Miniature Heroes - Introducing Our Brand New Class 142 DMU Family!

[Warbonnet]

Few trains divide opinion quite like the Class 142 ‘Pacer’ - but their place in Britain’s railway story is undeniable. 

From rural branches to hard-worked commuter routes, these unmistakable railbuses became a true everyday icon - the true unsung heroes of the UK rail scene.

Now, Accurascale brings them to life like never before with a brand new model that captures every ounce of their character, charm and individuality.

Packed with cutting-edge features, exceptional detailing and smooth running performance, whether pottering along a quiet branch or strengthening a busy multiple-unit formation, the ‘Pacer’ delivers versatility in spades.

With a wide range of liveries and authentic variations, this exciting new release offers something for every layout.

Unsung Heroes: The 'Pacer' Story

The Class 142 ‘Pacer’ DMUs were British Rail’s most successful take on the railbus concept, combining bus-based bodies with a simple chassis to create a low-cost solution for lightly used routes.

Introduced in the mid-1980s after a series of prototypes, they quickly became a familiar sight across the North West, Yorkshire, Wales and the South West.

Although early reliability issues affected performance, upgrades in the 1990s significantly improved their operation, allowing them to become dependable workhorses on both rural and commuter services. Passing through multiple operators after privatisation, they remained in service until 2020, and today many survive in preservation, valued as a distinctive and enduring part of Britain’s railway history.

The Accurascale Class 142 DMU debuts in a curated selection of iconic liveries, ranging from original BR Provincial and the Western Region ‘Skipper’ chocolate and cream to the later Greater Manchester PTE and Northern Rail eras. With multiple running numbers available, we make it easy to assemble authentic paired sets or recreate specific regional allocations.

Despite its compact wheelbase, this ‘Pacer’ boasts a heavyweight specification. The model features a finely detailed full interior, a smooth low-profile drive system, and a sophisticated electronics suite optimised for reliable performance.

Magnetic BSI couplings provide seamless compatibility with upcoming Class 153 and 155 units, while the clever internal circuitry allows both vehicles to be operated via a single DCC decoder.

The lighting suite is fully featured and independently controllable, offering directional headlights with day/night modes, a warm interior glow, and discrete cab illumination.

To ensure the 'Pacer' performs as well as it looks, the model incorporates our acclaimed 'Stay-Alive' power pack. This guarantees smooth, flicker-free running and consistent performance, even across complex pointwork or demanding layouts.

Our new Class 142 'Pacer' DMUs are due to arrive in Q1 2027, and you can pre-order yours today exclusively from Accurascale with no deposit down - reserve yours now to avoid missing out!

They're as good value in model form as in real life - priced from £199.98 (DC/DCC Ready) and £299.99 (DCC Sound-fitted). You'll also benefit from free UK delivery and collect Accurascale Reward Points that you can exchange for discounts on future purchases.

We've produced multiple running numbers for each livery, and they're the ideal companions for our forthcoming Class 153/Class 155 DMUs too!

 

PRE-ORDER YOUR MODELS TODAY

 

Meet the New Range

We have recreated four iconic 'Pacer' liveries spanning the decades of the trains in our first run. Read here the detailed stories behind each livery and how they can fit into your layout. 

Greater Manchester PTE:

Running numbers & destinations featured:

142003 (55544+55594) Crewe / Special
142008 (55549+55599) Bolton / Stockport
142012 (55553+55603) Manchester Victoria (via Oldham) / Blackburn

The 1980s saw several paint schemes make the jump from bus to DMU as the Passenger Transport Executives (PTEs), later Authorities (PTAs), began to sanction repaints covering rolling stock they sponsored. One of the most attractive was the Greater Manchester Transport orange/brown/white that had been adopted in 1981 and this was applied to the first 14 ‘Pacers’ 142001-142014 which were delivered in 1985.

Based out of Newton Heath depot and seen at both Piccadilly and Victoria, they worked all across the North West, including to Blackburn, Colne, Chester, Helsby, Liverpool Lime Street, Llandudno, New Mills / Rose Hill, Oldham, Ormskirk, Preston, Rochdale, Southport, Stalybridge and Wigan North Western, as well as longer distance journeys to Barrow-in-Furness and the Cumbrian coast, Blackpool North/South, Carlisle, Doncaster, Sheffield and York.

142012 represents the Class 142s in their as-delivered condition with original destination blind, while 142008 has the smaller blind assembly introduced on the second batch, revised heating arrangement with the extra ventilation grille on one side of the body and additional warning labelling for passengers. The third GMPTE-liveried ‘Pacer’ is preserved 142003 with revised double-leaf doors and chassis-mounted sanding equipment.

BR Western Region 'Skipper'

Running numbers & destinations featured:

142015 (55556+55606) Exeter St Davids / Paignton
142024 (55565+55615) Newcastle / Middlesborough

The next 13 units, 142015-142027, were for use on branch lines in Devon and Cornwall. New to Plymouth Laira between September-December 1985 and branded as ‘Skippers’ they were delivered in a chocolate and cream scheme in a reverse of the Great Western coaching stock livery, appropriate considering the GW150 celebrations that had been taking place that same year. This was applied to the same format as later introduced on the Provincial ‘Pacers’ complete with the same white waist band. Entering service on routes including Barnstaple-Exeter-Exmouth, Liskeard-Looe, Newton Abbot-Paignton, Par-Newquay, Penzance-St Erth-St Ives, Plymouth-Gunnislake and Truro-Falmouth, their introduction was not a happy one.

Despite the best efforts of newly-installed greasing equipment, they were found to be entirely unsuited to the South West with the tight curves and difficult gradients leading to excessive tyre wear and wheel noise on the long-wheelbase units. They were transferred north starting with 142017 in August 1987 and the ‘Skippers’ were no more after the last day of November with the fleet being split between Newton Heath and Neville Hill.

 However, it wasn’t long before the majority of the units were on the move again to Heaton to supplement the Alexander-Barclay built Class 143s. Of our releases, 142015 is as built and firmly set in the South West. With its Exeter St Davids / Paignton destinations it would have made a fine sight on the sea wall at Dawlish. Meanwhile, Tyne & Wear-based 142024 has the revised destination blind, extra bodyside vent and subtly different labelling.

BR Provincial Blue

Running numbers & destinations featured:

142077 (55727+55773) Hull / York
142096 (55746+55792) Preston / Liverpool Lime St

The majority of the ‘Pacer’ fleet, 142028-142096, was delivered in the attractive Provincial two-tone blue and white livery and the new trains were split between Newton Heath (Manchester) and Neville Hill (Leeds). They could be found working similar diagrams to the GMPTE fleet in the North West, while on the other side of the Pennines they became common on local services in North and West Yorkshire and the West Riding.

Destinations included Bradford, Cleethorpes, Doncaster, Goole, Halifax, Huddersfield, Hull, Ilkley, Knottingley, Leeds, Marsden, Scarborough, Scunthorpe, Selby, Sheffield, Skipton, Sleaford and York, as well as longer distance routes such as Leeds or York to Blackpool North / Lancaster / Manchester Victoria / Morecambe and even Scarborough to Holyhead!

Both units in our first run are taken from the second batch of units, known as Class 142/1 with Newton Heath-based 142096 – the last built member of the class – in as delivered condition, while 142077 is in post 1994 condition with revised double-leaf doors. These are painted yellow as they originally were on the converted units. This unit also has the extra heating vent on the bodysides, revised door warning stickers and the NRN roof pod provided in an accessory pack.

Northern Rail

Running numbers & destinations featured:

142062 (55712+55758) Carlisle / Lancaster
142070 (55720+55766) Bishop Auckland / Saltburn

Rounding off the first run of the Accurascale ‘Pacer’ fleet is a pair of Northern Rail units, once ubiquitous from the late 2000s almost anywhere between Chester / Sheffield and Carlisle / Newcastle. 79 members of the Serco-Abellio operated fleet carried the purple/blue/grey livery, although sadly none received promotional vinyls like several of the company’s Class 150, 156 and 158 DMUs. The Northern fleet was complicated by bringing together units that had been refurbished to different levels by various predecessors, including several different seating configurations.

For the first run, we will be focussing on units that have retained their classic Leyland bus-style 2+3 seating. Ex-First North Western 142062, one of 12 sets to return to the South West in 2007, represents the first half of the Northern era. Based at Newton Heath it gained this livery in 2009 and was scrapped in at EMR Kingsbury in January 2020. 142070 was another of the FNW units to briefly see service in the Exeter area in 2007/8.

Also repainted Northern in 2009, our model of this ‘Pacer’ wears the additional bicycle and disabled stickers applied to the hopper vents and other later warning labels. Both sets also feature the extra cab front louvre, plated roof heating vents, factory-installed NRN roof pods and sanding equipment.

 

PRE-ORDER YOUR MODELS TODAY

 

 

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[DJ Dangerous]

Is / was there any connection between the Class 142 and the NIR railbus?

[Galteemore]

The 5 LEVs, of which RB1 was one, played a part in the genesis of the Pacers. One of the LEVs is apparently still in Ireland, part of the abortive UK gauge line near Dundalk 

[DJ Dangerous]

The faces look quite different on the 142’s, but they still have that Leyland National spirit.

[Mol_PMB]

11 minutes ago, DJ Dangerous said:

The faces look quite different on the 142’s, but they still have that Leyland National spirit.

I'd rather drink Meths than Leyland National spirit. The buses were bad enough, but the Pacers - Ugh! 

Those of you that moan about commuting on 450s or 29000s don't know how good you had it - the 142s were truly dreadful and I couldn't wait to see them destroyed. Out of principle I won't visit a heritage railway that has one. Needless to say I won't be troubling Accurascale's order book on this project.

[Westcorkrailway]

17 hours ago, Mol_PMB said:

I'd rather drink Meths than Leyland National spirit. The buses were bad enough, but the Pacers - Ugh! 

Those of you that moan about commuting on 450s or 29000s don't know how good you had it - the 142s were truly dreadful and I couldn't wait to see them destroyed. Out of principle I won't visit a heritage railway that has one. Needless to say I won't be troubling Accurascale's order book on this project.

Infairness, there are people on here who traveled in AEC/C class push pulls in the early 1980s which must have been equal or (probobly) worse the any 142! 

[Mol_PMB]

7 minutes ago, Westcorkrailway said:

Infairness, there are people on here who traveled in AEC/C class push pulls in the early 1980s which must have been equal or (probobly) worse the any 142! 

I will concede that. 

One of the many bad features of the 142s for commuter services was that they simply weren't big enough, and were usually badly overcrowded to the point of leaving people behind to wait for 30 or 60 minutes for the next one. And I gather the same was often true on the CIE suburban services in the dark days pre-DART. When they were that full, 142s stopped being 'bouncy castles' because they were hard down on their bumpstops and every irregularity in the track was transmitted directly into the bodyshell. 

Personally I don't have the mental scars of the 1970s push-pulls and with the benefit of my rose-tinted spectacles I'd be delighted to buy models of AEC railcars and C class locos!

[Galteemore]

As one who recalls both in service , the AECs were a good design allowed to fall into decrepitude. The Pacers were a bad design allowed to go into production! 

 

[Westcorkrailway]

21 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

I will concede that. 

One of the many bad features of the 142s for commuter services was that they simply weren't big enough, and were usually badly overcrowded to the point of leaving people behind to wait for 30 or 60 minutes for the next one. And I gather the same was often true on the CIE suburban services in the dark days pre-DART. When they were that full, 142s stopped being 'bouncy castles' because they were hard down on their bumpstops and every irregularity in the track was transmitted directly into the bodyshell. 

Personally I don't have the mental scars of the 1970s push-pulls and with the benefit of my rose-tinted spectacles I'd be delighted to buy models of AEC railcars and C class locos!

I’d buy those models too, in silver and green, fore the C class got good and before the AECs became miserable 

[Horsetan]

1 hour ago, Galteemore said:

As one who recalls both in service , the AECs were a good design allowed to fall into decrepitude. The Pacers were a bad design allowed to go into production! 

 

The Pacers were cheap to build, which is why they came into existence. Using a bus body on a rail underframe was no different to what the LMS, GNRI, CDRJC and others had done in the past. Even the various small single-unit diesel railcars introduced by BR in the 1950s/1960s share the same philosophy. What could be simpler than a 4-wheel chassis?

Back in the mid-1980s, the 142 Pacers were enough to inspire Railway Modeller to run a scratchbuild competition. The winning model 142 I remember being a superb effort - finer than Hornby's eventual RTR model.

[Galteemore]

Irish railways had basically abandoned railbuses by the 50s as outdated technology, preferring more advanced designs such as the Walker railcars. BRs adoption of the concept seemed a rather retrograde step. 

[Horsetan]

31 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

Irish railways had basically abandoned railbuses by the 50s as outdated technology, preferring more advanced designs such as the Walker railcars. BRs adoption of the concept seemed a rather retrograde step. 

BR were trying, by various degrees, to make some branchlines - East Anglian ones in particular - viable, or rather less lossmaking than had been the case with steam, so anything that was cheap to procure and capable of carrying low-volume passenger traffic (and it was very low volume for some routes, with some services regularly failing to reach double figures in terms of passengers carried) at relatively low cost had to be a goer.

That was good news for AC, Park Royal and Waggon und Maschinenbau in particular, all of whom turned out 4-wheel railbuses.

[Galteemore]

10 minutes ago, Horsetan said:

BR were trying, by various degrees, to make some branchlines - East Anglian ones in particular - viable, or rather less lossmaking than had been the case with steam, so anything that was cheap to procure and capable of carrying low-volume passenger traffic (and it was very low volume for some routes, with some services regularly failing to reach double figures in terms of passengers carried) at relatively low cost had to be a goer.

That was good news for AC, Park Royal and Waggon und Maschinenbau in particular, all of whom turned out 4-wheel railbuses.

No I meant BR’s adoption of Pacers! The 1950s BR railbuses were a sensible solution to an Irish style problem. The 1980s ones weren’t 

[Horsetan]

17 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

No I meant BR’s adoption of Pacers! The 1950s BR railbuses were a sensible solution to an Irish style problem. The 1980s ones weren’t 

Ah.

[Mol_PMB]

The contemporary Sprinters were a good train for both commuter and rural services and are still earning their keep on such duties. I've no complaints about a class 150, I was on one yesterday and probably will be again this evening and tomorrow. Even the prototypes are still in service - here's my snap of 150002 at Huddersfield on Monday this week, now 42 years old:

But the 142s were just dreadful. 

In their early years they had a host of mechanical problems and the 'cheap' advantage was soon lost when they needed new engines, transmissions, doors etc... None of that solved the cheapness of the passenger accommodation with 2+3 seating crammed into a narrow bodyshell with no legroom, single-glazed windows with inadequate insulation, heating and ventilation, not enough doors, terrible ride quality, and just simply not big enough. An effort at heating was made by piping the engine coolant circuit up to the roof pod, but it used to leak and the floor would sometimes be a puddle of blue coolant. It soaked into the seats too, which wasn't always obvious on the dark blue moquette - until you sat down. The roofs leaked and they often had a horrible musty smell with moss or mould growing inside. Once I even saw an 8" high seedling flourishing in an inaccessible damp corner inside the vehicle! In the later years internal repairs usually involved gaffer tape, cable ties and if you were lucky, self-tapping screws inserted with a hammer.

The only people who liked them were the Newton Heath fitters, officially because they were so basic that there wasn't much to go wrong. But the real reason was because they could rearrange the seat squabs into a bed and sleep through the night shift. I'm sure that had nothing to do with their deteriorating condition. 

I see that AS have mis-spelt 'Horrors' in the thread title.

 

 

[Northroader]

How are they being done? A two car pair, presumably, but is it model power car and trailer, or two power cars?

One story went that the compressed air system originally powered the toilet feed, and if the toilet was flushed, you lost the brakes, but that must have been an exaggeration. We had a prototype in, but nobody said it was a double battery layout, with the engine start having its own system (it beats the cleaners leaving the lights on overnight) Soo… the charger went on the obvious socket on the one side, like all the other sets we had, and when the nobs turned up next day for a demo run, they couldn’t start the engines.

Edited April 22 by Northroader

[GSR 800]

3 hours ago, Mol_PMB said:

The contemporary Sprinters were a good train for both commuter and rural services and are still earning their keep on such duties. I've no complaints about a class 150, I was on one yesterday and probably will be again this evening and tomorrow. Even the prototypes are still in service - here's my snap of 150002 at Huddersfield on Monday this week, now 42 years old:

But the 142s were just dreadful. 

In their early years they had a host of mechanical problems and the 'cheap' advantage was soon lost when they needed new engines, transmissions, doors etc... None of that solved the cheapness of the passenger accommodation with 2+3 seating crammed into a narrow bodyshell with no legroom, single-glazed windows with inadequate insulation, heating and ventilation, not enough doors, terrible ride quality, and just simply not big enough. An effort at heating was made by piping the engine coolant circuit up to the roof pod, but it used to leak and the floor would sometimes be a puddle of blue coolant. It soaked into the seats too, which wasn't always obvious on the dark blue moquette - until you sat down. The roofs leaked and they often had a horrible musty smell with moss or mould growing inside. Once I even saw an 8" high seedling flourishing in an inaccessible damp corner inside the vehicle! In the later years internal repairs usually involved gaffer tape, cable ties and if you were lucky, self-tapping screws inserted with a hammer.

The only people who liked them were the Newton Heath fitters, officially because they were so basic that there wasn't much to go wrong. But the real reason was because they could rearrange the seat squabs into a bed and sleep through the night shift. I'm sure that had nothing to do with their deteriorating condition. 

I see that AS have mis-spelt 'Horrors' in the thread title.

 

 

The coolant leaking from the roof is giving me nightmares thinking about it, the smell must've been atrocious.

The 29s have a problem with coolant leaking into the underfloor due to burst seals and overfilling, one of the reasons their floating floors have needed replacement, getting rotted from the bottom up. The smell is absolutely shocking. Significantly worse around the WCs, I'll leave that to the imagination...