Darstaed Castle Class Locomotive

Dear All,

And here is the loco itself....



with special thanks to Watchthetrains.

All the best

David

David,

What a beautiful loco. I was concerned that the only GW Castle class was the Basset-Lowke version put out years ago. I have a double brace of Exley GW cars (including an Ocean Mails car!) that I want to head with a proper loco.

Long story short, Where can I get one of the Darstaed Castle locos??? It would be just right for my needs, if it were made in 3 rail version (AC or DC would be fine)

I like the satin. Makes the lining really stand out!

Rob, you can get one from Raylo , they will ship to the U.S.



John.

Thanks John. I'll look into it!

Correct me if I'm wrong, but Lionel already has the tooling to make this exact same loco (the Hogwarts Castle loco). Can no one twist Lionel's arm into producing this loco in Great Western colors like this? I'd certainly buy one (or two), especially if they offered them in several English liveries. And for pity's sake, why can't Lionel make the tender for this thing in metal rather than plastic?

Don't get me wrong, this Darstaed Castle loco shown in the video is a beauty, but given my experience with buying British or Australian-made locos, they're quite expensive. I have some vintage Hornby O gauge and a B-L 0-6-0 from the fifties (I think), but I primarily use the Lionel Hogwarts loco to pull around the Hornby, Marklin, B-L, and Leeds passenger and freight cars I have. Somebody needs to wake Lionel up about this issue and get them to produce more European profile locos that will fit in with vintage European tinplate cars.

Thanks for posting, great looking loco!

Jager, Lionel copied the real locomotive used to portray the "Hogwarts Castle" loco... A Hall class loco called Olton Hall... Both classes are 4-6-0 locos and look similar, yet they were different. Castle Class locos were quite a bit bigger, had more superheat and much greater tractive effort, and more. The Castle class was so successful that GWR recruited Stannier from LMS, the designer of the Castle class.


Anyway, the Olton Hall is teasingly called the "Hall that thinks it's a Castle" and for the cars I have the Castle is the most correct engine as I understand it.

You are not wrong that Lionel should leverage the tooling for this loco, and they have already made the Shakespeare Express loco "Kinlet Hall" in GW colors appropriate for the cars I have. It even has a Die cast tender chassis. Frankly the model is a joke relative to others being produced... HOWEVER it is the cheapest by a BUNCH and has a good following as is, and is being repainted probably as we speak by several trainheads.

Lionel could play in the UK market, but it is crowded, and why effort swimming with the Sharks?

Author Topic: Ace Trains of London Castle Class
Dave Allen
Posted October 09, 2011 11:14 PM
Andries and John, I hope you have a good show, you will probably meet some of my friends there. John, if you are doing the show next Spring, let me know, I might come over and I could give you some help.
Dave Allen

Dear David,

Although we have built the pre 2009 series of Ace Castles as well that feature in Dave Webbs excellent pictures, strictly speaking we are now dealing with the Darstaed Castles that Dave commented on so my reply belongs here.

Yes, we intend to be from now on at each York and in April I definitively intend to attend.

Cheers,
Andries.
Darstaed

Stanier was a Swindon man and recruited by the LMS where he took his swindon knowledge to produce his classic LMS designs... 

Rob,

 

Contact John Hoover at trainshoover@gmail.com , he is the American Distributer for Darstaed and I believe the locomotives are available from him. He is always located in the orange hall at York.

 

Eric Hofberg

TCA, LCCA