Andy Hayter

2024-04-25T22:54:24Z

Static grass suppliers

https://www.maurienne-trains.com/noch-m-54.html?page=4

www.fbsystems.com - sorry cannot give you a direct link since their SSL certificate has expired and my security system won't let me even see what is on their pages.

https://www.jura-modelisme.fr/fr/234-flocage-et-fibre - would be nice to support them as being local - ish to you and because they suffered a disastrous fire recently

2024-04-25T12:53:00Z

32 minutes ago, TheQ said:

Afternoon Awl, just.

Message left for vet as she's on holiday today, two locums at work which explains why she's so busy.

Next door called, she's been given a brand new printer a HP Envy 6020e... It took over 2 hours for me to set it up.

A 149MB " HP Smart App" , then that allowed you to go get the driver for the printer, then registration for the printer then...

Hp use " instant ink", they supply cartridges when the printer says it needs them, you buy a contract for 10 pages a month ( 1.49), or 50 pages a month (3.99), or 100 pages a month (5.99) etc.. anyway I've signed her up for the cheapest, you can change anytime . There are way around this but she is computer illiterate, I'd be round there every 5 minutes bypassing " instant ink"

And then I inserted the cartridges and paper, .. black cartridge faulty so it said, close inspection showed a plastic " hair" glued to a pin on the cartridge , scraped that off but it seems to make no difference .. tried one of our Envy cartridges but it's the wrong model..

Went round and round the HP "smart app" trying to get to their contacts pages... All 404 not found, their phone lines didn't appeal as I've no wish to wait for hours with their online system being offline.

In the end I've ordered via Amazon for a tomorrow delivery with her agreement as she's got something she wants to print out..

Her old printer? An Epson 442, that's 9 years old, very cheap in the first place, not used enough so the ink cartridges / heads used to dry out...

SWMBO is out with Ben, I'm defrosting as next doors computer room is effectively unheated..

I don't have instant ink, having found a way to avoid it. My printing is too erratic - weeks and months of no printing and then tens (and just recently hundreds) of pages. I have however on two occasions had problems when loading legitimate HP cartridges with the system telling me that they are empty or not suitable. Each time I have had to get their on line help desk to tell their machine that the cartridges are legitimate. The last time the boss of the help desk individual rang me after the system had been reset and admitted that their detection system is too sensitive.

2024-04-25T08:28:45Z

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Morning!

I’ve never understood this craze for open plan living. OK, I get the point that you may want to be sociable, but do you really need to turn your flat/house into an approximation of an aircraft hangar or warehouse to be so? I think that there’s a lot to be said in favour of dedicated rooms (so library/smoking room, home office, m**** r****** room and so on). Another consideration is that with dedicated rooms you can avoid the “whole house smells of XXXX” scenario (plus, separate rooms means that I can have my wicked way with the young scullery maid in the library and not disturb Mrs iD having Earl Grey Tea and buttered crumpets with her friends in the withdrawing room).

Regarding the UK, I think you need to understand how small many homes are. Our rented house in Germany had a living room that was approximately the same footprint of a typical 2 or 3 bed new build in the UK. The potentially small rooms that result leads to this open plan desire. So your approximation to an aircraft hanger light well apply in large sections of Europe but would often not apply to many UK houses.

Wednesday at 22:59

2 hours ago, joseph benjamin said:

Do model manufacturers such as Hornby and Oxford diecast seek the permission of the owners of trademarks such as Freighliner, Ford and Rolls Royce to use them on their models. I ask because I've just read in a April 2004 issue of Model Railroader that Union Pacific was suing Athearn and Lionel over the use of their trademark on models.

I have posted this elsewhere before but it shows the impact of not getting permission to use a trademark.

Back in the 1990s Jouef produced a range of Wagon Lits coaches. Accor Hotel Group then held the ownership of the Venice Simplon Orient Express and held the CIWL trade marks. They took Jouef to court for trademark infringement - not sure if it was for the use of the CIWL name across the top of the coaches but if so it was also certainly for the use of the WL crest on the side of the coaches.

Jouef lost. Not long after they went into liquidation to be bought up by Lima/Rivarossi - which may be connected or maybe not.

The irony is that the VSOE was selling Jouef CIWL models in the then in-vogue crystal boxes from their on-board shop as keepsakes for their passengers.

Tuesday at 09:15

On 21/04/2024 at 21:06, Andy Hayter said:

Not fatalities, but I was surprised by the damage wild boar do to motor vehicles.

ADAC in Germany (like the AA or RAC) reported being called out to rescue vehicles immobilised by boar strikes at an average rate of once every 20 minutes day and night.

I have an apology to make.

The accident rate I gave of every 20 minutes was for deer. Wild boar incidents occur every 2 minutes!

Sunday at 19:18

As I reported last weekend, this weekend saw the second muddling exhibition. Once again a good hours drive - but on mountain roads perhaps not as far as some might imagine.

Somewhat disappointed since there were rather few layouts on display, although those there were very good and ran well. trade support was however very good and only strong will stopped me spending several Deltics worth.

So that is probably that for another couple of years.

Sunday at 19:12

7 hours ago, Roy Langridge said:

I can’t help feeling that there is confusion here between writting off assets and recovering the costs of tooling.

You can recover the costs, i.e. recoup the costs of paying for the tooling costs, and make your desired profit margin on a first run. That tooling still has value on the books, but there is no hole as alluded to above.

Roy

I have posted as agreeing because I think you are right about the confusion but there is still a hole. If you have an asset with a book value of 400k that never gets used then the write down of that asset, whether done incrementally or as a one-off, creates a negative impact on the final company results. You are writing down against no tangible benefit accruing from that asset.

Sunday at 19:06

25 minutes ago, Ozexpatriate said:

The 'deadliest animal' question popped up today.

The species causing the most human fatalities in the US is humans - though I couldn't find a good source - total annual homicides and automobile fatalities is around 60,000, not counting other accidents.

Besides humans, the most likely culprit is not horses as some might insist, but deer.

CNN: Forget sharks and bears – it’s deer that you should worry about hurting you

I have seen a car immediately ahead of me strike a deer (which had a death-wish and leapt right into the car from the side of the road).

Random searching suggests the following annual US fatality rates:

Deer 200

Dogs 43 (average 2011 - 2021)

Snakes 5

Bears <1

Sharks <1

From a non-fatal standpoint in the US the list of dangerous animals (from an advocacy group) seems to be:

Humans

Dogs

Deer

Globally the top three are:

Mosquitos

Humans

Snakes

Not fatalities, but I was surprised by the damage wild boar do to motor vehicles.

ADAC in Germany (like the AA or RAC) reported being called out to rescue vehicles immobilised by boar strikes at an average rate of once every 20 minutes day and night.

Saturday at 21:25

1 hour ago, Ravenser said:

The problem is that if you spend £500K on tooling up a loco, write off 20% of that as depreciation against the first run and then leave the tooling unused and undepreciated in store , you have a £400K "asset" that is in fact of no trevenue-earning value sitting on your books. And in the real world £500K of cashflow went out the door to create this tooling, but only £100K has been written into your books via depreciation

You never got your development costs back. But an unrecognised loss is being punted down the line to infinity. Eventually the accountants will have to do something about this

The problem is, using your numbers, no matter how you dress it, you have a £400k hole. You can "hide" it through annual depreciation or you can take a one off hit with a write off. There is always the possibility that a model might be brought back for another run and until that is firmly set aside, you would probably not want to unduly depreciate a valuable asset. Remember a company is valued by its profit loss plus the value of its assets. There is also an argument that the longer you leave depreciating an asset, the less its value becomes because inflation devalues fixed values.

1 hour ago, Ravenser said:

But the fact Bachmann have on a number of occasions run something once or twice , and then it's disappeared, suggests something odd about Kader's handling of depreciation of tooling

I may have been a little pessimistic about the Jinty - it seems it was run quite a few times between 2004 and 2018, but not since. The Standard 4 tank looks like it's not been seen for well over a decade and it was upgraded to DCC Ready

Class after class looks like this . Just 9 versions of the Super D were ever produced. This was model of the year in 2008. Just 6 versions of the J11 . Just 9 versions of the Deeley 3F. Just 9 versions of the Crab

All those useful medium-sized black kettles that Bachmann got such a reputation for making... They don't seem to have made any of them for years

The sad fact is (and I say this as someone who needs a few black workaday locos) that little black numbers are not sexy - contrary to the fashion industry view. They probably don't sell in the numbers of colourful genuinely sexy models and almost certainly don't sell as quickly. Limited runs should not be a surprise, which is not to say they were not successful but perhaps not as successful as other models.

Surely running the tooling in the store for well regarded models of numerous general service classes has to be better for cashflow than tooling up a small pre-grouping class of restricted geographic coverage at great expense?

If you had unlimited production capacity I would agree, but the choices are always there when there is a limit to what can be produced. A repeat run of that black workaday model that sold but sold rather slowly, or a model of the latest must have in colourful livery, that is likely to not only sell well and quickly but will capture the attention of the model press, modellers and collectors and so promote the Bachmann brand.

Saturday at 17:39

I think you might be reading too much into the write down.

I know nothing about amortisation rules in China and Hong Kong but I can tell you that in Europe there are very different rules in place across different countries. For example in Germany a long-life asset would have 10% of its investment cost written down each year (1) whereas in the UK the same asset would have 10% of its residual book value written down each year (2).

(1) So with no further investment in the asset, after 10 years it has zero book value.

(2) So in the first year 10% of the investment value is written down. The net book value is 90% of the investment as you enter year 2, when 9% is written down leaving 81% book value for year 3 and a write down of 8.1% and so on. The asset always has book value.

So what might be happening in Kader? Just some thoughts.

1. You poo-hoo the idea of only writing down when a mould is used. I however can see that that is a good way to operate (if its allowed under the legal accountancy rules). How else do you get a good view of the true profitability over time of a single model? If you write down the value of all moulds each year, then the profitability of Mk2 coaches carries the write down costs of for example the Midland 1F 0-4-4T. Does that make sense? Is it right that a successful model should carry the write down costs of (potentially if UK rules are applied) every model ever produced unless totally written off?

2; The write down might apply to moulds that have been found to have been damaged.

3. The write down might be due to moulds for models that have now been superseded by newer versions.

4. Write down is a useful and legitimate accountancy mechanism to minimise tax liability. Of course you can only use it once per asset.

In the real Kader world a combination of the above plus more could well be the reason we see the results we do.

April 18

3 hours ago, Northroader said:

and here’s a OUEST wagon which has seen better days! (Wonder what colour they were painted?)

I really must invest in a copy but the publicity suggests a mid brown

https://www.gehf.fr/inscriptions-et-couleurs-des-wagons-de-marchandises/

April 18

2 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

Good moaning from the Charente. Whose stolen the sun.

Jamie

At the risk of Monty Pythonesque escalation:

Stolen the sun - you were lucky. We woke up to 4cm snow.

Now melting but it's pretty nippy and indoor "work" is called for today

April 16

23 hours ago, G-BOAF said:

Further interesting quote is

"The Group will strive to explore new sales opportunities and manufacture high quality products with competitive prices to sustain its business"

I sense the group will struggle in this strategy if Accurascale are selling a 37 for £170 and Bachmann's almost identical version is £245!

That may be true when a Bachmann model is in direct competition with a competitor but the number of such concurrent models is quite limited across the ranges and across time.

April 14

The thing about muddling in France profound is that you can wait literally years for an exhibition and then 2 come along at once.

Yesterday we travelled north to Annonay for a general muddling expo. A few railway items that were OK to really very good. Sadly the 3 rail 0 gauge layout was not working while we were there but to be honest these "collectors layouts" interesting though they can be are not really my thing. Lots of off road radio controlled 4x4s on show doing their stuff over rough terrain. The articulated radio controlled truck set up was very impressive and I could see that joystick control was just as difficult as moving the real thing. Some very nice models which I probably did not fully appreciate, with some very good driving, which I did. The powered boats were very good and perhaps the cherry on the cake was a radio controlled hot air balloon. Very appropriate for the birthplace of manned flight in a hot air balloon courtesy of the Montgolfier brothers. And French for a balloon is a Montgolfier as a consequence.

And next weekend near Valence a proper muddle train exhibition - held once every 2 years, covid permitting, which it didn't.

April 14

The sack barrow would not help much even if you were allowed to use it. You would be taking the boards through the door on the wrong axis but one skate board might just do the job. I suspect 2 would be messy when you get to that raised threshold.

April 14

17 hours ago, Covkid said:

I understand your drive here Andy, but I personally think your expectations are a little high. I know model manufacturers place a "potted history" with their product, but the sphere is so huge, you cannot really cover the "life and times" of the 7 plank 1907 in less than the Turton volumes. Surely this is all about the purchaser doing their own research, with a basic provision from Rapido. Also, how many purchasers actually care to your extent ?

My modelling period is around 1960 to 1974 so the remaining NCB internal users were in their last decade of use, on a private colliery railway branch. The Rapido product I see is a fantastic canvas for practising my weathering skills, and I suppose it is easy for me t buy half a dozen "St Andrews cross" examples which wont be going far behind my NCB locos.

To be clear here. I was not expecting a full history. I would have liked some indications such as:

Livery introduced with the first 1907 build specs and continued until at least 19xx

Photographic evidence of this livery in use in 19xx ( and 19xx) - providing some potential limits

Livery in use until the take over in 19xx where progressive change commenced.

New livery introduced from roughly 19xx - either as an indicative start of end point.

etc..

I don't in any way want to suggest that these anything but a are a massive step forward from where we have been with rtr, but a dearth of prototype info from the producer is a disappointment. Those who disagree are invited to keep stum the next time they see a class 66 hauling Dapmannby PO wagons on an exhibition layout. If you don't inform your purchasers they are very likely to go wrong.

.

April 14

It has been mentioned obliquely but the route you will carry these is important. Doorways are a real challenge getting you and the board through at the same time.

You suggest the route is at one level, without actually saying so. In that case I would consider building a small dolly say 60-90cm long and a bit wider than your boards with 4 castors underneath. Sit the board side on on the dolly and push it through to its destination. You then only have to lift on and off at each end. It may seem excessive for a few metres but it will save a lot of effort.

April 13

22 hours ago, AY Mod said:

I'd say the best information would be the dates of photographs shown in Keith Turton's volumes indicating when the builder made and recorded them. It's not an answer but it's where to find it.

Andy

I appreciate the sentiment of people doing some of their own research, but your suggestion is how many volumes of Turton times how much average cost per volume? I suspect it comes to a very substantial cost that will prevent many from having the resource to buy any of these wagons.

I would have hoped that Rapido - or its commissioners - would have been able to provide some rough dates for its potential customers . It seems they have fallen into the Dapmannby trap of producing pretty wagons with no background data.

Sorry if that sounds harsh on you and Rapido.

April 11

11 hours ago, Compound2632 said:

By no means. LQ was well nigh universal up until well into the grouping period. The perception of GW exceptionalism in this respect is a classic example of looking back through a BR steam lens - always bound to fog the picture.

Which is perhaps a bit surprising given the Abbots Ripton disaster of 1876.

Snow on signal arms (several in succession) set at danger, weighted the arms so that they were forced down into a quasi open position.

Upper quadrant would be fail safe in the event of such a failure but it seems such a warning was ignored for many years.

I wonder why the obvious lessons were not taken into account for 50 odd years.

April 10

It is a rather technical term relating to these very large vat-like barrels.

Dictionaries will give you several translations of a barrel but foudre is often not among them - tonneau, fut barrique etc..

Plus the typical translation of foudre is lightning

April 10

Bi-foudres are the wagons you have with 2 (bi-) barrels (foudres) used for moving wine in bulk from principally the South of France towards the agglomerations to the North.

April 10

1 hour ago, polybear said:

Very true, however....(and I realise this is absolutely no consolation whatsoever towards the innocent, their families and friends).....

Would the implementation of the death penalty result in a much lower rate of very serious/violent crime, loss of innocent life due to murder by re-offenders, rape, death due to drug overdose cos' the dealers continue their trade etc. that the overall net effect (i.e. a far lower loss of life, lower serious crime etc.) is actually of much greater benefit to society as a whole?

VSBT's; It sounds to me like the Ward Sister should tell those concerned that "No Earphones then no telly - or it has to be on mute"

The American experience suggests no, it would not have any serious effect on violent crimes.

April 10

Unless of course they have already done that.

There will be much going on that we will never be party to.

April 7

The problem with UPF is how to define it.

Many in the UK use the basis of anything that you don't keep in the kitchen that is used in food or it's preparation makes that food UPF.

So I don't have a stock of rennet or its vegan equivalent so cheese is UPF -

I don't keep saltpetre, so most cured meats from bacon and ham, though salami, chorizo and mortadella are equally UPF.

Both are processes used for ages to preserve produce - which in itself does not make them fully safe to consume.

April 6

3 hours ago, Dave Hunt said:

Acid rain, diesel particulates, dog piddle........ etc.

Dave

😄

All of which are external and can be washed off.

Acid rain - a bit old hat and almost no industry downwind this side of the Atlantic

Diesel particulates - lots of diesel cars and vans in our area of 300 souls with no agglomerations anywhere near. For sure they will be there but this is rural France not semi-urban England.

Dog Piddle - more likely to be cat. We have 19 just now. So we take suitable precautions.

As to rat and mouse piddle - yes possible but more likely to be vole and shrew. If you want to live in a sterile environment then I think NASA may be looking for ~~victims~~ volunteers for their moon base.

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