iamjamie

Me too! I'll need an O2 for my Bembridge layout at some point!

Does anyone know the overall height of BH easitrac? Unfortunately my digital callipers have a flat battery(!) That'll serve me right for going high-tech! Trying to find the right thickness of brass strip for my off-scene areas - á la Copenhagen Fields...

How about RevOOlution!

Me too! It's a welcome treat that Rapido are so open about their process. Sometime's I think that the process can be a lot more interesting that the final product (I'm a discovery channel "How It's Made" addict by the way!). Personally, designing something for an industrial process like this is just as interesting to me as someone building a loco from scratch. Even modellers who admit that RTR isn't their thing can enjoy following the progress of this, even if they don't buy it!

Yes, I think that's what GNR Dave meant when he said "in at the deep end"! I've always been very against the type of thinking that says: this is how it's always be done before, or that there is a right way of doing things. It's completely backwards to me to always blindly follow what comes before you. If everyone did it then nothing would ever be invented, or improved upon! Discarding everything and starting from scratch is a scary, but also very liberating experience, and by doing it you might come up with a completely different or new way of doing things. Of course, if you end up coming up with the same solution that's traditionally seen as "right" then that must be the best way! To the people that seem to be saying "there's no way I'm buying this, because it's impossible to do!", I'd say why not wait a bit and see! I think I've mentioned before that pre-orders aren't exactly about to close any time soon, and there'll be plenty of time to see the details. Pre-orders for the APT-E are still open, and you are able to see what is almost complete model to make your decision whether to buy it or not. Of course, it's fun to speculate and think of solutions, but I do think railway modellers have a tendency to lean towards pessimism sometimes! From now on I'm making it my mission to try and inject some more optimism on to RMWeb!

Whilst I agree with you that Rapido have a outstanding reputation for their products, GNR Dave is right to say that this is their first steam loco. And I think it's fair to say that putting a motor inside a box shaped diesel is very different to the challenges presented with a steam loco. (I'm not of course saying that Rapido churn out box-shaped locos, it's pretty obvious they have an awesome amount of detail to them!) I think we're probably in safe hands here. I doubt that they would have got to the stage of announcing the product if they didn't have the first clue about how to do it?! Scanning the locomotive is not the start of the design process, it's just one of many references to work with. I imagine that the basic ideas about how it is going to work and fit together have been thought through before they went ahead with the scan. They have a reputation to uphold after all, so I'm sure they wouldn't be undertaking this project unless they thought they could achieve it to their usual standard.

Everything's better in 2mm scale! (Just my opinion of course!!)

I'm not sure if there's any precedent for this, but could the locomotive be both tender drive and engine drive? Whether they are linked by a cardan shaft, or even two separate motors? In basic engineering terms, the more driving wheels there are the greater the tractive effort, right? So this way you can have several driving wheels in the tender, and then maybe just the large driving wheels in the loco as well (or perhaps more). Going round corners isn't a problem because the whole driving system is articulated. Like I said, I don't know if this sort have thing has been done before? Just a bit of out loud thinking!

Yeah, I'd recommend Zoom recorders as well. My company use the H4N when recording videos because not only can you use the two built in mic to record stereo ambient sound, but also attach two additional microphones (depending on the situation we use rifle mics or lapel mics). We then use a plugin called pluraleyes, which uses the in-camera sound to sync the separately recorded sound (the automated equivalent of using a hand clap to sync things manually). Well worth the expense in my opinion! Back on topic though: Rapido have said that they'll be putting some more details in their next newsletter, which will hopefully clear up some of these questions. Whilst I'm very excited about this as well, I don't think waiting a little while to get some more details is too much to ask. Pre-orders aren't going to close in the next week or two, so I'm certainly not worrying about missing out if I wait a few more days... I am very exited though!

Does any one with previous experience of Locomotion Models know if you can change your delivery address at a later date? I'd love to pre-order it, but I'll be in a different house (with more room for a model railway of course!).

It's way outside the era I prefer, way outside the area I prefer, and not even in my preferred scale! But I'm still considering getting one, even if I have to build a layout around it! Maybe I could build a model based on the Railway Children set(!)

You need to click on the "pay in full" link. Looks like £199 for DCC ready and £289 for DCC Sound.

I tend to export from AutoCAD as a DXF and then print using the plug-in from Illustrator... But this is mainly because I use illustrator to create images to be cut out, so I can print it out first and use the self-aligning feature of the Silhouette to cut them out (although this hasn't proved perfectly accurate, it's pretty good if you leave enough "bleed" around the image so if it cuts slightly off you don't get any white gaps). Because I've not managed to get the alignment with the image accurate enough, I've not been able to use it for modelling yet... But it is handy to cut out custom shaped labels for things!

From Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg...

The guys at Miniatur Wunderland are working on something similar that they intend to use to create a Formula One race track... It's in German, but all their videos have English subtitles if you click on CC.