MRJ 259

[Not Jeremy]

MRJ 259 is in stock here in Larkhall and should also have by now arrived at all your favourite stockists too.

 

 

Here's my review of the contents:

 

Martin Nield is in the chair for what is a festive edition, which has a bit of an operational theme to it. Plumpton Green is fully explored and illustrated, with particular reference to operation while the next major article covers operating Midland Sidings by the Westinghouse club. Tony Wilkins describes his fantastic working wagon tippler, Gavin Clark explains how he built his lovely L&Y signal box for Kerrinhead and Bob Essery contributes an Ellerton Road update. The very sad passing of John Spencer is recorded, the builder of Ryton Road and a superb "plywood wonder" signal box with an unpronouncable name for Bernie Baker. Finally we have letters, well a letter really, from one Iain Rice who disusses Tony Wright's recent contribution in the context of OO and P4, informative and measured, it makes for interesting reading I think.

 

 

Simon

 

[Branwell]

An excuse to pay a visit to Haworth tomorrow ... as if I need one!

[Hroth]

In the manner of a child in the back of a car...

 

Is it here ALREADY?

 

 

I'll have to pop into a local retailer some time in the next week then!

[Kylestrome]

An action photo on the front cover! Surely a first for MRJ?

[Branwell]

An excuse to pay a visit to Haworth tomorrow ... as if I need one!

 

Not in stock yet

[Donw]

Not in stock yet

 

I think the postie hasn't finished reading mine yet   Only joking I can wait as SMT came through the letterbox on Saturday.

 

Don

[Branwell]

I think the postie hasn't finished reading mine yet   Only joking I can wait as SMT came through the letterbox on Saturday.

 

Don

 

I know the Royal Mail can be a bit slow sometimes, but didn't SMT stop in the 1990s?

Edited November 19, 2017 by Branwell

[Donw]

I know the Royal Mail can be a bit slow sometimes, but didn't SMT stop in the 1990s?

 

Yes and no SMT is shorthand for 16mm Today the Magazine of the Association of 16mm Narrow Gauge Modellers as well as a bit of scale modelling I also like a bit of real steam.

 

Don

[Compound2632]

Double dose of red engines - superb!

[Tony Davis]

Dropped onto the mat of my fenland home today, and I managed to get to it before the Staffy's!

[Dunsignalling]

In all our local outlets with MRJ on display, it's still the previous issue.

 

John  

[ChrisG]

A marvellous issue - I love article about railway operation, and I love Plumpton Green very much indeed. I want to highlight a point made by Barry Luck in his article about the layout. He says, "I am sure that I am not the only person who finds it necessary to adjust handbuilt track after it has been laid. I am puzzled, though, as to why all the layouts I have been involved with suffer from under-gauge track after a couple of years, despite being built as accurately  as possible using all relevant gauges."

 

This was something I raised elsewhere on RMWeb a couple of years ago and I think it was Hayfield who explained why my track was turning out to be under gauge. Accurately modelled chairs (such as those available from C&L and Exactoscale) incline the rails inwards. If you force the gauges down on the rails when building the track, they force the rails apart, but as soon as they are removed, the plastic in the chairs recovers and inclines the rails inwards. The trick is to place the gauge lightly on the rail and allow the inclination to place the base of the chairs a little wider.  What puzzles me now, however, is that Barry does not use chaired construction, he uses rivets plus cosmetic chairs. So it shouldn't be happening to him....

 

The plot thickens because I thought Hayfield's intervention had closed the subject.

 

The cover had me wondering too - A Terrier with a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement? Solved by a quick Google search but I did wonder if it was a little Christmas teazer.

 

Chris Gardner

Alton

Hants

 

[John_Hughes]

A marvellous issue - I love article about railway operation, and I love Plumpton Green very much indeed. I want to highlight a point made by Barry Luck in his article about the layout. He says, "I am sure that I am not the only person who finds it necessary to adjust handbuilt track after it has been laid. I am puzzled, though, as to why all the layouts I have been involved with suffer from under-gauge track after a couple of years, despite being built as accurately  as possible using all relevant gauges."

 

This was something I raised elsewhere on RMWeb a couple of years ago and I think it was Hayfield who explained why my track was turning out to be under gauge. Accurately modelled chairs (such as those available from C&L and Exactoscale) incline the rails inwards. If you force the gauges down on the rails when building the track, they force the rails apart, but as soon as they are removed, the plastic in the chairs recovers and inclines the rails inwards. The trick is to place the gauge lightly on the rail and allow the inclination to place the base of the chairs a little wider.  What puzzles me now, however, is that Barry does not use chaired construction, he uses rivets plus cosmetic chairs. So it shouldn't be happening to him....

 

The plot thickens because I thought Hayfield's intervention had closed the subject.

 

The cover had me wondering too - A Terrier with a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement? Solved by a quick Google search but I did wonder if it was a little Christmas teazer.

 

Chris Gardner

Alton

Hants

 

A Terrier with a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement? Yes, there were a couple of examples I think, used on autotrain services around Brighton, if memory serves. the front coupling rods were removed, presumably to increase flexibility on curves, though I'd have thought the short Terrier wheelbase rendered that rather unnecessary.

[ChrisG]

A Terrier with a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement? Yes, there were a couple of examples I think, used on autotrain services around Brighton, if memory serves. the front coupling rods were removed, presumably to increase flexibility on curves, though I'd have thought the short Terrier wheelbase rendered that rather unnecessary.

 

It involved a bit more than removing the connecting rods, as the front wheel was a smaller diameter.

[smiths park]

Arrived in Smiths in Newcastle this morning

[Captain Kernow]

Mine arrived through the post yesterday, and it's another great issue.

 

I was looking at the article on Kerrinhead signalbox and was very impressed by the lengths the builder went to, to get the brickwork right.

 

But here's another model where privately-produced etches have been necessary, because there's presumably nothing available commercially. As a complete technophobe when it comes to things like CAD etc., I am so glad that the likes of Churchward/Modelex produce etched signalbox windows that have suited my own needs!

[pete_mcfarlane]

A Terrier with a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement? Yes, there were a couple of examples I think, used on autotrain services around Brighton, if memory serves. the front coupling rods were removed, presumably to increase flexibility on curves, though I'd have thought the short Terrier wheelbase rendered that rather unnecessary.

I think it was less to do with any real logic, and more because the Brighton CME of the day, Douglas Earle Marsh, had a dislike of leading coupled wheels on passenger locos. 

[Compound2632]

I think it was less to do with any real logic, and more because the Brighton CME of the day, Douglas Earle Marsh, had a dislike of leading coupled wheels on passenger locos. 

 

Completely overturning his predecessor's cherished views!

[John_Hughes]

It involved a bit more than removing the connecting rods, as the front wheel was a smaller diameter.

 

Ah, I'd forgotten the smaller leading wheels - thanks for the additional info.

[pete_mcfarlane]

Completely overturning his predecessor's cherished views!

I'm sure Edward Thompson would fully support this. 

[Donw]

A marvellous issue - I love article about railway operation, and I love Plumpton Green very much indeed. I want to highlight a point made by Barry Luck in his article about the layout. He says, "I am sure that I am not the only person who finds it necessary to adjust handbuilt track after it has been laid. I am puzzled, though, as to why all the layouts I have been involved with suffer from under-gauge track after a couple of years, despite being built as accurately  as possible using all relevant gauges."

 

This was something I raised elsewhere on RMWeb a couple of years ago and I think it was Hayfield who explained why my track was turning out to be under gauge. Accurately modelled chairs (such as those available from C&L and Exactoscale) incline the rails inwards. If you force the gauges down on the rails when building the track, they force the rails apart, but as soon as they are removed, the plastic in the chairs recovers and inclines the rails inwards. The trick is to place the gauge lightly on the rail and allow the inclination to place the base of the chairs a little wider.  What puzzles me now, however, is that Barry does not use chaired construction, he uses rivets plus cosmetic chairs. So it shouldn't be happening to him....

 

The plot thickens because I thought Hayfield's intervention had closed the subject.

 

The cover had me wondering too - A Terrier with a 2-4-0 wheel arrangement? Solved by a quick Google search but I did wonder if it was a little Christmas teazer.

 

Chris Gardner

Alton

Hants

 

Funny that I noticed that the chairs would distort if pressure was applied when first using the ABS chairs ( sold by Alan Gibson in those days) but when I mentioned it no one else seemed to agree. I though it was just me. Fortunately in 0 gauge there is a bit of clearance and if the gauge shrunk by half a mil you would be ahead of the crowd with 31.5mm gauge.

These days I build the crossing wingrail assemby using bit of brass to hold the rails in the right place so any chairs there are just on the ends or cosmetic.

 

Looks a good issue when I have time to read it.

 

Don

[corneliuslundie]

I can think of a few cases where leading coupling rods were removed from 0-6-0T locos on light passenger duties but going so far as to rebuild them is taking things a bit far. In the cases I can think of they were restored after it was shown not to make much difference. Not so easy with those Terriers. At the speeds most of them moved in service it probably made little difference to either the track or the loco except that it would lose traction. We are not exactly talking about express passenger locos. After all there were a few 0-6-0 good engines over the years, and they seem to have coped OK.

Jonathan

[Horsetan]

A marvellous issue - I love article about railway operation, and I love Plumpton Green very much indeed. I want to highlight a point made by Barry Luck in his article about the layout. He says, "I am sure that I am not the only person who finds it necessary to adjust handbuilt track after it has been laid. I am puzzled, though, as to why all the layouts I have been involved with suffer from under-gauge track after a couple of years, despite being built as accurately  as possible using all relevant gauges."

 

This was something I raised elsewhere on RMWeb a couple of years ago and I think it was Hayfield who explained why my track was turning out to be under gauge. Accurately modelled chairs (such as those available from C&L and Exactoscale) incline the rails inwards. If you force the gauges down on the rails when building the track, they force the rails apart, but as soon as they are removed, the plastic in the chairs recovers and inclines the rails inwards. The trick is to place the gauge lightly on the rail and allow the inclination to place the base of the chairs a little wider.  ....

 

Nowadays, the track components are somewhat more expensive!

[Andy Y]

Down at the Wild Swannery Not Jeremy is very pleased he's been really organised and packed everything already for Warley!

 

 

Either that or he's just seen a picture of Jerry's pumpkins on the internet.

[John_Hughes]

I can think of a few cases where leading coupling rods were removed from 0-6-0T locos on light passenger duties but going so far as to rebuild them is taking things a bit far. In the cases I can think of they were restored after it was shown not to make much difference. Not so easy with those Terriers. At the speeds most of them moved in service it probably made little difference to either the track or the loco except that it would lose traction. We are not exactly talking about express passenger locos. After all there were a few 0-6-0 good engines over the years, and they seem to have coped OK.

Jonathan

 

Given the easy curves of most British main lines and the speeds of the day, I incline to think that Stroudley's views were entirely reasonable; as far as I know the Gladstones, for instance, were perfectly well-behaved. The Terriers, of course, could buck horribly at speed, especially over pointwork, but I doubt if converting them to 2-4-0 format improved that much.

 

And Swindon - unlike Wolverhampton! - saw nothing wrong with leading coupled wheels; even towards the end of steam the autotanks could put up a very sprightly performance and seem to have been pretty stable under most conditions.