Railpassion

It's a great scale, you can get so much more in. Simon Kohler has done a great job in establishing a new British market and creating a buzz. It's a stunning achievement. He's positioned Hornby to have almost the entire market, as it did in dublo days. There's huge growth potential and it's a great opportunity for another player to enter the field to help expand the market. All to play for.

Will Bachmann enter the market? I think there's rewards if they do.

These delivery schedules seem slow. Maybe an opportunity for a small rival to produce a couple of models

Chiltern benefited from total route modernisation and a very unusual franchise arrangement. No other route has since managed total route modernisation. Virgin West Coast had a shot at it.

Thanks for the enlightening replies. @Innerhome I've ordered a copy of No.14, I was unaware of the series, thanks for drawing it to my attention. Truly, Barnstaple was a railway haven with three stations and the L & B too. It beggars belief that so much was destroyed by savage closures. I remember my family going to Ilfracombe and not thinking it perverse to abandon the train for a coach for the last few miles. How did we come to tolerate such thinking as an acceptable public transport solution? But that's another topic..

Thanks. Very smart work indeed, one more or less impossible on today's railway. I've seen a video of a tank in the down loop spur waiting to run onto the rear coaches once the Ilfracombe has left. There doesn't seem to be a backing signal from the up main for the Up manoeuvre, unless the ground signal applies both ways back along up main and to the Dock.

Thanks for your reply. That's helped to clear a few things up, as I haven't seen the sectional appendix. It would a marvellous model to operate with plenty of variety. Yesterday, I found a Barnstaple A revised drawing from the 60s on sale on ebay. No connection to the seller. https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/353786486739

Yeehah! Looking quite special. I had an Airfix rebuild with proper bogies and two motors but in a mad moment, I sold it on ebay. Nothing since has come close. But now......

Hello, Barnstaple Junction was a much loved station on its heyday. There's some wonderful photos, particularly of the 60s on the Internet etc. The very cramped conditions at the west end with no less than 5 diamonds in a short space is a challenge to model. The track layout here at srs signal https://www.s-r-s.org.uk/html/srq/S3517.htm Is intriguing. Two down platforms for the two routes, Torrington and Ilfracombe and one up platform for Exeter and sometimes Victoria Rd or Taunton on the GWR. The unusual feature is the middle siding. Was its original purpose to allow an ex- Torrington goods to layover whilst a passenger used the up platform? When the Atlantic Coast Express combined the Torrington and Ilfracombe portions to go forward, did the Torrington portion run through the middle and platform at the starter end before shunting back onto the stock in the up platform? Does anyone know what the practice was?

I'm looking forward to seeing the layout at York soon. What are the dimensions of the new TT layout? PS, Do you have the original plan A for Bregenbach, please? It no longer shows on page 1

Smrzovka was blazing a trail. I'm sure many who saw it began to think of the advantages of TT. I hope you get an invite soon.

There's a particularly good corrugated engine shed I saw in Monk Bar - it looked terrific.

There's some very nice RTR locos and stock coming through at the moment in OO9. Yesterday I was admiring a little display diorama in Monk Bar Models in York. The engines seemed like jewels with rich colours and glints of brass. There was a magnificent layout exhibited at York show a few years back with a beach scene and harbour. A marvel.

I experimented with TT using HOm track. I found the bttb couplings a bit clumsy but the size of stock seemed very comfortable. Much more room for loops and longer trains on a small layout 9 x 11. The cost of tillig track, to do the job properly, eventually put me off. I'm back with HO using short carriages/umbauwagen building a German layout which I'm really enjoying.

Does anyone know what is in the shed at Filisur these days?

They've weakened an iconic design.

I'm on this with head out of the window in the first carriage! We got on at Filey for some reason and off at Rotherham. First stop after Bridlington was Pontefract Baghill.

My friend has an SUV, great tank of a thing. He drives at 47mph on fuel save, annoying if you're behind him. The interior isn't that roomy, big seats and fittings take up the space. The boot isn't as large as I thought it would be. I have an MPV Vauxhall and it's just as, if not more, roomy. Around £40k cheaper too.

Here's German N, Piko TT and Hornby OO Old photo so excuse the quality

It's not just inflation and the cost of living that is hitting the hobby, covid and the supply problem has hammered the shop windows of the box shifters. Few other model shops have the range they once had and this is a real problem. I think the second-hand market is healthy and will dominate in the future.

A bold move by Peco. I tried continental TT as an experiment and found the positives to be shorter carriage lengths and more space generally. What had been a maximum 4-coach OO train length could now be 5 full length German IC coaches. The negatives were the track (very expensive from Tillig, so I used Peco HOm) and the coupling standards across different models. I'm sure that with mass produced track it's only a matter of time that UK locos and rolling stock appear from the smaller builders.

January '73 for the singling. Boxes at Speeton and Flamborough were downgraded with Bempton eventually becoming a frame on the platform. Details from my scanned copy of the Weekly Operating Notice for Jan 1973 "BETWEEN BRIDLINGTON QUAY AND HUNMANBY Double line working has ceased and the Up line between Bridlington Quay and a point where the line is slued into the Down line at approximately 40 1/2 m.p. (near the Hunmanby Down Distant) and the Down line from there to Hunmanby is now a Single line worked in both directions under the Electric Token Block Working Regulations. The adjacent redundant sections of the Down and Up Main lines will, except as shown below be subsequently removed. 310 yards of the Down Main are being retained at Bridlington Quay as a Shunt Spur and a 440 yards Up Main over-run retained at Hunmanby. A new facing crossover has been brought into use at Hunmanby for Up direction movements from Up Main to Single line and a new facing crossover has been provided at Bridlington Quay for Down direction movements from Down Main to Single line. Bridlington Quay The Down Home No.2 and Down Starting signals have been abolished. The former No.1 Platform Down Home signal is now the No.1 Platform Down Home (Platform Starting) signal to Single line and an off-set disc mounted on the signal post has been provided applying towards the new Shunt Spur (former Down Main). The former No.2 Platform Down Home is now the No.2 Platform Down Home (Platform Starting signal to Single line) and an adjacent ground disc has been provided applying towards the Shunt Spur. The double disc formerly applying - shunting - Down Main to Nos.5 or 4 Platform lines or (lower disc) towards the Sidings now applies (Upper disc) Shunt Spur to Nos.2 or 1 Platform lines and (lower disc) Shunt Spur to Sidings . The Up Home 3-aspect colour light (No.36/37) has had the diamond sign removed and this signal is now the Up Single line Home to Nos.4 or 5 Platform lines." The single line now enjoys two trains an hour throughout the day - the busiest the section has been outside the summer Saturday heydays.

Forgive my ignorance, but does anyone make a 742 in HO?

Living in Bridlington as a child I the railway scene came alive in the summer months. We lived on a leafy road close to the railway embankment north of the station and the line was, effectively, the horizon when looking toward the sea. By 3 or 4 years I would watch out for the distant signals to raise and wait to see what came and counting the carriages. (In winter often just two) At bedtime I would peep through the curtains in summer whenever I heard the sound of a train. Northbound trains were climbing the bank and working hard whilst southbound trains would fly down at speed. Sometimes two would pass, but only until 1973 when they singled the line to Hunmanby. When I started school at 5 the first big thrill of the morning was the walk to over Quay Crossing as the 0830 was due and seeing a train close hand. Sometimes there was a class 20 shunting over the road to the gasworks, a thrilling sound that had me holding my mother's hand tightly in case the engine got too close. After school we'd go and take a look at the goods yard if we could hear an engine. I remember going in to the goods warehouse and seeing a class 31 moving through when I was a good bit older. By then I was very keen and knew the different types of DMU and some of the diesels. The station was large with 8 platforms and several entrances. To a child it was the very grandest station until I saw Hull Paragon and then Kings Cross. Summer would see long trains going to Filey Holiday Camp with mixed rakes of maroon and blue and grey. Excursions would arrive almost everyday and Saturday mornings were a feast of trains in the 70s with DMUs from all over joined by some loco workings including Kings Cross trains. Traction was mostly 31s, 40s, 37s, and the odd 47. The station front had a road crossing to access the goods yard and if you timed it right you'd see the flagman come out and a loco cross the road to shunt the yard.

What a great project, a restoration that starts with the buildings rather than the track . Some lovely work by a dedicated modeller.