Tri-ang Model Railways

This Site is dedicated to Tri-ang Railways. This range of products was manufactured between 1950 and 1965 in the United Kingdom, by the Lines Brothers group of companies. The main factory was at Margate in the South East of England. For many this range was the affordable introduction into the world of Model Railways

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©D L McCarthy 2011

Site Introduction

Tri-ang Railways 1950-1965

Dave McCarthy, Cardiff, Wales, UK

January 2011 Site under revision. 2008 introduction below.

The Site is now over 500 Megs and there are over 28,000 files in it.

It was mainly created when we all used Dial-up modems and all the files were kept small for reasonable download speeds. By today's standards the images are rather small and 'poor' quality, but the Site is too large to start trying to improve this, so I hope you will still enjoy the contents which I believe provide the most comprehensive source of information on Tri-ang trains on the Web.

Regards to All,

Dave

 

Greetings, and welcome to my site.

 

Revised January 2008

The site is now nine years old, having been first created in March 1999 (My original introductions are shown below)

The Site has grown out of all proportion and now consists of nearly 2,000 Pages and Eight Thousand Pictures. It is made up of four main sections. Tri-ang OO, Tri-ang TT, Tri-ang Big Big Trains  and Tri-ang Minic Motorways.

The Site is completely my own, and is done for no commercial gain. It is purely my attempt to share my hobby and interest with others and try and provide a photographic record of the products manufactured under the Tri-ang Railways and associated lines. 

It has been joined with a New Site on Airfix Model Railways and Railway Kits.

The number of visitors from all over the world to the Site has grown and grown. It is staggering to me to find that I have had so many from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa, all places that Tri-ang / Lines Bros. had factories, and where the memories are obviously still there. To all of you I say WELCOME and THANKS for visiting the site, it gives me great encouragement to continue.

Many people contacted me. Unfortunately, so many that I fail to reply to a lot of them. MY APOLOGIES TO YOU ALL.  The Guest Book has been a help in this.

I have made many new friends and acquaintances through the site, many, too many for me to mention,  have helped me develop techniques and ideas for improvements. I am always looking out for ideas, so if you have any, please let me know.

Most of the photographs on the Site are taken by me using a Digital Camera which has made all the difference. Many people have been very kind and let me photograph items for the site, in fact many people have brought along items for me to include. I have also been sent many images for me to include.

There are a few images which I have acquired from a variety of unknown sources and I have included them to try and provide a comprehensive guide  My THANKS to any unknown contributors. If any of these are yours and I have been unable to contact you then please let me know and I shall obviously credit you or remove them if you wish, please remember they are only used to share information with other Enthusiasts about the Tri-ang products. Please e-mail me.  Again thanks to all.

 

Thanks and best wishes for now, Dave.

 

 

Original introduction 1999:-

This is my first attempt at creating a Web Site, thus combining two of my interests, Collecting Tri-ang Railways and computing. The Tri-ang Railways side of the interest (obsession!) started with a ubiquitous Princess train set for Christmas 1960. Then followed long periods of Catalogue thumbing, unfortunately without the finance to do anything about it. Then I grew up, or so I thought at the time, the train set vanished, fortunately only to the loft.

Pat Hammond's excellent book, "The Story of Rovex, Volume 1 1950-1965", then became my downfall. As soon as I picked it up I was hooked. 30+ years just disappeared. I was back to "Catalogue thumbing" in a big way. I had always gone to Swapmeets being interested in a variety of Die-cast toys. Some how, although the Tri-ang items had always been there, I suddenly saw them.

Now two to three years later, I am into Tri-ang Railways in a big way. Finance whilst being better than in the 60's is still limited so I don't collect Mint Boxed, but scour the swapmeets for good condition items. I enjoy this much more than having enough money to buy it when I see it and usually if I wait long enough one will turn up in fair condition at a reasonable price.

Pat Hammond's book is invaluable as a source for reference for all the variations, and the other items as well as rolling stock. So much so that his details of the Tri-ang layouts for shops lead me to building my own.  I decided to build it using standard track throughout, rather than the mix of standard and series 3 as in the original. The search to make it totally accurate led me to spend a long time looking for items not usually prized. The missing items in the pictures, Early Engine Shed, and original Curved Sidewalls have now been found and the layout is now Exhibited complete.

My interest in computers has lead to me using the scanner to intake pages from rather tatty originals and photo retouch. Some samples are attached, unfortunately to make them small enough for the Site the quality is rather poor, but reducing from 20+ Megs to 50k is bound to take its toll.

Enough of an introduction, I hope if you find this you may find it interesting, any feedback/advice would be appreciated.

Dave McCarthy

 

 

 

Revised October 2003

The site is now four and a half  years old, having been first created in March 1999 (My original introductions are shown below)

The Site has grown out of all proportion and now consists of over 1,700 Pages and Six Thousand Pictures. It is made up of four main sections. Tri-ang OO, Tri-ang TT, Tri-ang Big Big Trains  and Tri-ang Minic Motorways.

The Site is completely my own, and is done for no commercial gain. It is purely my attempt to share my hobby and interest with others and try and provide a photographic record of the products manufactured under the Tri-ang Railways and associated lines. 

The number of visitors from all over the world to the Site has grown and grown. It is staggering to me to find that I have had so many from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and South Africa, all places that Tri-ang / Lines Bros. had factories, and where the memories are obviously still there. To all of you I say WELCOME and THANKS for visiting the site, it gives me great encouragement to continue.

Many people contacted me. Unfortunately, so many that I fail to reply to a lot of them. MY APOLOGIES TO YOU ALL.  The Guest Book has been a help in this.

I have made many new friends and acquaintances through the site, many, too many for me to mention,  have helped me develop techniques and ideas for improvements. I am always looking out for ideas, so if you have any, please let me know.

Most of the photographs on the Site are taken by me using a Digital Camera which has made all the difference. Many people have been very kind and let me photograph items for the site, in fact many people have brought along items for me to include. I have also been sent many images for me to include.

There are a few images which I have acquired from a variety of unknown sources and I have included them to try and provide a comprehensive guide  My THANKS to any unknown contributors. If any of these are yours and I have been unable to contact you then please let me know and I shall obviously credit you or remove them if you wish, please remember they are only used to share information with other Enthusiasts about the Tri-ang products. Please e-mail me.  Again thanks to all.

I have to record a BIG BIG THANK YOU to DEREK GARDNER in Australia, the owner of Tri-ang.com, who has provided me with the facilities to Host my site and develop it to the size it now is.

Thanks and best wishes for now, Dave.