As of mid-2006, a range of these products has been made available under the Hornby International brand, refitted with NEM couplings and sprung buffers and sockets for Digital Command Control (DCC) decoders.

Consequently, Riko International, Lima's UK distributor, were able to provide models within weeks of rollout of the actual prototype[citation needed].

By the mid-1990s, Lima had a swollen UK product range of over 300 models, some of questionable quality, while still producing new variations at a rate of five or more new schemes a month[citation needed].

There was also an attempt to compete with Hornby and Bachmann by introducing new paint schemes on existing 1980s steam models[citation needed].

The distributor, Riko International went into receivership in 1999 and their replacement, The Hobby Company, commenced by commissioning further repaints[citation needed] and a new model, the Class 66.

The demise of Lima in 2004 left a significant supply gap for some of the key classes of the British diesel and electric locomotives range.

Initially, the quality was on par with other brands of the era, but competitors' improvements in detail and running characteristics soon relegated much of Lima's product to near toy status[citation needed].

The company also entered N scale fairly early in the game, producing at first Continental and British outline stock, some of which was fancifully[citation needed] decorated for North American railroads and sold in the States under the A.H.M.

Generally, the N scale line suffered from the same lack of improvements that plagued the North American H0 offerings[citation needed].

They made the Swedish SJ Rc locomotive with a wide range of coaches, including the rare dining and sleeping car.

Only the engines suffered from lack of traction and too high speed,[citation needed] a problem first solved much later when Roco started to set pace in the Model railway world in the 1980s.

Some models were not true representations of the prototype (the Lima XPT was just a repaint of the British HST) and all had NEM wheels and couplers.

The Australian Model Railway Magazine (AMRM), Issue 200, October 1996, carries a 14-page article on super-detailing the Lima New South Wales State Rail Authority 422.

In 2008 Murphy Models brought out the second specific RTR Irish Diesel, a highly detailed Bachmann version of the CIE 141 Class.