward to seeing James and Emily in particular pulling these Express Coaches as well. But for the target engine that the coaches are made for, I can easily say that Gordon looks fantastic pulling a nice rake of Express Coaches. I might actually look into getting another pair of Express Coaches to match the amount used in Season 1.


So overall, I strongly feel that Bachmann has really done a solid job of introducing these Express Coaches to the N scale range. It's definitely been weird having Gordon for so long but not having any Express Coaches for him to pull, but needless to say, Gordon's presence feels a lot more complete now. If you have Gordon and James and have plans to get Henry, or just want more rolling stock for your Thomas line in general, I would definitely recommend picking these up.

Thanks, Bachmann, for introducing these coaches, and I am looking forward to my next review being on N scale Diesel, followed by the highly anticipated model of Henry!

One more thing I actually want to ask everyone about:




Did anyone else happen to receive a box with the Lilliput logo on it by mistake? Just to be clear, these coaches use completely new body shells and are not made from Lilliput tooling. However, two of my coaches came with boxes featuring the Lilliput logo, while the other coach came in a box with the correct Bachmann branding. I'm curious if this was just an isolated packaging error or if anyone else ran into the same thing.

I know I'm late to the party on this, but I'll post my thoughts anyway.

I'm absolutely thrilled that Thomas and Percy are getting retooled! Even though I'm late the decisions have already been made, I do hope they aren't afraid to go all out on these models. If I know anything about thomas fans it's that they extremely detail oriented. So things like thomas having a proper smokebox saddle, his wheels having the correct number of spokes, etc, is something people really pay attention to, and lets not forget that we're basically going to have buy the models of the same characters again. Now I have no doubt that these retools will be an improvement regardless given the quality of bachmann's recent models, but I really want these models to have as little need for modifications as possible for hardcore fans.

Details I would personally like to see is open cabs and windows, and Thomas having his red bunker lining as seen in season 19-24.
(these might've already been confirmed via trainworld streams, sorry not up to date)

James is obviously on everyone's radar for the next retool if they are going down this route. Paxton's face being updated is something i've seen get brought up and I'm all for that too. Gordon and Henry would please alot of fans too, especially seeing the quality of their N scale models. Unlikely, but I personally would love to see Spencer be redone, his body shape is really disproportionate to the show. Would love to see his silver paint too!

Well, after finishing the 'Whistlestop Diner', it's ready to be installed:





Here, it's positioned in the location.



It's getting 'roughed' in.











And finally, an unloading rame for all the food deliveries for the diner.







That's about it for now, More to follow...

Ken

While we need the logoless green coal wagon and gray van in N Scale, another good choice for a logoless rolling stock is a BROWN 12-Ton van, for all three scales. It can also be used to create Henry's Flying Kipper train. The brown van we do have is the Mr. Jolly van, which is one with a logo. We can also use one without a logo. If they announce the explosives, Brendam Bay and Christmas wreath vans for N Scale, then we'd have all the vans with logos in that scale. I'd love to have N Scale Henry pulling a line of brown vans, as he pulls the Flying Kipper. The Brendam Bay van also works for that train.

N Scale rolling stock that require new toolings include the cattle wagon, salt wagon, mail car, show-accurate tankers, and BR 20-Ton brake van. All of which have potential repaints and can be used multiple times. If Bachmann announces N Scale rolling stock with new toolings, any of those options will be welcomed by everyone. Those toolings will be well worth the investment. The red coaches for N Scale would also be welcomed, and they too have potential repaints like Toby's museum coaches.

The next Large Scale engine could be Sidney, Mainland Diesel, Stanley, or Origin James. Sidney and Mainland Diesel are soon to be released for HO Scale, and Stanley can recycle Thomas' chassis, just like his HO Scale model. LBSC Thomas is soon to release in Large and N Scales, while Origin James is also soon to release in N Scale, but not announced for Large Scale yet.

Initial cleaning involves reflowing the solder to eliminate all the dendrites already formed.  It also heats the area to remove any moisture.

A good cleaning with Solvent Alcohol and compressed air removes the flux residue.  A good scrubbing with a Dremel with rotary wire brush also cleans up the solder mask.  Additional cycles of Alcohol, Compressed Air, and microscope inspection cleans it off.

Note in the first picture how close the blue solder mask surrounds the solder pads.

I didn't remove the solder mask on this one.  After getting as much debris out of the gap as I could, I cleaned it again then baked the circuit board area with a heat gun to evaporate any oils or water under the solder mask.

Tested for 1.5 hours -- no loss of signal.

I tried the 'extra' dynamis command station on my 4x8 sheet of plywood test track and let it run for about 30 minutes.
After that time, both handsets lost signal and the trains stopped.
I swapped out the IRDA head and it worked OK for the next two hours.  This is likely why I got the command station so cheap.

The ROOT CAUSE of these Dynamis failures is not so obvious.  Yes, the Chinese work is sloppy, but also the German Engineering also has a fatal flaw that allows this sloppiness to cripple these good products.

The BLUE Plastic layer that surrounds the solder pads is the WRONG SIZE !!!!  It should allow at least 0.020 inches of space around those solder pads to keep the flux and other soldering waste out from under this 'Solder Mask'.

Instead of protecting the PCB, it funnels solder flux UNDER the solder mask.  This forms a petri-dish of Dendrite Formation.  The hand-soldering of the connector separates and damages the solder mask.

The repair is to carefully remove the solder mask from around these pads with a sharpened small jeweler's screwdriver, then clean and apply a sealing RTV over the whole set of pads to keep out moisture.

It's a tragedy that Dynamis was so discredited for reliability because some engineer goofed on the size of the Solder Mask through-hole openings in the PCB Gerber Files.

Hi, I have a Bachmann HO auto-reversing E-Z Track system. It's approx 8 years old and has stopped working properly. I've tried troubleshooting the problem and discovered that it appears to work fine if I remove all of middle track pieces marked "A" on both ends and simply connect the two pieces with the "reversing trigger notches together" - the sections that have a B on one end and A on the other end. When I place a section with "A" on both ends back in the middle the locomotive will run for a few seconds and then die. The track has been cleaned and is well connected. The locomotive has also been cleaned and lubricated and runs fine on the track at the local hobby shop. I'm at wits end. Does anyone have an idea what's wrong? I'm hesitant to shell $$ for a new track and discover that the problem persists. Thanks!!!!!