This is a common and well known issue with the Dapol 73s. The positioning of the contacts inside the gearbox means they get covered in grease and lose conductivity - very poor design on Dapol’s part. A reliable fix is to add external wiper pick ups to both bogies - this completely transformed mine and its now a very smooth and reliable runner.
Hi, there is plenty of information on improving your Dapol class 73 on RMweb, the lighting issues are also covered, I wanted the Olivia’s Trains class 73 in Network Rail yellow livery for a long while, it was in their sale so I decided to buy one, to date I’ve had no issues with it and I’m happy with my purchase, I’ve seen many negative and positive reviews over the years, the body removal can be quite difficult apparently, I will find this out once I’ve got a sound decoder and a driver figure to fit, thanks for sharing.
I've not had any issues with body removal - there are 4 screws which are a bit obscured by the bogies but if you have a small cross head screwdriver they are easy to reach, and the body then comes straight off.
I have the br blue version of the Dapol class 73. It runs faultless over 2nd, 3rd & 4th radius set track & also over curved set track points with no problems at all, indeed a very smooth runner even at slow speed.
I bent my bogie pick ups so they sit over the top of wheels. Runs nicely now. Good luck
This is a common and well known issue with the Dapol 73s. The positioning of the contacts inside the gearbox means they get covered in grease and lose conductivity - very poor design on Dapol’s part. A reliable fix is to add external wiper pick ups to both bogies - this completely transformed mine and its now a very smooth and reliable runner.
Hi, there is plenty of information on how to do this on RMWEB, the lighting issues are also addressed on there.
Hi, there is plenty of information on improving your Dapol class 73 on RMweb, the lighting issues are also covered, I wanted the Olivia’s Trains class 73 in Network Rail yellow livery for a long while, it was in their sale so I decided to buy one, to date I’ve had no issues with it and I’m happy with my purchase, I’ve seen many negative and positive reviews over the years, the body removal can be quite difficult apparently, I will find this out once I’ve got a sound decoder and a driver figure to fit, thanks for sharing.
I've not had any issues with body removal - there are 4 screws which are a bit obscured by the bogies but if you have a small cross head screwdriver they are easy to reach, and the body then comes straight off.
I have the br blue version of the Dapol class 73. It runs faultless over 2nd, 3rd & 4th radius set track & also over curved set track points with no problems at all, indeed a very smooth runner even at slow speed.
Yes. Just give it a shot of PL-64 "Power Lube"!
I had two and they all stop over insul frogs. Sam's trains reviewed them and from memory I think the problem was a split chassis design? Bill.
My layout is all insulfrogs. I would give your locos a shot of PL-60 power lube as the video suggests! Thanks for watching.
Best think to do is to fit the HM7000 hornby chip with the stay alive and use the class 73 sound profile, works really well.
Well thats put me off from getting the dapol version. Ill stick with my lima ones . Cheers for the video.
There is the Hornby one, based on the Lima tooling, which I reviewed earlier. Thanks for watching.
Back when Gatwick Express was under the intercity branding.
I am glad I got the right coaches! Thanks for watching.