Hornby BRc 46100 Royal Scot (Pete Waterman
Collection) R2824
When asked to choose three of his favourite locomotives that Hornby could sell in the Pete Waterman Collection, one of them was Royal Scot. It consequently arrived in special Pete Waterman Collection packaging.
Introduced by the LMS in 1927, it was designed by Sir Henry Fowler and was loosely based on the Southern Railway's 'Lord Nelson' Class. The drawings were done at ex-Midland Railway design centre at Derby but they were offered out to contract for construction and the first 50 were built by the North British Locomotive Company. The class were gradually rebuilt, with tapered boilers, between 1943 and 1955 and so some of the rebuilt locomotives carried only a BR livery. The locomotives gave 40 years of service, the last one surviving in revenue earning operation until 1965, Royal Scot itself having been decommissioned in October 1962. After many years in Norfolk as a static exhibit, the recently restored loco has been painted in LMS Crimson Lake, a livery it never carried in its days in service.
The subject was popular with model makers before the Second World War, with Royal Scot being the name generally chosen for the model. Invariably it was sold in red livery and in its original form, with a parallel sided boiler. With its glory being stolen, first by the 'Princesses' and then the 'Duchesses', the 'Royal Scots' had to take a back seat with model makers until the 1970s. Three post-1970 introductions were the Mainline (1977) and Airfix (1978) 00 'rebuilt' models and the Rivarossi H0 'unrebuilt' model of 1978. Palitoy topped this with an 'unrebuilt' version in 1981. Both Mainline models were reintroduced into the Bachmann Branchline range in the 1900s but by 2007 it was felt the market was ready for a super-detailed model and Hornby took the plunge and chose the 'rebuilt' locomotive. Since then they have released nine versions of it, this being the latest.
46100 Royal Scot is in BR green as seen in its final days in service, with late tender decals and warning flashes. This is a beautifully detailed model which comes ready to run except for fitting the brake rods, cylinder drain cocks and front steps - if the unfitted front coupling is not required.
What then happened to the Airfix and Rivarossi tooling. After Dapol bought the Airfix tools, those for the 'Royal Scot' could not be found in China. If they do turn up, they may technically belong to Dapol. The Rivarossi H0 tooling was presumably bought by Hornby and there are a number of British H0 modellers who would like to see them back in use. If the British H0 lobby grows in strength, the former Rivarossi chassis offers some interesting possibilities.