Michael Edge

In my experience brake gear has to be very securely fastened, especially if the blocks are close to the wheels. It shouldn't be necessary to remove it.

They are Romford wheels, you can wriggle them off (if you ever have to) with very close fitting brake blocks - they don't have to pull straight out.

It was the only BR loco with outward opening doors - there was no room to open inwards and there was a large casing in the middle of the cab covering the mechanical radiator fan drive.

I would have soldered up the spacers, then removed the unsightly screws and filled the holes - or just filed them right back.

I thought that was my idea....

I scrounged some from old mechanisms and bought some Hornby ones. We have a great variety of motors in the loco stock, very few rtr ones (these gave no trouble) but anything from ancient K's (again no trouble!) to modern coreless and Portescaps. What sort of shielding did you try?

There are two main faults with the Seep, both related. The wire fastening from the coil to the plate is often far too tight, should really have a bit of slack in it and the crude fitting of the coils into the baseplate often fails, early ones are much more prone to this. I now fasten a wire round the coil and the baseplate, tightened by twisting, this prevents the coil from dropping off even if the melted plastic fastening fails. I have found the the frog switch can work fairly reliably (at least in a warm dry room) and can be improved with application of electrolube. I went through most of the process Stewart describes and then got rid of the problem by using Tortoise motors for my fiddle yard and new layout.

It wasn't too expensive but we now have another problem with the signals. All worked fine on test and installation but I gradually noticed that they occasionally malfunctioned, stopping working at all, losing the setting and fluttering at times. The first was fixed by the time honoured method of switching off and switching on again - rather than pulling a plug out I put a push to break switch in side of the baseboard to reset everything. The second and third appear to be linked as I realised that only certain locos were causing the problem, fitting suppressors to the motors mostly cured this but D11 and D13 motors still do it. With no rogue locos running the signals seem to have kept their setting. More curiously only some of the signals show this fluttering, about half of them never do it and one in particular (up Strafford Crossing) does it most - however some locos (bankers) don't normally ever pass this signal. The interlocking works well but the design of the Dingo Simplex boards hasn't made it any easier because they have an internal common connection between the power supply and the control circuit. I needed to use either of these to interlock the switching and would have preferred them to be completely separate. One samll snag from the operator point of view is that if the power supply has been used to interlock the signal lever has to be put back before the points or section switch is put back - otherwise there's no power to return the signal arm.

I put brakes and sandpipes (fit to frames, not to footplate) on before painting.

No chance, get on with building it! Nice to see you doing some proper modelling again.....

I built one of the Blackpool single deck trams many years ago, it wasn't bad as I recall but I can't remember what I did with it. We tried running it on Andy Ross's Leeds tram layout but while it got round the corners the combination of a long vehicle with a pantograph in the middle (rather than over a bogie) was too much for the overhead wires.

I would go with the trailing axle option.

Just to remind everyone that we won't be doing our usual demo at York this year but we will be there with Wentworth Junction (stand 11). If anyone wants to pre-order kits we can bring them with us. Mike and Judith

Another Hecate just finished, ready for the paintshop. This time with the original boiler and open coal rails, to be painted in SR black with green lining - the lining will be subcontracted to Dave Studley though.

I used to collect bits of scrap etch to make these from, all the narrow strips with a right angle in them - although I now have a supply of etches for GW lamp brackets.

I think that’s five now, plus an E1 which is the same kit. I used to like them……

This works fine at least down to 3ft 6in radius (probably tighter but I don't have direct experience), all the Mk 1s and LNER corridor stock on Carlisle has Kadee No5 couplers at the correct height for the full size buckeyes.

Interesting photo, that must have been its last overhaul when it was painted green - at last it's possible to know which side is which, it had a left facing crest this side and right facing on the other. The second photo in his collection is even more interesting, taken four months after 10100 was withdrawn (because of high maintenance costs, not the usually quoted fire or catastrophic failure) and it seems to be still intact.

If you need to stop locos chuffing to a standstill (which always sounds ridiculous) all you need to do is alter the deceleration delay until it stops - somewhere between 5 and 10 is usually enough for this. Incidentally acceleration delay has no place in steam locos - when you open the regulator steam goes straight to the cylinders and the loco moves.

We went on the Bernina with GRJ in April 2000, it's very obvious how much less snow there is now and you were there in February.

Time for another test track photo On the back row the Barry 0-8-2T is now complete ready for the paintshop. The EM1 production line at the front, the second part etched one is now ready for lining and glazing, further on yet another LBSC D1 (Albion kit), another Hecate and the Sentinel 0-8-0. The NER 0-4-4t is in for conversion to S4 - if possible! The B17 at the back hasn't moved this year.

It's a bit late to put this on here but we will be at the GOG show in Kettering tomorrow, this is a one day show despite what I managed to put on our website just now.

I do put little pads in if something goes wrong but I usually solder in thin shims of metal. The old fashioned "battleship" frames do behave more like bar frames (which don't twist) than plate frames. The difference with bar frames is one reason why American loco practice went to compensation much earlier and much more than European builders did (the other reason was very poor track of course).

Which is exactly why I don't do this, I build the frames with cylinders/motion bracket/footplate supports and put the wheels on, then leave that until the body is complete. I also leave the bottom edges of the buffer beams clear and easily available as reference surfaces until the boiler (or engine casing for diesel locos) is fixed in place - then I know the body is square and won't distort the frames. Our kits are all designed with this sequence in mind although I do accept that springing or compensation does make this less necessary.

At the risk of repeating myself, there is no point at all in trying to assemble a plate frame exactly square. Almost all the torsional stiffness in a steam loco is in the boiler and this will easily pull your exactly square frame out of true when it is bolted up. All plate frames, including full size ones, are able to twist a bit, if your assembled frame isn't true just get hold of each end and twist it. For good running the only things that matter are wheel quartering and an exact match between the rod centres and axle centres - any of the jigs will enable the latter to be checked, springing or compensation are irrelevant in this context.