hoppy504 said:
Can anyone please tell me how difficult the above are to assemble, also is it a complete kit or are extras required?
You need to supply wheels, gears, motors and pickups or a battery pack and radio control.
The best wheels are the cast iron from Mark Wood, which will set you back the best part of ?200. You will need two motors at the minimum: one for the loco and one for the train, plus sprockets and chain - just as you would with 7mm diesels.
I suppose these extras will increase the price to less than twice that of the kit alone, but you can also spend more if you are so inclined.
I am part way through building a 22, and have been for some years as it stalled about 4 years ago (nothing wrong with the kit, other things to do). The resin body moulding is simply superb, as are the nickel-silver etchings and the assorted whitemetal and brass castings. In terms of quality, it cannot be faulted. There are one or two minor errors in the etchings, but Fred draws you to them (re-drill a hole) so no problems there. To fit the grilles, you file a 45deg bevel on the etching, and scrape the inside face of the opening 45 deg to make it a snug fit, and super glue in place. This is reckoned to be the "worst" part of building the 22. There are some intricate soldering bits to assemble (e.g. the steps under the buffers) but the etchings are well designed and go together easily. You do need a reasonably powerful iron for the bigger soldering joins, and you also need to solder the whitemetal bogie side-castings to nickel stretchers. I suppose you could glue and pin here, but I prefer soldering where I can. Small detail bits for the body (grab handles, etc) glue into place with super glue.
I have a 29 kit: this has rather more origami to it, as it was Fred's first kit and there is a lot of etched brass (much prefer n/s) to form for the body shell - cabs are resin.
Having seen but not assembled a Warship, more seems to be cast into the bodies, and they may be easier, but not having built one, I cannot say - there are others here who have.
Are they difficult? I do not know how I can answer that. I make a bit of a mess of bending up one of the fuel tanks (quite difficult to make a mess of this task) due to getting cocky and not taking enough time: I spent a lot of time filling with solder and filing back to correct the error I had made. I have also modified the chassis somewhat to suit my ideas of how I want it done. Folding up the cab interiors is fun: really clever and some photos of the process/parts/end result are attached.
:scratch: 
;D
