Hi, I seen some YouTube stuff on this loco, I could be wrong. But will it actually go round 36 radius despite its paperwork saying 42?
Can someone try👍😁 please.

Hi,

Märklin must have had a good reason to advise potential customers to avoid R1 radius with the 241 A. I'm convinced that some people will force it through R1 curves and proudly announce that it's not a problem, but is it a good idea? Might cause additional wear and tear on the chassis or the wheels ...

Best regards,

Mark

I like this point of view.

I believe that the "better safe than sorry" approach is the best in this case... If you tell everyone that it runs well on R1 and then there's a guy which say that the third wheel of the tender get out of the rail by 0,0000000001 micron everybody will make a fuss, if you tell everyone that min radius is R2 and then people discover it runs ok on R1 everybody will be delighted. It's about creating expectations, you know.

So pleased to here this, I will weight for the paint job and double chimney one from Mulhouse SNCF musee? As it’s in original livery I believe 😁😁👍

Is this a fact or a guess? Anyway, Märklin should tell us and explain things clearly. Why did Mr Bächle announce on Märklin TV that this loco couldn't be built to negotiate R1 curves?

This reminds me of the first two versions of the BR 01.5 (39205/39206), which were delivered without boiler steps, a feature that Märklin introduced back in the early 1950s!!! The G800 and F800 actually had such steps, but the 39205/39206 didn't! There was no explanation, but the BR 01.5 was redesigned with boiler steps when the 39207 was released.

Best regards,

Mark

It is a guess, but having worked in a design lab, and still doing product design on specialist test equipment I would not be surprised to find that a new member came onto the design team who suggested that "move this there and we can tweak the chassis here and it will go around R1". This probably happened very late in the process, but all the advertising literature was already written. Initial move to production may even have already started when this change occurred.



The impression I had with these locos was that items were not fitted during production as advertising literature showed these as fitted, not that the design was deficient and required redesign. This was noticed by early customers and resulted in the recall.

Hi,

I've looked it up, but 39205/39206 did not have boiler steps in Märklin TV episode 73, which was released at the time when those locos were announced.

Märklin TV Episode 73

In this forum I found a thread from September 2015 featuring a photo without boiler steps:

New special item 01.5

At the end of that year I bought a copy of Eisenbahn Magazin (em), a German publication that isn't known for being very Märklin-friendly. It featured a test comparing H0 models of the BR 01.5 made by different manufacturers. The missing boiler steps on Märklin's BR 01.5 were pointed out in the test, as well as a few other details that were not prototypical. Despite some kind of recall, the 39205 and 39206 were finally sold without boiler steps. Was Märklin not aware of that or had those locos been designed somewhere else???

When Märklin released the new Nohabs in 2014, the liveries as shown in the news brochure were prototypical but things went wrong during production in China. The horizontal air vents above the bull's eye windows on both sides of the CFL and SNCB Nohabs were dark grey (close to black) in the catalogue, which is right for era III (or even IV). Nevertheless, those air vents were painted the same color as the locos (red brown for the CFL and green for the SNCB) and sold like that. They look wrong, but nobody seemed to notice that though I pointed it out on two forums, in English and in German. Very few people have seen color photos of Nohabs taken in the 1950s, but I have books and magazines about the prototype, so I could see what was wrong. Actually, this year's 39676 looks wrong again, even in the news brochure, but nobody seems to have noticed that. Those air vents were simply NOT painted in era III; that was only done on some museum locos which were repainted much later, in era V.

In the case of German locos, mistakes are usually uncovered and published. Sorry if this is a bit off-topic, but it shows that we can't trust any announcements or photos in news brochures, and that most people only see what they want to see. To get back to the topic of this thread, Märklin says the 241 A is era II, III, or VI. Actually, it's era VI as the loco didn't have the painted white rings on the wheels during the SNCF era. What's great is that Märklin (or its Asian partner?) seems to have done a much better job this time as compared to the Nohab or the first BR 01.5.

Best regards,
Mark

Edited by user 23 December 2017 09:09:08(UTC)  | Reason: added some info

I finally got to my dealer last Saturday, to pick up my 241. I am very pleased with it. It is a beautiful locomotive. While playing with it at the dealer's he noticed it did not have the skull and crossbones symbol with "danger de mort" on the back of the tender. I wonder if that would have been on the original in the 1930's?

I particularly love the detail. With the cab light on there are gauges that light up on the face inside the cab. I had not noticed that before, a nice touch by Marklin.

So far it has pulled my LS "Nord" coaches, and my blue Marklin CIWL set. I know, I know, the CIWL is 1920's and the 241, 1930's.

Hi

In another forum,here there is a picture dating 1956 of a loco 241A decorated for the then French president Coty (you must click a few screens down on "page 89" to see it ). The same topic covers many aspects of this loco (in French, sorry) and many pictures inside, out and of the real one.
What a lovely locomotive. Still waiting for mine.
A little bit further down on the same page 89, the system for scooping water on 241 A locos without stopping used by Etat machines is described.
Cheers

Jean

Great photos of the locomotive!

David

As am I Jean - I only hope that I do eventually get one of these beauties.

Thanks for that great link - I really enjoyed seeing those beautiful images!

Oh, and by the way, I can buy the 241-A-65 right now from the same place where I bought my 37015, and for a mere 775€.

And to be totally truthful, if I don't get one directly from Märklin I might consider doing this. I knew that I should never have screwed around and waited six days before ordering mine.

Hi Jean,

Thanks for that information, which gives me hope that I might still get mine. I ordered 6 days after the announcement and I don't mind waiting as long as I get one eventually. I emailed my dealer last night to see if he thinks that I am still in the queue for one of these beauties and it will be interesting to see what he has to say.