Edwardian

The Bouch locos add to the Stainmore feel this layout has for me! I live very close to the Stainmore Gap before the move (and am still not very far away). The bleakness of the moor and pregnant gloom of the sky seem very familiar! Now a Class 59 is not a thing often seen (or even mentioned!), so very good to see it in your line up.

Yes, Brother Compound is correct; the layout is not the WNR. The railway has a history and an extent that would never be modelled comprehensively. At it's simplest, once must remember there is a prototype! That said, the WNR model railway needs to follow the usual compromises and to find 'artistic' solutions therefore in both physical and operational terms in its depiction of the prototype. Thus Brother Schooner does make a very profound point. There are a lot of things, I refelect, that only exist in my imagination!

So long as the Bronx is still up and the Battery's down, I will happily accept that. Oh, I had assumed there would be, but....

If the Bichoverhams to the North are Up, then everything else is Down? Or the other way around!

Ah, just seen this, but you have anticpated my response! Err..... Good question. Don't know. Up to the Birchoverhams and Down to CA, Bury and Norwich, or t'other way around? Yes The only way... Thank you for your wishes and also for posting these. Very handy

Thanks. I can only attest to the reason I am biased towards LQ signals, but, yes, it is one of those details that helps set the period by being typical of it. No yella Distant arms niver! Thanks, Annie, definitely a low spoon count in recent months. Spoons and days. My parents' gaff needed sorting, packing up and the stuff moving out. In the Marie Kondo Universe, we, as a family, must represent the Antichrist. Fortunately, since none of us is a Millennial, we understand that the KonMari method is utter b0ll0cks. That said, my parents' house was full. They've been there since '76, so their entire lives since then, and much of mine unto the third generation, was evident in the house and its attic, along with much of my deceased grandparents' lives. It's cumulative hording unto the third generation. It made me think. What it made me think was, I need a model railway executor for when my number's up. This was the slow work of months, not least because I have a school-age sprog, two mentally school-aged dogs and a full-time job while my parents' gaff is 150 miles away. Latterly it became very pressured as we had an early offer and were being pressed to complete before Christmas. I narrowly missed that, did some more during the Christmas holidays, and when I returned to the house in early January with a week or so until exchange and completion, l found that a burst pipe had flooded both floors of the house at taken the ceilings down. This was not ideal. There was more packing and re-packing, a little soggier than before, then moving, then unloading here. This means that the large shed is now rammed with stuff, so nowhere for Castle Aching, and the overspill filled my reception rooms in the house. Again, not ideal. This last month has been spent clearing these rooms. Another couple of weeks and things will be to rights. I can certainly see the light at the end of this tunnel. And most of my sitting room. Anyway, I haven't really had enough spoons for the job at any given point, so certainly no spoons left for modelling. The next task will be to go through the shed to determine the fate of each and every box until there is enough room to convert it to a railway room, albeit one with a lot of under-basedboard storage! I do think that my little salvaged BLT might find room in the house, though, so I might revisit that. As you know, I have a fondness for old scratch-built buildings. As little buildings are a my joy, I honour those folk who went before and cherish their models. I found what I thought was a very charismatic signal box on the Bay of Fleas. I don't recall much other interest in it and it was mine for £14. The model is in very reasonable nick, with really just the top of the stovepipe and some handrails to be replaced. I fancied it for Castle Aching, but decided that, regardless, I would use it somewhere on the layout. I had reviewed just about every model signal box going, but the style of this one just looked right in my eyes for the WNR. It features the three-by-three window pane arrangement that the Great Eastern finally adopted for their standardised design of 1886. For me the proportions of the windows seemed fair and I liked that the windows were in pairs, one inset, one set forward, so that the inner ones may slide behind the outer. This arrangement is also found on Saxby & Farmer boxes, such as Bearsted on the LC&DR and Combe Junc. on the Liskeard & Looe Railway. Thus, I can base the standard WNR type off this scratch-built prototype, using components from the Wills kit. The frontage of that kit could be shortened from 5 windows to the 4 of my model. It rather depends on how many lever frames each box is likely to need. As to the colour, yes, it is rather Late & Never Early Railway, and the WNR station colours are buffs and stone shades and such. That said, some pre-Grouping railways had it that the S&T department would do its own thing, so signal boxes were not always painted in the same colour scheme as station buildings. Green and cream/ivory is, of course, reflective of WNR livery and I had been wondering if it might apply these colours to its signalling infrastructure. Thank you. Those are some lovely kits.

I have had a lot on which has absorbed all my time and energy and I am more of less chronically unwell at present; both Miss T and I have had a bad few weeks in that regard. No modelling. Looking ahead, I want to consider the WNR S&T department. I have long held the view that the WNR would have used one of the private contractors, like McKenzie Holland or Saxby & Farmer. There will be some old slot-in-post signals around, but the introduction on the WNR of block signally in the 1880s would have seen something of an overhaul in the S&T infrastructure. I have decided on a contractor, Saxby & Farmer, and on a style. The standard WNR boxes resemble in style the GER's standard 1886 design. Although McKenzie & Holland were the GER's main contractor, some of this style were built by Dutton & Co, and the design is very similar to boxes produced ny Saxby & Farmer. I really like the look of the design and it is nice to tie the WNR to some extent to GER practice and examples from Norfolk. In terms of resources, I have a nice scratch-built box in this style, and have the ability to kit-bash both the Wills plastic Saxby & Farmer kit and Osborn Models' laser-cut GER box, although I am not sure I would need such a large example. In terms of signal components, lower quadrant (GWR preferences showing through) Saxby & Farmer etched and cast parts are available from Wizard Models. In planning the physical building, then, the first question is, in terms of the 4 boxes I will need (Castle Aching, Achingham and Birchoverham Market North and South boxes), based on the respective track plans and likely signalling arrangements, how many levers am I likely to need in each box? That's a rather indirect way, I suppose, of saying, is it about time we evolved signally diagrams for Brother Schooner's excallent track plans.

Yorkshire Titantic Caption: "Give over, Luv. Am sure there's enough room fur us both ont door, if only thee'd leave off fidgeting"

Again, that is what rain is for!

Thanks, Gary. Look OK at a cursory glance, but I'll give tem a good look over this weekend. WNR and Isle of Wight trains in the offing then.

Now arrived at Aching Constable carriage works.... Of course, having viewed the photograph I was horrified to see the ghostly reflected image of a malignant entity from Beyond towering menancingly over my carriage prints. It was chilling to think it was in there, with me, invisible to the naked eye! Then I realised it was bird sh1t on the window pane. Panic over.

I'll think about it. No guarantee, mind. But, seriously, that is a lovely shot, very 'natural' looking splay of track.

Great project, and I look forward to developments. Still, resulted in a double-take. I thought I was looking at a giant 3D print of a locomotive boiler until I saw the stitching and realised it was a sofa.

Bowlers hats ... When I served, I attended the annual Cavalry Memorial day in Hyde Park. We were expected to wear officers' out of uniform 'uniform' for such ocasions, a dark suit, regimental tie, rolled umbrella and bowler hat. It did not go down well when, seeing brother officers converging on the Park from various directions, Yours Truly exclaimed "bloody Hell, it's an Avengers convention!!"

Yes, the MC&WCo-built LSWR carriages. The Third Brake and the Third are taken from the MC&WCo-built LSWR 1872-3 block sets. The LSWR-built ones were slightly different. The First-Second Composite is another MC&WCo-built LSWR carriage, of 1871-4. I believe 4 of these went to the IWCR at the turn of the century. The Luggage Brake is a freelance vehicle in the same style.

Thanks to Brother Bluelightening at Oak Hill Works, some 1870s WNR carriage stock has been printed and is soon to wing its way to Edwardian Towers. Some additional chassis have also been produced with a view to using them with etches

Adorable

Adorable. My only cat joke is: Erwin Schrödinger is pulled over on the road by the traffic police. The policeman asks Schrödinger to unlock the car boot. The policeman opens the boot and looks inside. Then he says, "Sir, did you know there's a dead cat in your boot?" "Well there is now", replies Schrödinger.

Apologies if this has been posted already, but the Utube Algae-Rhythm just chucked this one at me:

Do you know when? According to the 1897 OS survey (if accurate) it appears to be single, but double by the time of the 1911 revision.

A guard's van at the end of a train, rather a fourgon conclusion.

This is another example of why, while I am just so bored by Hornby and Bachmann announcements these days, my interest is kept alive by the likes of Accurascale and, pre-eminently, by Rapido. Another three cheers. Aside from the odd L&M release (and laterly that range has included a lot of dross) I can say honestly say that nothing Hornby has announced since the Peckett W4 has made me feel enthusiasm. Bachmann's only interesting releases in recent years are things that commissioners have, eventually, been able to beat out of them. In general, though, it's just same old same old, or in the case of Hornby, yet another LNER pacific. I am jaundiced; toy makers who later learnt to make some very good models (others less so), but who seem to lack imagination, passion or originality these days. Hornby in particular has been a lazy copycat and milker of ancient dross, while the most interesting thing about Bachmann's most recent announcement was the company's questionable use of the Youtube copyright strike system to silence a critic. Thanks to Sam's Trains for bringing to my attention this travesty meted out on a fellow Youtuber. Accurascale and Rapido, by contrast, strike me as passionate and enthusiastic model makers. That is unfair, no doubt, to many passionate and knowledgeable folk working for Bachmann and Hornby, but all I have to go on is the overall impression these behemoths create. That impression is, I would say, lacklustre. Let's hope that, instead of spoilers, the competition bucks up the sleepy old giants of the industry to be more creative (though not in the 'Basset Lowke' sense, Heaven forefend). In the meantime, Rapido in particular has developed a knack of coming up with interesting, exciting, yet also useful releases. What a great sequel to the MW L Class and the Port of Par locos in these terms. We never know what Rapido is going to do next. It's always worth hearing though. Thank you, Rapido, once again for warming my old, cold, bitter heart with the simple childlike joy your products engender. As something introduced in 1913, the fireless only just squeaks within my period of interest, but I am strongly tempted. l wonder how the earliest of these compared with the later-built ones? How early can you go with the announced versions?

Finding real answers is hard though. Easier to kick back and think of those strong men running the Roman Empire!

We might add to that summary concerns that the generality of more liberally inclined youth are (a) too concentrated in towns for the effect of their votes to reflect their numbers and (b) they are anyway relatively less likely to vote than the Old Haters amongst us. We've had a couple of by-elections here, both lost by Conservatives to Labour, but in both seats the right-wing Reform Party came third, both displacing the centrist Lib Dems and in one seat causing combined Reform and MAGA*-Tory vote to exceed the winning Labour vote. Labour will win the next general election. This will halt the worst excesses of the present government. It will not, I predict, effect real or effective change to solve the many deep-rooted problems we have. Labour is both too embedded in a broken and corrupt system and too fearful of its returning 'socially conservative'** core voters to be more than Tory-Lite, with an ironically less diverse cabinet than the current Loonies. * Here 'Make Albion Great Again' ** For which read 'xenophobic reactionary anti-wokist', if not even worse.