Zinc pest is accelerated immensely by humidity. If you want to presrve your collection its very important to store them properly. Make sure yiur bathroom extractor fan is efficient. Allow for air changes in the house for parts of the day even and especially in winter. And most of all If you're other half lazily dries washing indoors, or airs it on the radiators then sack her 😂😂😂😂. If you catch it soon enough you can try oxalic pickling followed by hot oil dip or a decent enamel paint to seal the surface. There is a long list on rmweb of known affected models and all main manufacturers have suffered at one time or another. The big worry though is you typically dont know a model will suffer until years have passed.... So as i said...store carefully. Keep a humidity display nearby. Or seal in tupperware with dessicant

Hi Nigel, your videos are very entertaining and constructive. Keep up the good work!

Now that's a clever little jig old chap, well done! I admire your problem solving - I'll have to nick that idea for later on!😊😊

Thanks for sharing this video, J

Must phone the missus. As usual Nige....your dry humour had me in stitches 😂

It's kind of amazing that a Triang Railways power bogie casting, fabricated back in the 1950's, will have zero Mazak rot. Yet, a recently made Chinese fabricated Hornby loco will be riddled with Mazak rot. One can only conclude that Britain's 1950's Mazak metallurgy was vastly superior to the present day Chinese equivalent.

Great video , very well explained operation, looking forward to the next part , there are other KZfaq Channels that spoiled by the back ground Music been too Loud I think a lot don’t realise this , the speech audio on your videos is spot on , keep up the great work & interesting videos. 👍

It’s always nice to see these knackered things returned from the brink of destruction; I find it surprising how nobody seems to have made a replacement block for this model. They’re everywhere, with rot being inevitable, and some can’t be saved. Someone could become very rich if they made a new block! In regard to rot itself, it’s affecting so much now. I had an axel on an old Hornby class 90 crumble on me a few months ago, and I’ve heard a story of a friend’s friend whose mint condition Dinky Toys Daimler - worth thousands - had shattered into crumbs when the poor old boy knocked it off a shelf! It’s made me so paranoid that I actively avoid diecast items.

Nice , yes I had Mazak rot on the engine mounting on my T9 managed to get new one ,runs like a good one now. Like your commitment to these locos 😊

Brilliant. Thanks for showing this. I am considering using this for all Hornby chassis mounted coupling arrangements (31s, 50s, 56s and 60s) as it will stop the derailing problems.

Very interesting, I have 4 older heljan 47s 3 are fine one has succumb to mazak rot, yours series will give me an idea on how to tackle it 👍

Thanks for posting this video. The NEM drawbar can be replaced by one that works properly from a company called Keen Systems. Their products are advertised regularly in the Railway Modeller mag. Only own one Hornby 31 with Mazak rot. Hopefully your videos will heip me fix mine.

Excellent video as always Nigel. As you know, the mazac rot was not exclusively Hornby. I had four Austrian Klein Modelbahn diesels which were wrecked in exactly the same way - cab corners split. I have a Hornby 31111 which i haven't dare look at for the last ten years, but maybe your series of videos will be a real help. Thanks as always for your really useful content

I have also one 31 which got it. Still have to tackle that one. Other models I own were continental models of the Kleinbahn brand of the Belgian class 60 locomotives, 4 of them which all had zinc pest. I managed to repair these using replacement chassis not being similar replacement Kleinbahn chassis as I couldn't trust these not also to rot, but chassis of a Roco starter set locomotive of the German class 215 or the rather crude Belgian class 59 from the same brand using the same chassis. The bogie pivots happened to be at the exact same distance as it used to be on the original chassis. By filing a bit off the sides the fitted well in the Kleinbahn bodies and fitted a few pieces of styrene strips in the body to seat it at the proper height. The cosmetic sole bars of the Kleinbahn model were permanently glued to the new chassis and the bogie sides also fitted with some styrene spacers to the Roco bogies. The other main advantage of the Roco chassis and drive is that it uses a central motor with cardan shafts, where the Kleinbahn had two motors, each bogie one, which often caused problems if one of the bogies had wheel slip. All just to show that there is often a way around not only to repair models even if you can't find original replacement parts or don't trust them, and even improve running characteristics, by just using other models you have lying around or can be picked up very cheaply at swap meets.

Good evening Mr train man. I’ve got a Hornby 31 still in its box that’s been packed away for over 3 years 😮 I hope it’s ok 🤔 Great video as always cheers Stevie 👍🏻

Great video, looking forward to the next one

Hey 👋 great to see you working on the class 31 again. I've rescued a few but nowhere near what you have done. I'd like to find a better option for powering the lights than the naff mechanism that is shipped with.

I had two Hornby 9f’s and Thompson L1 that suffered from mazak rot . I was lucky enough to source replacement parts though.

I am looking forward to the rest of this series, I loved the original video and rewatched it several times. I have a model of 31110 in the projects box as a cheap source of spares as the chassis seems to be crumbling completely. I have wondered if a 3D printed replacement chassis block would work, it would be light, but I am sure weight could be accomodated somewhere.

Did you mean out with Polos? Pola? Patios? Or did you go out with Paula? 😂

Is it me or do the bogies of the Hornby class 31 always seem to ‘splay’ I’ve cut plastic strips and glued the inner ends together, but that doesn’t always hold…. Then I started using the paper Qtips cut to size and these seem to absorb the super glue nicely and hold permanently. Wicked bit of bogie work there Nigel. Did you put this as ‘not for kids’ lol👍

Onboard for this series. I was always told that Mazak rot was “invented” in the Mechano factory in Liverpool in the 20s when someone kicked a bottle top into a crucible of molten metal. That’s what it’s about - poor quality control in the manufacturing process.

Love that comment ! must remind me i must ring the wife ! 😂😂😁🙂👍

Fantastic episode, by the way, what did your wife say when you phoned her 😉

Cheat like I have and run Tri ang no need to do this Airfix and Lima have no problems on there class 31s either 🤔

Hornby will still gladly sell you mazatrot trains today ,they couldn't care less, when they moved to China that when the problem started, I have dozens of hornby trains in boxes with mazatrot, and loads of my 1.50 scale corgi lorries have gone in the bin, they knew about this 20 years ago they did nothing about it then and they will do nothing about it now, look around youtube customers with model trains less than 18 months old coming on there channels with the same thing today, 18 months goes beyond there warranty and they will not help you, hornby should be ashamed, hornby get a grip and at least change the customers models that have mazatrot , I think there rolling stock is OK or less some one else knows different , I once knew a model shop dealer in the northeast that showed me boxes , and boxes of chassis with mazatrot mind some where helljan to, but not as many as hornby, I think that's one of the reasons the shop went bust customers keep bringing stuff back and the poor man trying to repair them ,hornby please do the right thing and replace the customers trains with mazatrot, or you may find you go bust to

hattons are trying to sell some of these for 80quid in their closing down sale 80!

Good old Zinc pest , i thought that went out with polo ?