Pteremy

Yes research is fun, whether on line or in books. But if a manufacturer is offering a range of liveries, some with quite subtle variations, I am sure they are doing so on the basis of their own detailed research, including photographic evidence. So why not share some of that information, including published source references, with us?? It is not as if they are giving away their own intellectual property. It evidences the efforts they are going to to achieve a high degree of accuracy. And it allows us to make better informed choices in our preorders.

Is it possible to have some approximate date ranges for the different lives? I can't be alone in being more generous with Rule 1 for wagons, because when modelling mixed freight trains and yards variety is everything. But I do like to stick to accurate time ranges. I am particularly interested in the Ice Blue vans. I read that this was introduced around 1964. But is there anything in the lettering/data panels etc that would fix either version to a later date (after summer 1965 in particular)?

Well it does distract the eye in what would otherwise be excellent photos.

is it an illusion - or have you finally fixed the wonky railing on the embankment?

I have managed to track down a couple of references from old RMweb threads. The first is a Mica B at St Erth in 1960. This is on page 113 of Welch's 'Western steam in Devon and Cornwall'. It isn't a close up shot but it is clear enough to see that it still has end roof vents, 2 handrails on the ends, the end steps (including the latterly added central one at the top) and is in a relatively clean white livery. In a different thread there is a suggestion that the St Ives Branch generated traffic for other types of refrigerated van, possibly fish. Update: there is an article in GW Journal 97 which says that during the 1950s two traders in St Ives sent fish away by rail. The article mentions a Bloater attached to the rear of a midday passenger train. But perhaps insulated vans were also used at other times, particularly as the Bloaters were withdrawn over the course of the decade. There is also a reference to a Flickr photograph showing Mica Bs in a freight with BR built meat vans passing Aintree station en route to Bankfield Goods Yard. This is dated to 1957. Try as might I have not managed to track the actual photograph down.

'What goes with what' is one of the first steps most people take in developing model railways as a hobby, after the simple pleasure of watching something (anything) go round and round has waned. Hornby are doing a good job in getting new products to market, particularly alongside the bluetooth DCC push. But it is difficult to see any coherence in the timing of releases, particularly if you want to attract established modellers. TBH there is more coherence to the expanding Era 1 00 range, where existing regional/era preferences may not be a significant deterrent to developing a sideline interest and, perhaps of relevance, there is unlikely to be any competition.

Thanks for the update - sounds like I should get mine sometime during April.

Although being lunar based the New Year celebration only lasted from the New Moon on 10th February 2024 to the following Full Moon, which was 24th February. But it is certainly a big hiatus every year.

Do you have the same postcode as the church? If you take SATNAV as an example there are clearly some people who overlook the blindingly obvious preferring to believe what the information on their 'device' is telling them.

Hopefully there will be another 'despatch update' soon.

Yes, I can see that now. I think I was fooled by an optical illusion, an apparent 'step' at the base of the yellow dot, which is just where the panel is kept cleaner, around the letters and numbers. Indeed, looking at pictures of the real thing it looks as if the shape of spurious panel is intended to 'represent' this feature, which seems to persist even when vans were subsequently in Departmental service - e.g. p25 of Gamble's British Railway Vans v2 in the Cheona series

The faux luggage is a great idea. Adaptable to other contexts - like DMUs

As I am here.....has anymore been said recently about the delivery of the Crump coach? It seems to be a completely different timeline to the railway items.

12 of the sound functions on the Titfield version are extracts from the soundtrack of the film

With excellent Banana vans appearing from Accurascale and Rapido recently I thought I would have a go at a couple of Dapol/Red Panda conversions, for added variety. Am I right in thinking that you did not attempt removal of the spurious body side panels? Instead you seem to have camouflaged them by adding the large chalk board that these van had, plus it looks like you have scored a line to represent the correct pattern corner support?