Trix Twin Railway : Model History in Pictures 1935 to 1937

Photos of every Trix item made with catalogue numbers

© Copyright 2004-2011 Garry Lefevre all rights reserved

Home Page : Trix-Twin

Part I

1935 to 1937

In this period

· Trix Express the first 00 gauge model railway in the World

· TTR introduced at the British Industries Fair in 1936

· Trix Train models in LMS, LNER and Southern Railway liveries with catalogue numbers

· The first attempt at a scale model of the “Portsmouth train” in 00

· From wooden buildings to metal Manyways stations

· Also known as Twin Trains

1935 the beginning ....

On Sunday 3^rd March 1935 the World of 00 gauge model railways began. This new smaller scale system was first presented at the Leipzig Trade Fair by the Vereinigte Spielwaren-Fabriken, (the United Toy Factory). The name of their new smaller model railway was called Trix Express. A year later this was to become “TRIX TWIN” in the UK. More about this exhibition and the very first 1935 newspaper advertisement, (February 1935), for Trix model railways and latter ones can be seen on the links : For the exhibition 1935 Exhibition layouts and for the first newspaper ads : – Advertisements for Trix.

Prior to this date model railways were 0 gauge or even larger. Whilst experiments had been made as early as 1912 by Märklin, (this was nearer to “S” gauge) it was not a success because of the unreliability of the small electric motors at that time. In the 1920’s the Bing table top railway was a success as clockwork models and latter a few electric engines were introduced. But the system was very toy like. The company producing these went bankrupt in the 1930’s following the Wall Street crash. But the originator Stephan Bing joined with Siegfried Kahn, ( the inventor of the Twin running system as recorded by the British Patent office), to build on their experience and develop a more comprehensive 00 system. They bought into a company - the Vereinigte Spielwaren-Fabriken – partly for this purpose. The company already had a Meccano style construction set with the name TRIX. Hence the name chosen TRIX EXPRESS for these new model trains.

Above the very first Trix train on the very first public layout shown on the 3^rd March 1935 in Leipzig.

Note the coaches have windows on the ends and the track is not the black colour later used. These were prototypes and were modified before production in the summer of 1935.

Example similar to the original track produced in early 1950 by Trix for an exhibition.

From the beginning the company presented a complete system, a locomotive, coaches, goods wagons, a variety of track, buildings and accessories.

Throughout the development of Trix trains another influential person was Wynne Bassett Lowke both before and after 1935. He and Stephan Bing had known each other since 1900 when Bing started to manufacture English outline 0 gauge trains for export to England. Bassett Lowke was mainly a mail order business with a couple of retail shops. Most of the items he sold were not manufactured by his company but produced exclusively by others for his distribution in the UK. The main suppliers were, Bing, Carette and Märklin. He had been in constant discussions with Bing and Kahn during the development stages. He now wished to import these into England and persuaded Bing to repaint the German 0-4-0 from black to green for the English market so as to be able to sell it as a “Southern” style loco with 3 German coaches also in a modified green colour. The catalogue described the set as in “correct Southern Railway Green”. The loco did not have “Southern Railway” on the tender as you would expect but “Trix Express” although the picture in the catalogue shows it as “Twin Train”, both versions have the number 5391

Catalogue nr. 11/2

On all the tenders you can see underneath the word “Trix” the word ”Twin” so it was clearly overwritten at the factory. Yet the word “Express” has not been over written. Trade photographs exist showing the loco with “Twin Express” on the tender, clearly a last minute change.

Catalogue nr. 11/1

The same green loco was used in the Goods set, with one covered van, one open truck, one shell tank wagon, and one goods van. All the wagons were unchanged German stock described in the English catalogue simply as “Finished in correct colours”, what ever that meant!

Both sets were sold in similar boxes, only the insert to support the coaches or goods wagons was different.

The loco above is the black one for the German market

They came with 4 straight rails and 12 curves, a controller, 6 plugs, and an instruction book. Transformers had to be bought separately a necessity as mains electricity varied in different parts of the country.

In the UK Bassett Lowke was the principal importer and promoter of these new trains. Evidence exists to show that Hamleys Toy shop in Regent Street, London imported direct not only trains but other toy products of the German company. Bassett-Lowke for the first few years always referred to these as the “Twin Trains” or “Twin Train Table Railway”. The Bassett Lowke’s own catalogue and a special one he printed for these new trains never uses the name Trix anywhere in the catalogue. However the Hamleys Xmas 1935 catalogue used the name Trix Express through out.

Above the two catalogues issued in 1935, selling the same trains but with different names !

The price for the complete passenger train was just £2 and the goods set 35/- or £ 1-75. Probably about £100 in today’s money The bogie coaches were also different for the English market lacking the German markings but still in green. Goods wagons were no different

The ins The inside of the first 1935 catalogue, shows mainly items available to the German market with some changes. The loco for England was in green whereas in Germany it was in black. The green tender in the catalogue shows:-

The station called “Trixstadt” in Germany was renamed “Twin City” for the UK

The design of the station was based on an ‘O’ gauge station made by Bassett-Lowke some years earlier ( photo below of the 1932 model). This was designed by Henry Greenly working with the principle architect of the London Underground. The station is very similar to the designs one sees where the trains run above ground in the London suburbs. The 00 German stations had a round clock face with a flag on the tower, whereas the English version from 1936 had a square face and no flag, not withstanding the picture in the catalogue.

Above the 0 gauge station : even the blue line under the roof is copied on the Trix Express 00 station

The very first wooden buildings in 1935 were painted in a pale green colour, this was only for a short time before the colour was changed to pale cream.

Above are the four initial buildings shown at Leipzig in March 1935. By September the engine shed had grown higher and longer to accommodate the pantographs on the 0-4-0 electric loco introduced in the autumn. Thus the early small green engine shed was made for a very short time less than 4 months.

To see more of these and other buildings in the Trix range from 1935 to 1954 see the link to - TTR Buildings

Other items imported into England in 1935 were :-

The coach on the left was only imported by Hamleys described as a Pullman car Catalogue nr. 21/153.

The suburban coach in both catalogues was the German Catalogue nr. 21/103

It is a puzzle why the red Mitropa was chosen and not the wagons lits with the words in English “ Dining car”

Aside from the goods wagons in the sets, four other wagons were imported, a Brake van (Catalogue nr. 21/163), an open truck without load, Catalogue nr. 21/61, ( the one in the set is with coal Catalogue nr 21/67), a Timber wagon (Catalogue nr 21/69) a Tarpaulin wagon (Catalogue nr 21/66). The first of these was the German long covered van which looks nothing like a brake van. The popular “Jamaican banana” wagon was not imported until 1936, probably why it is a scarce item for collectors today.

The telegraph pole ( 21/234) was in both catalogues

The Hamleys’ catalogue also shows the mile stones ((21/233).

The runaway success of these autumn imports meant they were sold out well before Xmas. Bassett Lowke realised if English out line models were made he would have a winning product to sell. So with agreement of Stephan Bing in late 1935 he commissioned Henry Greenly to design English outline stock to put onto the German chassis for both locos and rolling stock. Track, controllers etc would continue to be imported from Germany.

Already in 1932 the German company had set up a UK subsidiary – Trix Ltd – in London with Franz Bing ( Stephan’s son) as director. The company was used to market and produce locally Trix construction sets. For this purpose a Northampton company was chosen - Winteringham Ltd, a company associated with Bassett Lowke Ltd. It was now this company that was asked to produce the English out line trains.

A second development was to ask Winteringham to produce the wooden buildings also instead of importing them from Germany. The company was already producing the larger 0 gauge station and island platform for Bassett Lowke. The design of the goods shed was changed and the engine shed changed by Henry Greenly. All were now painted in a more realistic concrete colour of pale yellow.

The scene was set to introduce the new line at the British Industries Fair in the spring of 1936

1936

The success of the introduction in 1935 led to a decision early in 1936 to start using the “Trix” name together with the word “Twin”, (capitalising on the publicity of the launch of “Twin sets”). It was hoped this would be accepted by Bassett Lowke so he would drop the Twin Train Table Railway label he was using in his publicity. But he was stubborn and went on using his own preferred name right up to 1939 with Trix Ltd using the name Trix Twin on all their boxes, literature and advertisements. Indeed there are magazines where the same item is being shown in two different advertisements one with the name “Trix Twin” and the other with “ Twin Trains” !

To see more of these first newspaper ads click on – Advertisements for Trix.

Clearly to design, tool up, and produce models would take time. The target was the Xmas market when 60% of sales occurred each year between end of October and December. Thus in the early part of 1936 the German models continued to be imported. The only significant change was to the wheels of the loco, which changed from the flat disc type to spokes. The English ones were in black whereas the German ones were in red.

The new models were unveiled at the British Industries Fair on 22 February 1936. The Queen visited the Fair that day and there are pictures on Pathe Cinema News of her looking at the Trix stand.

View of the layout at the British Industries Fair, BIF in 1936

The 1936 Catalogue showed this layout with the buildings, signals and yard lamp

The loco has disc wheels ! Probably because the improved spooked wheel version had not been produced in time, to import and fit it to the English outline body.

Other new items in this picture are the yard lamp, the footbridge and the signals.

To see more of these and other buildings in the Trix range from 1935 to 1960 see the link to - TTR Buildings

From the autumn of 1936 one could buy the first “TRIX TWIN” models in the liveries of LMS ( London Midland Scottish) and LNER ( London North Eastern Railway). Southern Railway fans had to wait until 1937. GWR models were planned but the railway company refused permission to use their name as they thought the locos too unrealistic. This ban lasted until the late 1950’s when the 0-6-2 tank and some scale coaches were produced.

3 sets for each livery were produced :-

LMS Suburban set. Catalogue nr 2/315

The LMS Express Passenger set Catalogue nr 2/335

The set had two brake third coaches and a first class coach. The photo above shows a restaurant car in place of the second brake 3^rd.

The LMS Goods set. Catalogue nr 2/325

LNER Suburban set Catalogue nr.4/315

LNER Express Passenger set Catalogue nr .4/335

The set had two brake third coaches and a first class coach. The photo above shows a restaurant car in place of the second brake 3^rd.

LNER Goods set Catalogue nr 4/325

In addition other goods wagons were produced

The good sets were sold with different assortments of wagons. Each had a guards van but could have any other 3 wagons.

Sets were sold in long red boxes, whilst individual items were sold in plane buff coloured boxes. Note some of the labels had “TTR Trix Twin Railway”, whilst others had “TTR Bassett Lowke”. It is known that Bassett Lowke employed two ladies to stick his labels on Trix boxes. At the time of writing ( March 2010) one of these ladies in her 90’s is still alive living in Northampton. This continued until the late 1940’s when red boxes were used for single items and reference to Bassett Lowke dropped.

These early sets were sold with track. Track was the same bakelite type originally sold with the 1935 TE sets. The catalogue below shows the track available.

It is worth noting there was no picture of the half curve although it was listed and the buffer rail is different from that actually produced.

Before leaving 1936 it is worth reflecting on a photo taken at a commercial fair of a TTR layout showing a mysterious 0-4-0 in the outline of a Southern suburban motorised coach. Could this have been a prototype that never got into production? The German small 4 wheel green coaches were imported as “Southern suburban coaches”, so a loco would have been an idea to go with them.

The same photo shows a GWR wagon and a SR wagon not put into production.

A reproduction of the mysterious loco in the above picture has been made by Ton Jongen of the Netherlands.

It is shown below complete with disc wheels.

1937

This was the year with steady development of new models based on those started in 1936. Early in the year Trix Twin added the livery of Southern Railway to the existing LMS and LNER range with the introduction of a passenger and a freight train.

Southern Railway Express Passenger tra Catalogue nr in .5/334

The set had two brake third coaches and a first class coach. The photo above shows a restaurant car in place of the second brake 3^rd. Also an all 3^rd coach was made only in Southern livery.

Southern Railway goods set Catalogue nr.5/324

No suburban set was made to match those of the LMS and LNER models. However, TTR continued to market the Trix Express 4 wheel German style green coaches to run with the Southern green tank loco

. Catalogue nr 5/510

The loco was also produced in black

In the spring of 1937 TTR introduced the first “Scale model in HO in the World”. This was a model of the SR electrically motorised coach used on the route from London to Portsmouth. The motor unit was made entirely in Nürenberg whilst the coaches were made in England. Soon after TE introduced the Diesel Flyer (20/58), based on the Portsmouth but with the addition of white and red lights which changed over according to the direction of travel.

. Catalogue nr 5/375

The Portsmouth motorised coach was designed by E W Twinning, an artist, architect, professional model constructor and model railway enthusiast.

One unique aspect was the method of the bogies swivelling in the chassis as designed and patented by him. No central pivot pin is used either under or over the motor as was more common on other models. Instead the die-cast frame is provided with four curved guides having both vertical and horizontal faces. These rub on corresponding faces on the pressed steel under frame as can be seen from the patent application extract below.

The train, consisting of the motorised coach, plus one first class and one third class corridor coach, was sold in a green box,

( the only time TTR used a green box).

The set contained a complimentary copy of the 8 page Southern Railway publication The Evolution of the World’s Largest Suburban Electrified Railway.

Another small change was that an insert about the Portsmouth motor in the instruction book was printed in green. These are rare, since they have often been lost or become separated from the sets.

To advertise the launch which coincided with the opening of the actual train run from London’s Waterloo to Portsmouth, an exhibition stand and layout were on display at the stations.

The Trix Company was now firmly establishing the name “Trix Twin” and the symbol TTR in the public’s mind. Oddly Basset-Lowke continued to market their own catalogue with the name “Twin Train” sets up to early 1939 whilst ignoring the name “Trix Twin” in their catalogues.

Above is an extract from the spring 1937 catalogue

In the summer TTR introduced the London Transport electric locomotive – (the prototype followed the UK practice of picking the current up from an additional rail). It was based on an 0-4-0 with pantographs made by Trix Express. The pantographs were omitted, and the embossed “Trix Express” on the sides eliminated.

Catalogue nr . 7/530

Trix never made the matching coaches. Although in the late 1950’s Trix made some suburban coaches in dark red which would have matched with the LT, just 20 years late !!

It was only in production for 1937

Sometime during 1937 Trix started to change the print on the goods wagons, e.g. changing the pale grey LMS ones to dark brown. The catalogue numbers were the same and both were sold at the same time. By 1938 a full range of new wagons was available, this will be covered in looking at that year. For example :-

First series from 1936	Second series from 1937

STATIONS

In the late 1937 Trix announced a new concept in stations : the Many ways Station units. A number of basic units could be put together in a large number of combinations to construct a whole series of different stations. These were designed by E W Twining. The final production version differed from the prototype in a number of respects. Twining had proposed the covered span should be over 4 tracks not 3. This required a higher span and to keep the buildings in proportion they had two stories with second row of windows, smaller than the ones on the first floor. The clock tower was also larger. This was rejected as too large in favour of the model we all know below. Photos of these other designs can be seen on the link - TTR Buildings

These basic parts enabled one to build a station to ones own design. For example:-

A terminal station from the front above

and from the other side.

or a through station

A grand terminal station is shown below.

Made of metal Many ways replaced the wooden stations.

To match these new design and colour scheme new carriage shed and engine sheds were also introduced but still made of wood.

To add to the realism Trix commissioned Britains ( the toy soldier company) to make station staff and passengers to scale.

Before we leave 1937, it is worthy recording that it was at this time both Stephan Bing and Siegfried Kahn made the decision to leave Germany. As Jews life was becoming dangerous. At first the British Government refused them permission to stay in England not withstanding that they owned a successful business here. They then applied to go to America but Bassett Lowke intervened. He had many contacts in the Government who he persuaded to allow them and some colleagues from Germany to stay in England. If they had gone to America who knows how Trix would have developed : for a start production would not have stopped in 1939 but gone on with many new models until 1942 or longer !!

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