Price: fitted with DCC and sound, as reviewed: £355

Purchased and reviewed by Mike Roberts

The basis of this review is LBSCR A1 Thames, manufactured and fitted with DCC and sound by Dapol and supplied by Tower Models in early October, 2015. Later production batches might vary.

Thames had an eventful life. She entered service in Jan 1876 based at New Cross. The loco as presented by Dapol would appear to be as she was before the mid 1890’s when the condensing pipes were removed. Thames was put onto the LBSCR duplicate list in 1901. In 1902 she was sold to Pauling & Co, then building the GCR London Extension, and in 1909 she was shipped off to South America.

My immediate impression on seeing this loco for the first time, straight out of the box, was of a very attractive and largely accurate model which fully captured the character of the original. My example did suffer minor damage in transit between my supplier and me. Fixing the damage proved simple enough, but the durability of this largely plastic model was brought into question, especially if handled repeatedly. The underframe is well constructed, consisting of a solid cast metal core faced with detailed frame overlays. Motive power is provided by a large can motor located centrally on the underframe and driving the rear axle through a two stage nylon gearbox which looks strong enough to cope with most authentic loads. All driving wheels are flanged and all have an electrical pick-up. The centre driving axle floats vertically ensuring good electrical contact with the rail head, connecting rods are properly articulated. My example copes easily with a 4ft radius curve on my layout and negotiates Peco pointwork. Detailed brake rigging is in moulded plastic. The internal valve gear is suggested by being moulded onto the frame overlays and painted. Dapol Terrier Thames

The plastic body sits on a cast metal running plate. Personally I think that the ‘Improved Engine Green’ is too yellow. I would have preferred a yellow shade with a more brownish-orange hue, however there have been decades of detailed discussion concerning the correct colour! The plastic fittings to the body are quite fragile. The buffer heads are a push fit only onto the stem which retains them and the spring, and easily come adrift. The buffer and coupling springs are too weak. I made similar criticism of the Dapol SR Brake van when I reviewed this. Dapol really need to review their design of couplings and buffers for 7mm scale products.

The DCC sound comes from recordings of a ‘Terrier’on the Kent and East Sussex Railway and is thus authentic. It includes the sound of the Westinghouse pump. Cut-off varies with effort and the loco sounds like it really has to work when accelerating a train on a large layout. When coasting at speed, the loaded loco is virtually silent. I like this effect. The authentic sound is among the best I have heard. I adjusted the CVs for volume, acceleration, deceleration and chuffs per wheel revolution. The latter was very necessary, the other three out of preference.

Some of my friends had purchased the basic DC version of this loco and I was aware that these ran very well. It rapidly became apparent that my DCC version did not run well at all. The loco repeatedly stalled. This happened at any speed, with a variety of controllers and on both layouts available to me. A detailed inspection revealed that the erratic running was caused by the DCC fitted by Dapol. I removed the small supplementary PCB which is wired between the main DCC chip and the motor. I don’t recommend undertaking this yourself unless you understand what you are doing. This action probably negates any warranty, but it did solve the running problem. The Dapol ‘Terrier’ captures all of the character of the original loco. The DC version is undoubtedly a bargain. The authentic sound of the DCC version is excellent. But there are issues concerning the DCC installation.

1. The stalling or running problem. A simple test run reveals this.
2. Incorrect information on data sheets provided by Dapol claiming that the DCC version would also run on DC. It will not do so without CV revision.
3. The apparent replacement of a proposed boiler mounted speaker in the original design with one in a side tank where it fouls the centre driving wheel.

The above three points suggest that the DCC installation was not properly thought out. This is a pity.

We need the Ready to Run market, especially at budget prices, as part of our hobby, but products should run, problem free, straight out of the box. Not everyone is a DCC expert and none of us want the hassle and expense of returning faulty goods. Unfortunately I cannot give this product 10/10. A copy of this review was sent to Dapol who gave the following reply:

The review by Mr. Roberts covers aspects of the Thames model, being one of the six different versions recently offered by Dapol and I would like to add my comments:

1. We did encounter some damage with the first shipment to the buffers and the tank breathers caused by shipping, this has now been rectified and all future models should arrive in good order.
2. The locomotive uses precision tooling to produce the pressure die-cast metal for the footplate and chassis.
3. We are aware of the rather soft spring tension of our couplings, which is now being changed to a stronger coil type for all future productions of locomotives and rolling stock.
4. Initially we did experience some issues when fitting the Zimo DCC sound decoders, however the PC board has since been corrected and all future models will operate as stated in our literature.

I should like to thank Mr. Roberts for his review and especially his appraisal of the sounds – we had a very enjoyable day on the Kent and East Sussex Railway back in March recording 32678 to provide us with the most authentic sounds of these remarkable locomotives.

Richard Webster,

Product Development Manager, Dapol Ltd.