A message, in a faded envelope....

No, not that Night Train (by Visage)! A night-time recording session, more of which later. It's been ages since the last update so there’s a lot to report.

The start of a very busy week in February saw me at Gresty Bridge for the first of two trips to record one of DRS’s Vossloh Class 68’s on behalf of Dapol. I was mightily impressed with this loco from both a sound and technical point of view. A full set of sounds were captured, including a static engine run. A return visit in June involved a very early start to attach mics onto the loco prior to hauling the Crewe-Mountsorrel (empty) and loaded return journey. These engine recordings, made with 1300 tons on the drawbar sound superb in the test bed loco! The run took place on the Friday of the DEMU weekend, and if you took a photo of the return working passing through Burton that afternoon you may be able to see Andy Forty and I in the cab.

Just days after the 68 session at Crewe, on the Thursday prior to Model Rail Scotland we were at Shields Road to tick off the next-oldest Scottish EMU on my to-do list, the Class 318 with the assistance of First Scotrail. Having done the 303 and 314 previously, next year’s target, already being lined up, will be the 334 Juniper.

This year's journeys to and from Model Rail Scotland were typically cloudy, wet & dull and not much use for photography, but we did scope some great locations and followed them up on the Perth trip. A notable faux pas on the way to one location saw us nearly get Richard’s shiny Jaguar stuck down a badly rutted farm track, just as it started snowing. A very lucky escape and a lesson learned.

March saw Richard Armstrong and I at Wembley Depot as guests of Chiltern, who came good with their promise to give access to a 67 before they went off lease. I’ve made several attempts at capturing good engine sounds from a 67 without the intrusive spirax valves but none have been completely successful. This time the fitters knew exactly what to do and killed them for the duration, and I’m much happier with the results. I’ll be updating the 67 with these and various other new sounds as soon as possible.

My first recording visit to the Gloucestershire & Warwickshire railway was a very pleasureable affair featuring 26043 at the front. I’m pleased to say that the engine on this one didn’t hunt like the previous one and the recordings are much more usable. I will probably take the opportunity to do a complete new version of the 26 to complement my existing one, to give some variation to the fleet of anyone who has more than one. Given my current workload this should be available sometime in 2018...

As you probably know by now I was asked by Jason of Rapido if I could do the sounds for the APT-E, which I agreed to. I was fortunate enough to have the assistance of Kit Spackman (aka ‘Mr Tilt’), who travelled and worked on said machine and knows the sounds very well, and Paul Ledley who is one of the preservation team at Shildon with a number of useful video and audio recordings. The result is quite different to your average sound chip and was both challenging and enjoyable to do. One feature I included for historical interest is a seamlessly blended montage of all the good bits from an on-board recording of the intercom channel on the record-breaking 143.2mph run.

The train had no less than 10 gas turbines which were started up in a pseudo-random sequence depending upon the driver. The chip will allow those who want to reproduce this to do so (with multiple starts all happening in parallel, or one at a time), but will also allow you to ‘start-up & drive off’ in the normal way by pressing F1 if you don’t want to faff about.

Doncaster show was notable for the superb meal of fish & chips at the Whitby restaurant opposite the racecourse, and great photos at Clay Cross North and South on the way up.

During the summer, I had the pleasure of Andrew Keast’s company for a couple of days (Andrew is the tallest one of the Kernow team!). One day was spent on a photographic tour of the local railway hotspots, and the second was spent recording Andrew’s dulcet tones for the announcements on the Cornish FGW 143 chip! My original version of the 143 with First Great Western announcements features the voice of a good friend of mine Paul Woolard, who’s photos you may have seen in the railway press. As well as a great eye for a photo, Paul has a lovely rounded West Country accent!

Peter Lord (of Lord and Butler) has kindly agreed to voice the Arriva Trains Wales announcements in his wonderfully evocative tones, and there will also be a Lancastrian version of the Northern Rail chips featuring announcements by Mick Bryan! Who do we think has the voice for the Yorkshire Northern Rail?

September brought an unusual overnight recording session at Longsight with Ben Ando, doing the Pendolino. The session took place during the luckiest weather window ever with Manchester living up to its reputation immediately before and after. We arrived at the depot at 2030 and were walking back to the car around 0300. I finally got to bed at 0630 in the morning. I’ve been after the Pendolino for some time so I was pleased to finally get one in the bag. The Hornby test-bed is currently rattling round my test track now and is starting to sound really good.

The most recent recording session was at the Spa Valley again, doing the visiting Classes 14 & 25 with Richard Armstrong. In contrast to Manchester the weather at this venue was once again absolutely glorious. You have to pinch yourself to believe how lucky you are to spend days like that running through beautiful countryside with the train and the entire line at your disposal. It’s tough work but someone has to do it. Richard’s videographer pal Jordi was on hand to capture proceedings so expect another video in the fullness of time.

Previous hard work at the Spa Valley has borne fruit as Kernow have decided to use my sounds in the latest batch of their superb Thumper. Anyone with a v4 chip with the old sounds on can benefit from a reblow if they drop me a PM or email. I fitted smoked acetate behind all of the windows in mine, which hides two Alan Butcher bass reflex speakers!

My Hymek project has had a very long gestation period (it’s been almost a year since it was recorded at the East Lancs Railway!), but has finally come to fruition. Needless to say that it features all the usual bells and whistles including different departure sequences, but also the ability to depart at idle even on a heavy train, which I’m reliably informed that the real ones can do. ‘Available now’ as they say. The model has room in the tanks for a 23mm round speaker which sounds pretty good, and fitting is relatively straightforward. Video to follow shortly.

Following the generous provision of an accurate recording by a customer, RETB sounds have now been added to all projects associated with the West Highland line (37/0 & 37/4 West Highland, 67, 156).

Although there’s no RTR model yet, anyone who’s built their own Hastings Unit can now buy a chip for it from us. The English Electric engine is very reminiscent of a Class 20, and those SR whistles and compressors sound great!

Finally, my Ruston 37/9 has now broken cover and is available from Charlie as usual. Following an enquiry from a customer and a bit of experimentation on my part, the chip now features the ability to recreate the‘flaming exhausts’ that the prototype is well known for. All you have to do is drill out your exhaust port and fit one or two LED’s underneath (I used a red one driven from Aux1 and an orange one from Aux2). The result is highly effective, with both gentle and heavy flaming that only occurs at appropriate times (eg startup & heavy acceleration), and in time with the engine beats. Videos to follow shortly.