phil-b259
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Posts posted by phil-b259
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8 hours ago, MikeParkin65 said:
The rear tender lamp is he said a permanent fitting with no alternative lamp bracket provided.
Thats rubbish! Come on Hornby even you can't be as thick as to think lamps were left on between locos and their trains....
If Hornby can go to the trouble of having a plug in lamp for the smokebox door then there is no reason whey the same cannot be done for the tender...
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7 minutes ago, Adi said:
I was not dissing him at all.
I meant 'you' in the general forum wide sense, not the personal.
Its just there are a lot of people on this forum who find him objectionable in one way or another.....
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2 minutes ago, Adi said:
He got a loaner off Athens and Hattons
He did - BUT (1) he never went and gave either item a final score nor (2) entered into his own 'league table'
Whatever else you might say about Sam his adoption of the system used by the Consumers Association / Which? for decades (only reviewing items / services they have purchased from providers the general public can buy from) does show integrity.
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On 01/04/2024 at 11:19, PhilJ W said:
Most of the Hatton's generic coaches sold out on pre-order but the Hornby ones didn't do so well judging by the numbers discounted by many outlets. This could be put down to several factors such as Hornby's 'bandwagon jumping' such as with the Titfield Thunderbolt. When Hatton's announced their generic coaches Hornby had some Victorian/Edwardian coaches in the pipeline and decided to produce them in several liveries as generic coaches though they were based on a specific railway.
And also the fact that Hornbys efforts:
(1) Are done to a far lower standard with much more reliance on moulded on detail
(2) Are very much a LBSCR Stoudley body design
(2) Have rubbish interiors
(3) Are fitted with Westinghouse air brake equipment and Stroudley emergency communication system (which means no external items visible)
As such I have only purchased 4 of Hornbys efforts (all LBSCR versions) but have many times that number of the Hattons offering in a multitude of liveries....
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On 15/04/2024 at 21:58, rodent279 said:
But if the doors are under the overall control of CDL, there would be no more risk of that than with a door with conventional manual handles under the control of CDL. All the push buttons would do is allow the door to be pushed or pulled open once CDL has released the main door lock.
CDL does NOT ‘control’ the doors!All it does is prevent them from being unlocked - once they are unlocked then it’s down to the forces acting on them which governs how fast and with what force they open outwards.
Plug or sliding doors will either retract into the train body or say very close to it and as such there is very little chance of them hitting a passenger standing on the platform as they open.
Hinged doors swing out on a wide arc - plus have door furniture (latches /catches) which stick out and could cause injury.
A person controlling when a swing door is opened and then the actual the rate of a swing can ensure that it is done in a safe manor - including stopping the door or deferring the opening until a passenger has moved out of the way.
A door which uses gravity to swing out when released cannot do this!
Finally you should take note that in places like France for decades they have had doors which require the user to manually open them - but which can be closed by power when commanded to by the train guard. This is by far a better way of doing things….
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2 hours ago, rodent279 said:
Would they need a new safety case?
If you've got CDL and a power supply, why not fit push button door locks, such that pushing the button releases the door lock, allowing it to swing open under is own weight, in a controlled manner?
Simply swapping one type of manually operated mechanical locking mechanism to another would, in railway terms probably considered in much the same way that swapping one type of point machine to another is dealt with - I.e. providing no changes are made to the controls then it can be done as a maintenance activity by maintenance staff and tested using maintenance testing procedures.By contrast re-inventing the whole door system and simply letting a door swing open under gravity and in an uncontrolled manor* would not be considered as replacing a manual mechanical lock with an ‘operationally equivalent’ system due to all the new elements which were not present on the old system and as such mean far more approvals / testing would be needed.
Such a system would also probably cost far more than simply making a drag batch of manually operated mechanical locks….
* Given the dangers of an uncontrolled** hinged door hitting passengers on the platform as it opens and potentially causing injuries I doubt it’s a solution which would pass a proper risk assessment
** if it has to be moved by a person then that person can be said to have the ability to control and stop the opening process if needed.
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13 minutes ago, adb968008 said:
Who’s going to be your internal door lock supplier then ?
Any engineering firm capable of making them!Door locks are not jet engines and as such it’s perfectly possible to get a new batch made (particularly if you make use of ‘off the shelf’ solutions rather than seek exact replicas of BR locks)
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33 minutes ago, Northmoor said:
. This is, I suspect, why WCRC are stalling on CDL fitment; vacuum braking will become unacceptable on NR before too long so the company doesn't want to commit to the expense on stock that might have to be withdrawn altogether before they have earned the installation cost back. CDL is a red herring.
Vaculm braking is not unacceptable on safety grounds - it still fulfills all the legislative requirements as far as vehicles operating on the national rail network go.The ONLY reason Network Rail don’t like it is hardly anyone uses it - so if a vacuum braked train needs rescuing / dragging off the main line due to a failure then it’s going to take ages to sort out thus increasing the compensation payments which have to be paid out to other operators due to the infrastructure being unavailable
(If the failed train is a charter then it’s even more expensive for Network Rail as the amount of charter operators pay is capped - what Network Rail have to pay out to everyone else is not!
By contrast if the train is air braked then it will be say to source an air braked loco from a Freight company to get the failed train out of the way.
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20 minutes ago, adb968008 said:
There seems to be a mk1 exemption date running until 2028 too… theres no guarentees that goal post wont shift either to an outright ban of mk1’s no matter what…
If that were a realistic proposition the LSL, Belmont, Hastings diesels etc wouldn’t have / are spending lots of money on ‘Mk1’ (the law basically considers anything with a separate bodyshell and underframe to be a ‘Mk1’ regardless of whether it is actually a true Mk1 coach.Fitting of interior door handles and restring droplight openings is also hardly difficult - huge numbers of BR Mk1 based EMUs had just such a setup as a response to restricted clearances on some routes (e.g. East Grinstead line)
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4 hours ago, Gwiwer said:
The timetable change appears on paper to be disastrous for most passengers and benefits no-one. Bognor retains through trains to London for example but not to neighbouring Littlehampton. Brighton loses its long-standing direct trains to Portsmouth. There are still only two trains an hour along the west Coastway to and from Brighton despite sometimes serious overcrowding and folks from Shoreham eastwards having to abandon the railway as they simply cannot get on. Among other things.
In the absence of more drivers or more rolling stock - both of which require authorisation from the DfT in Whitehall (who are still peddling the notion that trains are running round empty) any changes that Southern do is always going to be a robbing Peter to pay Paul sort of thing.-
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2 hours ago, Covkid said:
I am struggling with this.
When BR operated RMBs they were part of the seating accommodation of the train. Originally RMBs were basically a 64 seat TSO with two seating bays converted to house a very small kitchen, counter and panty. I am not sure if they were subsequently modified but a store room was built into the place of the seating bay adjacent to the counter - meaning three of the eight seating bays of the 64 seat TSO were taken up with the catering area. Therefore, the majority of the coach was second class seating.
My strongest memory of RMBs was a journey on the far north line - 26042 to Brora for 26046 back to Inverness. The buffet steward made the same train swap as me, but on the northbound journey he made a fresh boiled egg sandwich. I probably rode in the leading coach for the Sulzer thrash, but the RMB provided a very important complement of seats as one of maybe four passenger vehicles and a couple of BGs on the train.
The point I am making is that I cannot imagine WCR restricting it's passengers from the equivalent of 5/8ths of a TSO.
Plenty of coaches have operated with doors locked out of use to passengers - and at least one type of Mk1 (the RU) didn’t have any passenger doors at all!All the ORR will require is that before locking all the doors out of use is that someone has risk assessments the implications for emergency evacuations - but this should NOT be confused with a requirement that all doors must be available in an emergency!
As I said earlier if the RMB is sandwiched between two CDL fitted carriages with end doors then the risks of locking the RMB doors out of use will be minimal and as such there will be no issues as far as the ORR are concerned with it carrying passengers.
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1 hour ago, JohnH said:
Could they use the RMB with stewards on each door?
No - that would require an official exemption to be issued by the ORR for the RMBPlease remember the use of Stewards was a mitigating measure for the absence of a CDL system.
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10 hours ago, melmerby said:
I was curious to how the exit from the run round and the main line have the turnouts not interlocked to each other.
The line is not open to traffic yet and will be under an engineers possession.In such possessions points may be wound on manual and left in configurations which would not be be possible were they being moved by am interlocking for the purpose of setting routes and changing signals to proceed.
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16 minutes ago, adb968008 said:
The one I see is the buffet…
if its not got anyone assigned seating, but yet passengers can stil enter to buy stuff, and presumably sit in its limited seats… can they lock all doors out of use ?
It all depends on the risks...
If that RMB is sandwiched between two CDL fitted vehicles with end doors then locking out all the doors on the RMB wouldn't have present a huge risk. After all the Mk1 RU vehicle didn't have any passenger doors from the beginning - people had to board using the doors on adjacent coaches...
And if the RMB doors are all secured out of use to passengers then, legally speaking the requirement to fit CDL to it or get an exemption for it from the ORR also disappears!
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31 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:
I wonder what the rules are for locking all the doors on a carriage carrying passengers out of use.
If you mean securing all* doors with a railway staff issue carriage key then this would not be permissible because passengers would have no way of deactivating the locks in an emergency. CDL (and more modern systems) always have an emergency override facility inside and outside the carriage which allows the locking system to be disabled and the door opened.
*Its perfectly acceptable to lock some doors out of use at the planning stage (charter operators usually lock the middle doors on Mk1 stock out of use) - but I expect the exact number would depend on the outcome of a risk assessment (which would consider whether the locked door at the end of one carriage was right next door to a unlocked door in the next carriage for example.
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7 minutes ago, franciswilliamwebb said:
It definitely did, I've got one from that era. The 4F, by contrast, seemed to have tender pickups from the outset - unless I was just lucky.
The 4F came after the 3F and if yours has tender pick ups (I'm not able to check my 3F & 4F locos right now) then they would have been fitted to all 4F models.
Bachmann rarely seem to go back and tweak their locos once designed - some other manufacturers are noticeably better in that regard.
Adding tender pick ups where the decoder is already in the tender wouldn't be a significantly difficult or expensive exercise and its somewhat stage Bachmann don't do this given the high prices they charge for re-runs.
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On 07/04/2024 at 01:11, Kaput said:
Bachmann tender locos quite often don't have tender pickups so a stay alive is worth considering.
It depends on the era the loco was designed...
There was a period when despite Bachmann putting the decoder socket in the tender they neglected to fit power pickups to the tender and the 3F may have originated during this time.
In recent years all newly tooled Bachman tender locos have included tender pick ups.
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12 hours ago, david.hill64 said:
Good luck with that! I made the mistake on engaging with the online comments. Never received so many downvotes for any point I've made. I had the audacity to suggest that perhaps WCRC was not as innocent as they claimed and that preventing fatalities was a good idea. The top voted post suggested that Brighton beach should be off limits as people might walk into the sea and drown...........
I'm not surprised, the Telegraphs readership are generally very much right wing 'state actions = bad' 'private business = 'excellent' mentality with an added does of selfish self entitlement which comes from generally being well off.
Its not nicknamed the 'Torygraph' for nothing....
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1 hour ago, rogerzilla said:
The last time I hired a big lorry (7.5t) it didn't have seatbelts. When a vehicle exceeds a certain mass, it isn't going to stop fast enough to throw you through the windscreen.
Regardless of its size or mass, UK laws require ALL motor vehicles to be fitted with seatbelts which MUST BE USED by the occupants while the vehicle is in motion.
The only exceptions are for historic vehicles which did not come with seatbelts (or the provision for them when built), PSV vehicles (busses) and obviously motorcycles
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3 hours ago, Flying Pig said:
And if it isn't and it bothers you, you can change it. I assume you can put empty lamp irons in every position if you wish, though that's wrong at the front of a train as well.
Even if Hornby do include what amounts to a 'blanking plate' with a lamp iron on it, because it has to be robust and easy enough to remove it will not be a tight and close fit with the surrounding surfaces.
A loco with obvious squares which stand out more than the rivet details etc round each lamp bracket will look naff however much you try and ignore it.
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51 minutes ago, ColinB said:
I don't mind them adding gimmicks but if they must make them the right scale. As I said in an earlier post there are much smaller leds they could have used. I must admit I am not a stickler for detail but they even put me off. It makes a decent model look like something out of Harry Potter. Fortunately for Hornby they are probably too expensive for Sam to review, so they probably have dodged that bullet.
Firstly if the lamps are removable then they will have to be physically oversize so that your average Hornby purchaser can actually swap them round. It also follows that if the lamps are oversize using a tiny LED will only accentuate that look by virtue of the smaller lens
Secondly its the likes of Sam who are precisely the people who will be wowed by the lamps so as pricy as it is I wouldn't rule out it getting a review as Sam does make a big thing of asking his supporters what they want him to tackle...
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6 hours ago, ess1uk said:
another one yesterday in West Sussex
Yup - but again not is all as it seems.(1) The problem was with national grid feeders / equipment and not railway supplies
(2) The repeated outages affected the Domestic supply to Arundel signal box (which controls not just Arundel but also the coastway route between Angmering and Ford)
What caused most of the disruption was the Telephone concentrator failing (it has a battery back up but the prolonged outage drained it) with the signaller having to talk past 20 signals as all the level crossing phones were not working. There was also an issue where emergency lighting also started failing as its battery back ups went flat making it unsafe for the signaller to remain inside and forcing the closure of the box.
There were also issues with power supplies at Petersfield and Havant…..
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5 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:
Sort of ! ............ a batch of 158s were diverted and were 'rebuilt' as 159s in the process ....................... though I've never sussed out what the 'rebuilding' involved.
The ‘rebuilding’ was limited to the new interior where NSE wanted 2+1 seating in first class as opposed to the 2+2 RR had specified plus NSE wanted a slightly enhanced catering trolley provision and CET toilets fitted. NSE also wanted th3 couplers tweaked as outlined above.From a mechanical / structural perspective there were no differences to the 158 fleet. Yes the engines were a bit more powerful on the 159s as opposed to the 158s but that was something specified by RR before the idea of diverting the fleet to NSE was thought of.
The changes couldn’t be made at the build stage (as opposed to things like the exterior paint finish which was altered from RR to NSE) due to the way the contract was worded so after BR took delivery of the units (minus the first class seating IIRC) which were immediately sent on to someone else to have the NSE alterations done.
There was a nice article about the class which gave a bit of background as to alternative options to modernise the West Of England route in a 1992 edition of the Railway Magazine IIRC.
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23 minutes ago, DY444 said:
Also, and depending on how you define "railway", the erstwhile Central Division sees 700s and 165s.
Neither of which could be said to be inspiring - the former being a grubby white colour (particularly where the carriage washers seem to be useless at removing grime) and the latter being a dark depressing green….-
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Hornby 2022 Black 5 new tooling
in Hornby
Posted
Given how popular Sams trains website is and the sort of feedback which get posted in the comments section is I fear there is a large segment of 'don't care about prototypical nonsense' train set types out there who will hoover them up regardless. The only thing which might stop them is the high price....