Back to BR Locomotives

Class 14

Class 15 BTH

Class 16

Class 17 Clayton

Class 20 EE Type 1

Class 21

Class 22

Class 23 'Baby Deltic'

Class 24 Derby Type 2

Class 25 Derby Type 2

Class 26

Class 27

Class 28

Class 29

Class 30 Brush Type 2

Class 31 Brush Type 2

Class 33 BRCW Type 3

Class 35 'Hymek'

Class 37 EE Type 3

Class 40 EE Type 4

Class 41 'Warship'

Class 42 'Warship'

Class 43 'Warship'

Class 44 'Peak'

Class 45

Class 46

Class 47 Brush Type 4

Class 48 Brush Type 4

Class 50 EE Type 5

Class 52 'Western'

Class 53 'Falcon'

Class 55 'Deltic'

Class 56

Class 57

Class 58

Class 59

Class 60

Class 66

Class 67

Class 68

Class 70

The Class 56 was ordered in the early 1970's to fulfil a need for a Type 5 heavy freight locomotive. The first 30 were built by Electroputere in Romania due to capacity problems in BREL's own works. The remainder were mainly built at Doncaster with the last few being built at Crewe. In all, 135 were built. Withdrawals started in 1991 and by 2020, some 35 are still in service and three are preserved.

My model is the Hornby DCC Fitted version in original Corporate Blue livery numbered 56 013. As such, this makes it one of the Romanian built batch. The model is to a very high standard and shows just what Hornby can do when it has a mind to. The model is quite heavy and has the now standard central can motor driving both bogies through gear towers. Performance is smooth and powerful, as you would expect. Two novel features are the opening cab doors and rotating fans. The only problem with the fans is, as they are driven off the motor, that they only rotate when the locomotive is moving and reverse rotation when the locomotive goes the other way! The side grilles are well rendered with the internal detail visible. The only point of criticism is the rendering of the roof fan grilles, they are not quite right.

Hornby do offer a DCC Ready and DCC sound version, but it has the ESU sound chip. Hopefully they will release a cheaper TTS version at some stage. It would be nice to have a sound version as I remember these loco's screaming by with long Merry-Go-Round coal trains.

A great model with lots of fine detail and performance.

Mainline Railways did a Class 56 many years ago which although good for its time, was let down by a poorly performing motor. Cavalex Models announced in June 2021 a Class 56 to be produced in all variants.