TPO Post Office Mail Van Set (Hornby Dublo 2400)

Exhibit
TPO Post Office Mail Van Set (Hornby Dublo 2400) (i)
location:
Arch Four , Area 37 Hornby Wall (display)
Shelf 10

1957: Full-page colour advert in Meccano Magazine [image info]

A T.P.O. Post Office Mail Van Set (2400), with original retail box.

The set consists of a red Royal Mail mailcoach with yellow lining, a trackside mail pickup and dropoff station with shed, and a special section of track that activates the mailbag transfer mechanism.

Catalogue image, 1959

Hornby Dublo 2400 and 3400 TPO Mail Van Sets, composited 1959 catalogue image

Catalogue text, 1959

" All the thrills of the exchange of mails can be experienced in miniature by the Hornby-Dublo owner, for the system includes a splendid reproduction of a typical bogie T.P.O. Mail Van, two in fact, one for two-rail operation and the other for three-rail. With this and the lineside apparatus designed in each case specifically for working with it, the exchange of miniature mail bags is easy and yet thrilling.

The Lineside Apparatus includes a length of standard rail, in both two-raill and three-rail systems, so that it can easily be inserted in standard track. There is a short contact rail alongside, and all that the operator has to do, once he has hung a Hornby-Dublo Mail Bag on the standard ready for collection, is to press a Push Button Switch as the T.P.O. Mail Van approaches and to keep it pressed until it has passed. One sharp rap announces that a Mail Bag in the Van has been thrown out into the metal box in the Lineside apparatus that represents the ground collecting net, provided of course that one has been previously picked up and is waiting in the Van, and a second that the Mail Bag has been collected by the net on the Van.

Part numbers

The T.P.O. Mail Van set and components were originally designated just "D1" ("D" for "Dublo", and "1" to designate a default or "No.1" version).

By 1959, the appearance of parallel two-rail and three-rail versions of items required a more sophisticated catalogue numbering scheme and Dublo items were assigned new ID numbers.

Three-rail (original version)

• 3400 T.P.O. Mail Van Set (D1)
• 3401 T.P.O. Mail Van only (D1)
• 3475 T.P.O. Lineside Apparatus (D1)

Two-rail

• 2400 T.P.O. Mail Van Set
• 2401 T.P.O. Mail Van only
• 2475 T.P.O. Lineside Apparatus

1963 catalogue listing