Viriconius

Those ribs look fiddly. It’s the sort of job where say a pantograph mill would come in useful…

Whole wagonloads are certainly easier, but shame to lose the variety. Minirakes are good and could include E-class with appropriate fixed loads? But my experience is that as big an issue in keeping things moving is the owner/alleged operator who enjoys talking to visitors (no bad thing) at the expense of delivering the goods to the front (a bad thing) ;-) Alex Jacksons are worth looking at - discrete, automatic and dirt cheap too. I've got some made up on a couple of wagons here for initial trials...

Uh-oh. I'd be happier seeing you use the words 'replacing' and 'Landrover' without intervening words...

Excellent summary - agree on all aspects.

Cenac's book seems to suggest that the cab is supported on the triangular gusset/rear buffer beam and two brackets each side directly on the firebox. I'd send a photo, but phone is out of battery and refuses to transfer photos.. Looking very nice.

Weathering? Is it not getting a coat of green first?

Rules are for breaking! The 20hp Simplexes also ran once they'd warmed up. A Protected 40hp would be good. And you ought to have both HC & Barclay 0-6-0s before starting on the French stock... ;-) Another quick tweak is to remove some of the underside of the hay bale loads that seem to rest on the brake handles.

Is your next visit to apply the unique Up-the-Line roofing treatment?

Ok Kevin, promise not to argue any more...

If they're anything like the contents of our kitchen cupboards, half the tins are fished out to discover they should have been used 12/18/48 months ago! When I ever get to the stage of building baseboards, I want to try adding a saw-blade thickness shim between baseboards when track laying, so when the rails are sawn and the baseboards reassembled, the gap closes up. Thats my theory... anyone tried it in practise?

Baseboards on the kitchen worktops- didn't know you were into extreme sports! Satisfying progress.

Hadn't spotted that the gearboxes were back-2-back rather than facing the same way. That has a certain prosaic quality... Add (not this week!) an idler roller to keep the fig-8 friction-free? Over stretched simplex motor, if there is an issue in the mech, wood binde.

All looking a bit Frankensteinian but sounds like it's now going smoothly-glad the Dick Kerr is sorted. If you turned a groove in the two flywheels, could you lock them together with a drive band?

Having 'sampled' the samples, I say they work well, are convincing and the juxtaposition of birdsong and heavy artillery is prosaic. Just mind the low-flying biplane - I think it's had Kevin cowering under his own layout!

I'm sorry, I've not seen any reference to air guitars in any book about field railways or the front. It'll have to go else all credibilty... ;-) Saw a moving doc about bagpipes and pipers girding troops for the battle last week tho. Simon