murphaph

Tracking said DHL Express and the tracking number worked on the DHL Express Ireland website. Then I checked the DHL Express Germany website and it told me the parcel was to be handled by "regular" DHL, which is just the post office here and is the same carrier that delivers An Post parcels. The regular DHL website reported the parcel was "on its way to DHL" until this afternoon, when it changed and showed the parcel as being located in Bochum in the west of Germany. It'll probably be delivered on Saturday. That's 9 days in actual transit I believe, which is slower than an An Post or GLS parcel. The opens arrived via GLS in 4 days. I don't mind if a parcel takes a week or two weeks but I hope DHL Express aren't taking the Mick charging IRM for express delivery and then just pawning the parcels off to non-express carriers.

Mine were shipped DHL Express too but they handed them off to the parcels arm of the German post office (which is confusingly called DHL, without the Express. Deutsche Post owns DHL group). That was strange enough and I have never knowingly experienced that but DHL Express handing off to Royal Mail sounds even stranger as they are completely unrelated companies AFAIK.

I'd be in the market for the ITG livery A39 and for more green liveried ones.

My flying snail ones arrived today and I am well pleased with them I actually thought they were metal bodied! The pictures (like with A1) don't really do that metallic paint finish justice.

Sound!

My flats are showing a "weird" tracking number. It is neither An Post nor GLS. It shows the originating country as "Germany". It looks like a "Wish" tracking number where the seller bulk ships stuff from China to a warehouse in Germany, before it is re-labelled and handed over to DHL (which in Germany is just the post office's parcel delivery arm, not an express courier). The opens are being handled by GLS and look "normal". Strangely, when I track the parcel, it says it has been in transit for 14 days already, but that can't be right, can it? The IRM order page says it was fulfilled today!

Yep, same in Germany and presumably EU-wide. VAT and I believe duty also is charged on the total price of the article "landed" in the EU, which includes the cost of postage & packaging to get it there. There are lots of anomalies in the VAT system and this is another one because if you buy say a book, you may pay less or no VAT at all (in some EU countries) on the postage & packaging element even though that is no different to the postage and packaging element of items subject to the luxury/standard rates of VAT. I can see where they are coming from though....the Chinese shops like Wish/Temu etc. would simply shift more of the purchase price into the P&P and reduce the headline price of items if the P&P was not subject to taxes.

Far too young . RIP Dave and thanks for the words of tribute Noel. Condolences to you and his other friends and of course his family.

RIP Ken. I loved following your topics on here. A fantastic modelling talent who will be sorely missed. Deepest sympathies to your family and friends.

Even if somewhat expected these are a lovel addition to the range. Flying snail ones duly ordered

Sodding German customs sent my Baby GMs back to IRM. All inside the single market. I've never had a parcel actually sent back to any sender, inside or outside the EU (normally parcels with insufficient documentation are held in my local customs office for me to go open them in front of them, but intra-EU stuff should never be sent anywhere for lack of paperwork) so I can't wait to find out what exactly they are saying the problem is! Patrick is on top of it, giving me regular updates, which I'm grateful for. I hope you get your DART stuff soon Tony. I haven't experienced problems getting their stuff to me here in Germany.

Lovely. Pack of the flying snail era ones ordered!

Fabulous work!

I'd send that back and I am happy to try to fix most things myself. Models should not sound like that out of the box. Something is definitely not right. Send it back now while there are warranty replacements readily available. These things happen unfortunately but that's what the warranty is for

You don't have to use the presets in templot AFAIK. You can customise the gauge and various clearances to whatever you want.

James' videos are a really good explainer of what's possible. I follow the Templot forum discussion on "Plugtrack" and it is still very much "experimental" according to Martin Wynne (the man behind Templot) but it is possible to turn out (sorry!) functioning track that looks better than anything you can make using traditional methods I feel (except flat bottom rail on timber sleepers....it can only do Bullhead rail at present and that may stay that way in 4mm scale as the clips that would be needed to hold flat bottomed rail in place would be absolutely miniscule and extremely fragile (in 4mm scale anyway).

Cheers Fran. I was just curious to be honest. My 5 are on the way to me from IRM already

Will you be getting more in when they sell out like the mk2d's or is that it?

What do we expect on the pricing front? More prices like the baby GMs? I was kind of caught on the hop with those and just decided to push ahead with my pre-order of 5 despite the high price but if we are looking at €250 for DCC ready I will be a lot more conservative in what I pre-order this time I reckon.

Good stuff that they aren't in the 121 packaging which was a nice idea but in practice not reliable. Can't wait to get mine!

I'd have to agree. There is no way a buyer could know that a model produced in the same factory as the original is stolen IP so a prosecution would never be brought. Before I read any of these forum posts on this topic I actually bought such a single(!) model from HK. It was completely original and could not be distinguished from a "legit" one. How was I to know that there was some illicit trade in models made after hours in the actual factory the real McCoys were made in? I genuinely had no clue about this practice back then. It's not the same as Chinese knock-offs of Louis Vuitton bags or whatever that clearly look like knock offs once you start examining the item more closely. Once these illicit models are in circulation and no longer with the original importer, there really is no way to tell them from apart from ones that came in as part of Paddy's legit order. This all comes down to the lack of respect for IP that exists in China. It's always going to be a bit of a gamble having stuff produced there I guess. The smaller you are the less worried the factory is going to be about losing future orders presumably. I don't buy from HK or Mainland China based eBay sellers of models now as I know the score but most people not on this forum are probably genuinely unaware of the origin of these models on eBay.

Thanks for the update Fran

Are you talking about 16.5mm gauge track Noel?

That's a B4 bogie Brendan has regauged there, right?

21 is a great number for IRM: 6 more triple pack re-runs down the line to look forward too