Goldhawk

l don’t think there was ever such a thing as a rigid standard colour scheme for stations but there were a lot of what might be described as “typical”. The painting scheme for small to medium station might be - Black for ironwork, metal fencing, door and door frames, window frames, platform seats and lamps. Pale cream was used for the undersides of canopies and canopy valencing, timber buildings and fencing. White for window sashes and glazing bars.

Nescafé Azera instant coffee tins which have resealable plastic lids when filled with water will make ideal weights for holding down track and other things while the glue sets. Also plastic milk bottle caps are useful for mixing small quantities of paint.

The location is Surbiton. Might this show the loading of the Surbiton to Okehampton car train?

Another variation to mention, W33 Bembridge had a cab roof made in three panels rather than the usual two and without a ventilator. l’m not sure if this applied to any other of the island O2s.

Many years ago at a depot open day, l think it was Old Oak Common, there were a pair of 08 shunters named ‘Victor’ and ‘Margaret’ after the Meldews in One foot in the grave.

Not that I have found it a problem, the layout represents a very small freight yard. Freight only, no passenger, six wagons would be a long train my little model world and I rarely need to use anything even close to full throttle. Lima locos have a massive lump of solid steel inside that plants them very firmly on to the track. Perhaps the nickel-silver wheels can achieve a better grip on nickel-silver rail than brass would?

Are you able to run any non Lima locos with which to make a comparison? On my short shunting plank layout I have two class 73s, they both require a slightly higher controller setting (about an extra 10% on the turn of the dial) when compared to my other locos (Bachmann) in order to get them moving but once under way will run just as smoothly if not as quietly! They both still have their original Lima motors but fitted with replacement brushes and springs from Peters Spares. I have also fitted Ultrascale wheels and additional pick-ups. If your locos have been fitted with extra pick-ups might I suggest checking that they are not pressing too hard against the wheels and acting as a brake.

Taking up Wickham Green's suggestion I dug out my copy of "An Illustrated Survey of Selected SOUTHERN STATIONS" and picked out Hayes (Kent) as a good example of a Southern Railway reconstruction of the inter-war period. The plans are all scaled at 160 ft/inch and the measured distance between lamp posts on the plan I found to be about 20/32nds of an inch, which suggests that they were spaced about 100 feet apart. Hayes is a island platform terminus type station and from the accompanying photos the platform lamps were of the double sided concrete type to be found at many of the Southern stations rebuilt or modernized at that time.

According to G.W.R Disused Stations in Greater London by J.E.Connor, the shelters at South Greenford were reputed to have come from the nearby Trumpers Crossing Halt (on the Brentford Branch) which had closed earlier in 1926.

The second and third coaches are FOs.

Norton Fitzwarren, Norton Junction, Brize Norton..............are there any other GWR Nortons! Definitely a no-no for Norton. Just tried again on a second laptop and Mcafee seems quite happy with it!

In Mk1 coaches the lighting voltage is indeed 24v and I believe that this is also the case in pre-nationalisation designs as well. The caps on the bulbs are of the standard domestic 22mm bayonet type*. I have not seen what happens when a 24 volt bulb is put into a 240 volt light socket but suspect that the result would be similar to the old press photographers camera! Nowadays a lot heritage railways use LED bulbs in their coach light fittings, these come either as a direct replacement or have an adaptor bayonet cap fitted, brighter and also less draw on the batteries. *EMU stock has a variation in that there are three pins on the bulb cap intead of the normal two, I understand that voltage is also different, 70 volts I believe.

Working for Royal Mail at the time I remember that there was a steady rise in the number of Amazon packages that were being handled in the the system, mainly books at first. But once Amazon's operations became big enough to justify their own distribution network that business virtually disappeared almost over night.

A solution that I have tried is to make the lens from a small piece of clear selotape stuck to the back of the spectacle plate. Trim off the excess around the edges with a sharp blade. Finally colour the lens using a wash of green or red gloss paint diluted with thinners to get a translucent look. I would try first on a piece of spare selotape first to get the right consistency. Hope that this is of help.

Quite by chance this afternoon I happened to hear Solomon Browne, descibed as a poetic drama-documentary, on BBC Radio Four. It was one of the most moving programmes I have listened to in a long while, for 45 minutes I just sat transfixed, hoping that my listening would not be disturbed. I would definitely say this was radio at its best.

The sense of anger at the callous treatment that Jack Mills received at the hands of the gang was keenly felt by all railwaymen at the time. When my brother (the only member of the family to have been a railwayman) started his career at Willesden Junction, although a couple years after the robbery, that feeling of resentment was still strongly felt, especially being the London Midland Region, where there were many who would have known driver Mills. , After a year or two at Willesden, my brother transferred to the Southern Region then Network Southeast and finally South West Trains before his retirement. Even now I would be reluctant to bring up the topic of the so called great train robbery with him.

It could be worth making the underframe available as a separate item!

To hold a loose coupling in place. I find a sliver of thin card about 4mm x 3.5mm pushed down between the back of the fishtail and the socket usually works. Used rail tickets make an ideal source of thin card!

Bachmann did actually produce a push-pull version of the 2MT, back in the old split frame days. Though I don't think that it is currently available with the newer updated chassis.

Yes, provided that the external bolt on the gangway doors has been left undone, the guard could open the doors from the inside using his key.

Wickham Green has made a good point, that has puzzled me too, so having trawled a few coaching stock books looking for good photos of the ends of non-mark 1 gangwayed stock, I think I have found the answer. Where there is a gangway, the lamp bracket has been extended outward so as to hold the tail-lamp anything up to a foot away from the end of the coach so that the signalman's view of. the lamp is not blocked by the projecting gangway. It also seems to be a general rule that there was only one lamp-bracket provided which was mounted to the left of the gangway, this certainly seems holds true in my own line of interest of Southern stock.

As the lamp irons are attached on either side of the gangway face-plate and not on the end of the coach body, the left hand bracket being higher than the one on the left. Having this difference in height prevents the lamps being damaged if they are forgotten about when the coaches are pushed together.

A trawl though the Six Bells Junction website has come up with two possibilities. The train could be one or other of two railtours run by the LCGB on 4th April and repeated on the 2nd May 1965. The Wessex Downsman trains were both run over the same route; Waterloo - Reading - Devizes - Bath Spa - Bristol TM - Mangotsfield - Bath Green Park - Bournemouth West - Southampton - Waterloo. The website says that Hall 6963 was used between Reading and Bristol on both occasions. Photos of these railtours show that Bulleid stock was used.