hayfield

As far as I am aware none of the whitemetal wagon kits ever came with either bearings or wheels with pinpoint axles, I am certain neither did the latter plastic range which were introduced in the latter days of K's I remember whilst I was still at school a neighbour brought a K's terrier and two or three SECR coaches, the loco struggled to pull the coaches on the flat. These days were before parts like etched W irons and wheels with pinpoint bearings were available from main stream sources (mainly retail in those days) I have to great affect fitted etched W irons to both whitemetal wagons and coaches

Round here most EV are either SUV' s or similar size

Not where I live

Nick I think in this case its an experts view on known values. Will my Nissan Micra do more damage than a vechial 3 or 4 times heavier?. We all know the answer and with known information available to an expert, it would be quite close to the correct figure, real world will give the exact numbers

Agree HGV's are normally bulk delivery, more like ban the school run and make the little ones walk with their parents as we used to do

I was referring to pot holes within the first few lines "The Asphalt Industry Alliance has claimed that smaller roads could be vulnerable to increased pothole formation, " Within a few paragraphs "Heavier vehicles mean there is more friction between tyres and road, and more stress on whatever is below the car. That means roads deteriorate quicker. Academics at the University of Edinburgh in 2022 calculated that there could be between 20% and 40% additional road wear – think potholes, the driver’s bane – associated with battery vehicles compared with internal combustion engines." Hardly a myth As for carbon emissions, I would like to see the difference between buying a nearly new small petrol car verses a brand new average size EV, as far as total affect to global warming.

One of the problems that causes these issues is that insufficient funds are available, we all dislike paying tax and whatever government is in power never likes raising taxes especially in the run up to elections. Secondly bigger heavier cars and lorries cause more damage than smaller cars and lorries, again the problem could be in our own hands in that these heavier vehicles perhaps should be paying more into the pot to cover the damage they cause Thirdly the determination for net zero or being green by dropping oil propulsion to electric propulsion is flooding the roads with very heavy electric vehicles, which have the unfortunate trait of wearing out the roads quicker than lighter petrol/diesel vehicles Simply by solving one issue we make another. Perhaps we all should look in the mirror at what our actions do to others ?

The difficulties I have had with some of the Bricks** were totally down to human intervention and not Templot, having drawn up a crossover using Templot automated crossover facility, its only takes slightly more effort to make it 3D printable than producing a brick** for a single turnout . The main issue is that this project was started as Templot producing a 2D plan and had two people indpendantly working on it over several months plus changing the size of turnouts. Sorry if I seem to be making it look much harder than it should be ** Brick(s) is the terminology for each printable section Brick 5 under way

Looks like I can join you for last week in that my standing charges are £3,35 for 7 days, last week my net cost was £2.68 for the week, the week before was £5.10 but the first day of that week was so bad the net cost for the day (sunday) was £2.76 This past Sunday was quite good and as I stated we used 4.9 kwh of our own production which must be one of our highest days ever of using our own produced power. Yesterday was also interesting, a day of heavy wintery showers at times but still ended up producing 9.6 kwh from , 2.5 kw system, peaking at times at 2.42 kwh during cloud free times, with peaks of over 2.3 kws between 11:30 and 15:30, boding well for the summer

Tom Its very easy to get terminology wrong, I seem to do it all the time. Likewise we are always talking about switch and crossing angles when we talk about turnouts, so its an easy mistake to include it into the conversation about slips. Then when you get erstwhile sources talk about points, when in reality they are talking about turnouts. Lets face it when I was young turnouts purporting to be scale were classified in Radii not sizes. But I guess at times in various subjects we all fall into similar traps The problem lies in RTR turnouts where the tip of the blades terminate between timbers, which is totally non prototypical. The problem is that even manufacturers at times get it wrong, I brought/was supplied a timber Diamond fret described as EM/P4. Simply it cannot be both as Martin explained. Certainly for EM gauge it was too long if you wanted both Vees supported on timbers. I think sometimes the more we learn about a subject we realise the less we know. Wayne has done a super job with his kits and as you say they work very well. I don't recognize Templot moving the length of switch blades, but I guess this may be something some modellers do to make life easier. Flangeway clearances are usually set by the modeller with most setting them to gauge requirements rather than to scale Thanks for contributing, that's how we learn from each other

Yesterday was the third very good day in a row, these 3 days averaged 10.5 kwh per day The other thing was that we had family and a friend round for Sunday lunch, will the oven on plus dishwasher and I was 3D printing all day, resulting in us using4.9 kwh of our own production plus nearly 6kwh of exports The value of our total consumption was £2.80 our net cost was 71p (both figures do not include the standing charge) not bad for early April Today has been quite poor weather wise. But by lunchtime we still produced 3 kwh

Before I start I must emphasize that in its basic/normal form Both Templot and Templot 3D are very user friendly and easy to use However I have been asked to help someone with their new layout, this started out with assisting with a Templot plan with tidying it up in a 2D format One area I had not paid too much attention is restricting partial Templates plus sometimes pressing save too many times Anyway after mastering the easy part which was printing basic turnouts and plain track, which is very easy I have been learning how to print a layout with many templates, which involves separating the plan into printable sections, which in Templot are called bricks Here are the first three bricks plus a section which will be spliced in, as I made a couple of errors on 2 adjoining bricks. (Quicker and cheaper than printing 2 new bricks). Brick 4 is now printing, took no time in making the brick then creating the print file. It took longer for the print bed to warm up. Anyway I can get on with day to day chores in the knowledge that at mid afternoon another brick will be printed. Now to set up the resin printer, just need to recap on setting up the machine, then use the raft of chair file Martin kindly prepared for me (and anyone else) to use

James Thanks just what i needed and as always just in time.

Two months have passed since my last update, the resin printer has not printed anything yet (waiting for James video to be released or revisiting his previous videos. But I have been enjoying a phase of building/finishing two Springside locos On the FDM printer I have been developing my skills. At one end of the spectrum making a template in Templot can be very easy, likewise FDM 3D printing is also very simple. On the other hand making a set of multiple templates into a layout plan can at times be challenging with some formations. Well I have been approached to assist someone with their layout plan they designed. Mostly due to my own understanding of how Templot 3D printing works it been a steep learning curve but also an enjoyable exercise Due to the size of the print bed the track plan has to be printed in sections, in Templot 3D these sections are called bricks. This photo is of the second brick and part of a crossover, the two right hand long timbers are each made from 2 partial templates. Unfortunately they are out of register, it is a test print and I stopped it early (error missed during a late night bit of work, plus a small laptop screen. Thee revised brick is now printing and as you can see the two long right hand timbers now match each other. As for templot 3D printed track minor updates have been released making the job of printing easier and the risk of poor prints less. Martin is a genius I have also expermited in increasing the scale to 7mm. The results are very promising Anyway I have hopefully overcome the obstacles that prevented me to print the more demanding bricks and once I have a few more bricks printed I will need some chairs

Steve This is totally understandable and something which is going on in many clubs all over the country where members are getting on in age and having heavy large layouts. Perhaps in the future the North West will have their own Pendon where enthusiasts can just come and admire and enjoy this very special layout, with another or two equally ground breaking layouts. I feel privileged to have seen it at least twice and was looking forward to seeing the sound version, please thank all involved for giving so much inspiration and just shear pleasure over the years Good luck on the next phase in the layouts journey ps So glad the stolen locos found their way home.