So here they are the six dummies for Swaynton.

Did I really get the etches for these way back in April? It is not that these are hard to make up that caused the delay. I think that it is life got in the way. Plus of course the modelling mo-jo isn’t firing every day, which perhaps is a good thing I think as you don’t want to get stale with the same old, same old.

The only problem I had towards the end was getting the signal mechanism to be free-flowing enough for the weight to work. Careful scrutiny of the photo will reveal that the brass weight is thinner 5/32” on some of the signals. My initial thinking was that the weight would have a nice sliding fit inside the square base. However this didn’t work because the actuating wire to the signal goes through an arc so either the wire touches the hole in the base or the weight drags against the base. Filling the weight with lead shot helped but was not always successful. Next I tried to shorten the weight so that it hung below the base. Now this worked in that it allowed the weight to fall freely. But the weight caught against the hole when the signal was removed. The final version has a 5/32 brass tube with the actuating wire glued down one side then it is filled with lead shot. This seems to be the answer. However we won’t be able to tell until the end of day two of an exhibition.

So now I hand these over to Douglas who will have to fit them to Swaynton.

As ever I will drop another unsubtle hint that these "kits" ("scratchbuilders aids" as Eric Gates describes it) are available from my good self at £2.50 each plus postage.

When I finally sort it out they will be on the Swaynton website along with diagrams of the actuating mechanism and hopefully feedback from others who have made these up.

Cheers