Blandford1969

If you are visting this weekend. 2253 Ohama is not available due to a fault which it has not been possible to sort out since the paid staff returned to work on Tuesday. Through a lot of hard work though 7714 is now available for traffic as of this lunch time. 2968 is standing in on some diagrams and the order locos were originally working trains has now altered. Also on Saturday is the Kidderminster Railway Museum Photo fair in the building behind the museum on the other side of the roadway to the car park. There are over 20 dealers with all sorts of subjects and areas. Who knows maybe see you there tomorrow.

HSTs are being prepared for export to Mexico. We are also storing some other vehicles on a commercial contract

To answer your a number of your points. I understand and am sorry you did not have a good time. However some of what you have written is unfair. We no longer have paid staff in the buffets and are totally reliant on volunteers. I remember that it was made clear before Christmas that due to lack of staff there would be a very basic service over new year. There were only limited numbers of volunteers who knowing who is involved would have been doing their best to go as quickly as possible. For the overcrowding I'd always recommend if trains are running from Bridgnorth to start from there. The trains were 7 and 8 coach sets and that is the limit for our line based on passing loops. In an ideal world people would be evenly spread out over all days, however we do not live in a perfect world. The railway has been putting on additional trains from the original service to take account of higher demand. The first service from Kidderminster is always heavily loaded having said that. The largest delay of the day was 14 minutes and I can see from the notes the TTIs were going through one of the three trains appologising for being held at Highley. On the 28th we had a high winds which meant that at times speed restrictions were put on first servces, plus additional desiel inspection trains run in front of the first serivce to ensure there were no trees down after we had a neighbouring tree come down on the line recently. On the 28th an engine had to be failed due to a boiler fault, which I am sure you would prefer was sorted rather than putting peoples lives at risk. On the 26th an engine was failed on shed and another loco had to be prepared which takes time, we cannot afford to keep spare engines in steam. On the 2nd of January the firebrigade requested a line block due to responding to a vehicle stuck in floodwater which resulted in delays whilst that was in place and also afterwards when a caution was in place. Apart from those all other days ran without issues on times. No idea why the booking office at Kidder would not have announced the first train, that sounds unusual. I did not know you even had to exchange the e tickets. I would always say to anyone who is waiting for someone to tell the gaurd, how is the train crew to know if someone from a party is not on the train. Your experience is not what any of us as volunteers who have given many years or decades would want and on behalf of us I appologise for the things that have gone wrong, although we dont have control over the weather nor a loco developing a fault. I get you are upset but feel posting as you have is perhaps a bit unfair as you have not by the sounds of it even given the railway the opportunity to look at your letters or respond.

It is a term though I have heard said of the class by some enthusiasts, compared to the traditional Pannier they are brutal. That being said they are easier and quicker to prep and being Walsherts accellerate more quickly than a traditional Pannier. However you cannot pull a 15 up to one notch off mid gear due to the 15 having a fixed lead compared to the normal one with Stephensons which has an increasing lead as the engine is pulled up, so giving an increased amount of steam as pre admission before the full Live main steam is admitted.

DBS checks can only be carried out in certain circumstances where the person will be a: Teacher Childminder Social Worker Medical professional Foster Carer Most people on railways do not come into contact with minors so this is a bit of a red herring. Its worth adding you that on many railways the structure means volunteers do have a 'manager' be that Station Master, Gaurds/Signaling/Loco Inspector etc.

This really is becoming a use it or loose it. The number of buyers is falling and its becoming more difficult to justify the cost of printing more. We will see.

The PDK kit would be the sensible choice

How about 3d printing?

As per your comment on Wright Writes , It would be great to see the photos in this thread as the rebuild of a DJH S15 is beconin and your thread looked very helpful

It can be a bit more complicated than that sadly. I purchased a load of original slides of three deceased photographers. I did not know at the time the delaer had 'lent' them to a third party who copied them and sold them on their website claiming to be selling with reproduction rights, they also still appear in their books in which they claim they are their copyright despite never having been their copyright. When challenged they got very umpty. Buyer beware seems to be more and more the case now and will only get more complicated as we move forwards in time.

The boiler from 3612 is indeed pooled. The idea being a Pannier could always be in service with the spare boiler being restored and ready to go. It carried on for a while but then was dropped. The spare boiler not sure which one is currently in the yard at Bridgnorth.

It has varied depending on which boiler it has been fitted with

Have you got a list of the kits without instructions - I may have a set of nucast instructions (will have a look at the weekend)

Yup, crappy end to the year. No profits, big losses. Worked really hard to put together a fair redundancy process. The Sales Director ignored it and told one person they were redundant in the first meeting (becasue the customer has given notice) what part of consultation and ideas to aovid does he not get. Each manaager had a pack of invitations, Q&A, script to ensure fairness, which went to the entire board. FD leaves it till the morning before the seond one to say have you got the invitation - he gets the original email resent - then on the day 'have you got the Q&A' He really just acts like all he wants to do is undermine me. I was so cross I said as much on teams to him - his response was a bully boy response of 'explain yourself' that is not happening. I had fought this horrible bug doing the rounds all week and just though sod it and went off Friday afternoon. Not sure how I feel about Monday at the moment. No modelling, the bench and study are even more of a disaster zone (death trap my wife said last night) and spent most of today asleep as exhausted so tomorrow has to be mad clearing as the Out Laws arrive on Monday. Still the one light is not so much modelling as having had a cracking turn on 75069 last Saturday and a first reaquantence with 2968 next Saturday. They are keeping me sane as I really worry about what next year will bring with the jobs market at my level so rubbish - not many roles and obsessed by having the exact match on sector! Grrrrrr

Have you made any forward progress on this one?

Hi all, This is a long shot but does anyone have a Brassmasters 4f easy chass kit and are building the Fower tender version so have the Deeley tender frame etch as a spare? I know they do not sell it as an individual part and was hoping to find one for something I'm working on. Thanks in advance

No. Why, becuase the railway has just spent 1.3 million on restoring Hagley. The railway is as you know struggling off the back of the pandemic and massive rise in the cost of coal from about 100 to over £500 per ton and the average engine burns 2 tons per day. The cold hard reality is smaller locos cost less to restore and are more economical. The best size being around a class 4. Gordon is very, very big would ne at least a 1 million pound overhaul whereas to say restore something like 1501 might only be 500,000. Lots of footplate crews that worked on it are very glad it stays nice and warm in the Engine House, its a pig to get to steam, awful to get coal down in the tender and inveriably the hydrostatic needed refilling part way through the day and trying to do that is one heck of a job with lots and lots of cold water.

View Advert BR DJH Duke of Gloucester kit - unstarted (needs wheels etc) DJH Duke of Gloucester kit, new and unstarted one of many I will never get to. Just needs wheels, etc to complete Advertiser Blandford1969 Date 19/11/23 Price £90 Category OO / 4mm scale  

View Advert Brassmasters Patriot loco and tender kit, unstarted Brassmasters Patriot compelte with tender kit as well. Advertiser Blandford1969 Date 19/11/23 Price £130 Category OO / 4mm scale  

Thanks, I had copied the original drawing as the stating point and not paid attention to one of my negatives of her (as shown below). Certainly the footsteps are turned up as well. I appreciate the help.

A while ago I asked if anyone knew of a drawing for the rebuilt tender from a 3P which eneded up with 3f 43435. With a good supply of photos, none side on and a drawing of the frames I decided to put a drawing together and hopefully its of interest. There has been quite a bit of chopping and changing with trying to get angles and points in the right place. Overall its pretty good and enough to turn into a scratchbuilt version. You can see how the drawing was built up especially with the frames. Still not totally happy with the steps.

J37?

You'd be amazed how much side to side wobble even at slow speeds you can see when accelerating just from the hammer blow

However the staff on the Hornby stand at the weekend knew nothing about it at all.

There is a story of Gordon on its way to Shildon in 75. It was running tender first, to demonstrate how to get the coal forwards the driver accelerated the loco up to about 50 and then shut off. As anyone who has been on a Dub dee will know the intermideiate buffers are pointless. The tender crashed into the loco, bounced off and was repeated countless times with the coal shooting forwards onto the footplate, Those tenders rank as about the worst for getting coal down unless you get in and dig it forwards