idd15

Really interesting feasibility study into platooning HGVs is here . It’s a bit long but there’s always the summary. Remember overtaking “road trains” in the Outback when I was a student in Oz many years ago. Bit scarey to say the least… Cheers idd

It was £13.95 for the parking, supposedly this is £5 cheaper than the normal on the day rate. However we saw parking in other car parks advertised at £14.80, but this may be a special Sunday rate. The chargers are 59p per kWhr but I only took 21 kWhr to get me back 80%. As it was I could have taken just 10 as the journey back was so much more pleasant without all that rain! Don’t know if you are aware but there is an open to all Tesla Supercharger just up the road at Trentham Gardens at j15. Quite a bit cheaper I suspect than what you had to pay at Stafford. Depending on time of day there’s also a big choice of eateries and shops there as well. hth idd

What about using Hornby HM7000 decoders for this application? The app itself is of course free if you have a Bluetooth device. Just an idea… cheers idd

Apparently the British and American forces were on manoeuvres in the area sometime in 1943 when Captain Mainwaring and his men apprehended a German airman who had recently been shot down! Thought it a luvverly bit of modelling, especially the moving rifles through the van roof. “Don’t tell him your name Pike!” Classsic. 😃 idd

Visited the Key Model World show at the NEC on Sunday which was well worth a visit. Some good videos up on YouTube about the show if you are thinking about it for next year. As this was just short of a 200 mile round trip for us in the Born I decided to use the pre-book park and charging facilities at the NEC for a top up whilst in the show. This charging hub run by BP Pulse is I think the largest in the UK with 150 7kW AC chargers for long stay and, 30 very rapid 300kW DC chargers for those in need of a quick zap and go. A very good facility and very convenient just off the M40. This site along with recent upgrades at quite a number of motorway services around Birmingham certainly makes this an easy no anxiety destination for EV drivers. Frankley Services upgrade Hopley Services Upgrade

First EVs with sodium ion batteries have gone on sale in China. Somewhat limited at the moment but give it time… Sodium ion EV Cheers idd

So my take on all this. Very good to see Hornby are still developing and putting significant investment into TT120, and long may it continue. Maybe things are not going quite as quickly, or in the many and varied directions as perhaps we’d like. But hey at least it’s happening! 😊 pip pip idd

Some pics from this morning taken from the road and footbridge nearest the incident. Might be on the BBC news this evening as a local team were also there:

Apparently the current version, which is only available on the continent has clocked up over 140,000 unit sales in 3 yrs. So I think it’s going to be pretty popular in its new guise. We’ve also got the new Citroen eC3 and Renault 5 on the way later this year with prices starting in the 20 to 25k bracket, so maybe just maybe EVs might start to become a bit more “affordable”. Cheers idd

Ta Dah! 1st preorder TTA has arrived. Am very impressed with fit and finish, most of the lettering is readable with a magnifying glass. The walkways are also very impressive with no blocked or misshapen holes due to too much paint. Hope others are as happy with their samples as I am. idd

I have both a Badger 200 single action airbrush which is siphon fed and a Sparmax 4 double action gravity fed brush with an inbuilt paint cup. Of the two I prefer the Sparmax because there is a lot less to clean! The Sparmax is also clever in that you can configure it to act a as single action airbrush. However, as I also spray the odd RC model aircraft then the Badger is the one to use because it can hold a lot more paint. To my somewhat untrained eye as an infrequent sprayer the quality of the finish is the same. HTH idd

You may find you actually burn off the insulation with your soldering iron, there are “enamelled “ wires made so you can do this. The trade name escapes me at the moment! Alternatively you could use fine abrasive paper by gently pulling the wire through it. hth idd

One of our small suppliers had both of his two diesel vans out of action this morning due to the cold. One was a collapsed 12v battery and the other was a “frozen” gearbox. Had to run the engine for half an hour to defrost it! Driver was not happy either as he was well behind. idd

Have used Vajello Matt spray varnish and seems pretty Matt to me. However you still have the problem with spray cans being a bit fierce at times! hth idd

Yes I like the design cues from the old model. Do you think the grenade launcher will come as standard or be an optional extra? 😀 Big takeaway is that they’re after best in class efficency. Stellantis is now very much going down this route as well with the Fiat 600 and improvements to the existing range. A good move imho as I’m not a big fan of the “bung a bigger battery in it” school of design that seems to have dominated recently… cheers idd