flyingsignalman

Many moons ago, Merlin Models produced a live steam model of the ex Sierra Leone Government Railways 2-6-2T (as running on the Welshpool and Llanfair Light Railway). My credit card limit had just been increased to £650, the price of the loco and surprisingly, I was not owing anything on it! I was tempted but in the end bottled out of paying that much. Many Bachmann locos passed me by too, as at the time they appeared, I couldn't afford them - good old "limited run batch production!!!!" Being a BOF, I hanker for the days I could go into a model shop and have an equal chance of buying what I was after! Nowadays, modelling in N gauge has really limited my missing out on stuff.....

25052 with an Officers' Special at Rock Ferry, heading for Canning St and maybe the Wirral lines. May 1983.

Union Pacific, as my late uncle used to work for them as a Brakeman.

I had the turbo fan car; a bonus was it could be pushed round when the juice was turned off! My first train set was a Playcraft one and my brother also had a set too. The Playcraft range appeared in Woolworths each year in the run up to Christmas and at first was all we had was an 0-4-0 and and 2 mark 1 coaches each. We quickly found that moving one loco would generate enough power to move the second one. We also found that this would create enough interference on the TV to warrant our Dad coming upstairs to tell us to pack it in....

Not an article but this advert from the 1971 David & Charles Light Railway Guide opened my eyes to light railway modelling (I'd not long discovered narrow gauge railways too! ).

I've seen photos of class 24s and 25s on the line up to Blodwell Quarry and not long before the line was mothballed I was stopped at the level crossing south of Oswestry when a class 31 passed with a train for the quarry.

I've always understood that the first lager brewed in this country was produced by a brewery in Wrexham around the start of the 20th century.

Here are a few photos of a coil train arriving at Dee Marsh, from South Wales, behind class 37 Tremorfa Steelworks and finally a photo of a covered wagon in the sidings. Taken 23/3/1990.

Here is a slightly better (hopefully) copy of my slide referred to in the quoted link. It was taken 14/5/1981

The numbers are not lever numbers they are reference numbers in the list shown (the full extent of which covers the lines from Birkenhead Park to West Kirby and New Brighton). The diagram was issued by the Mersey Railway to their drivers for road learning purposes.

Regarding the above comment, at Sutton Manor Colliery near St Helens was this 16t Min fitted with open spoked wheels. Photo taken 13/2/1982. (this is a better scan than the ones that appeared a while ago in my thread on Sutton Manor colliery.

Quick reply. I think 7 could work the points and traps, though a S&T Man might disagree. 5 could become the FPL with 6 the main line points if you're concerned. Disc 8 applies to the loop for moves to the main line. Points 12 would likely only be sprung and worked by a hand lever if the platform finished short of the crossover. 15, I think would be needed if there was a lot of shunting; you could live without it though. Disc 3 only applies to the move from the main to the loop (and sidings). The Southern, especially, seemed happy to use one disc for several routes.

Here is my sketch of how I would signal your layout as shown by the plan above. I've moved the signal box onto the platform, mainly because it would allow the Signalman (Porter Signalman) to undertake other duties in between trains; the position of the box on your diagram is fine though. There is a couple of comments on the diagram; I hope they make sense (but having not long finished a 12 hours shift, I may be a bit addled). The numbers on the diagram are the lever numbers.

Hope these are of interest. Looking through my stuff carefully arranged files, I saw the following on (what was I assume) a Mersey Railway Driver's route learning aid in preparation for the electrification of the Wirral Lines of the LMSR. The numbers are for identification purposes only. The diagram is annoted :- "Central Station, Birkenhead , July 1937. Also shown, are 2 back board plates that were given to me from the box; the first is for lever 5, the ground frame release and the second is for lever 34.

Here's my attempt at lengthening a Hornby coach. It is 2nd from the left and is mounted on its (cut in half and with added bits from another) chassis. I trimmed about 1mm strip from the top of the sides which can be seen on an unaltered coach and seems unnecessary to me. I originally used the roof from the coach and lengthened it with a piece from the leftovers from the conversion but it seemed too high. I lost interest in it after I discovered it was similar in length to a Ratio kit but eventually carried on with it. I replaced the roof with one from Ratio that I had spare after creating the coach on the left from various pieces of Ratio coach sides but it is a little too high still. The left hand coach is a representation of one that ran on the Wirral Railway, bought from the Mersey Railway and in my world ( the one with the pink sky.....) was then sold on to my light railway by the LMSR, hence the green livery! The 2 right hand coaches are Ratio kits. The inspiration for this last coach was an article by Nigel Digby (?) on the Wirral Railway Livery, one of many he did for BRM, shown in the second photo. The final photo shows the bits left over.

Looking at the diagram, the facing point locks stand in; this means either lever 1 or 4 must be reversed before the points they lock can be reversed. To clear signal 2 all the rest of the levers would be normal except 7pull which would have been cleared first.

No 7 lever had three positions; The normal position would be standing vertical in the middle of what would be normally a pull from normal to reverse. Both discs would be at danger with the lever in that position. To clear a disc you either pushed the lever fully normal or pulled it towards you to the full reverse position and the respective disc would clear. It was a way of saving levers.

As promised, some diagrams of New Brighton in my collection, also a photo of the Down Inner Homes taken 6/9/1989. The TC diamond is covered because the box had been recently been damaged by fire and was being worked without any track circuits or electric locks working; there was a Supervisor monitoring the Signalman to ensure safe working (!). The first three diagrams are from information in the Railway signalling Company records that are (were?) in the Liverpool Museum Archives, the 1958 diagram is from information received from a SRS member; later, levers 32,33,35 were taken away leaving the siding on the down as a long headshunt, when it was finally removed I'm not sure. The engine release crossover in platform 2 was, presumably, removed after the line was electrified in 1938 but again, I'm not sure when it was done. The crossover in platform 1 lasted until at least late 1965, as on bank Holidays until then, the normal DMU to Wrexham was replaced by an ex-GWR pannier and 4 coaches. The final diagram is my sketch I made when on the relief and I've included it for completeness; it also gives the date when the set back discs on the up were provided. Naming of sidings (in the station area), from the up to the down was : - 2 Loop, 1 Loop, Wall Siding

Despite there being a route into the up siding it was not a signalled move for arriving trains; they had to go into the platform or down Sidings and then shunt out onto the up main. To get into the up siding from the up main ( or back into the station) required a handsignal from the box as the set back discs were a late addition to the layout. I'm away at moment but when I'm back I'll post copies of the diagrams I do have.

I had a mental image of a photo of one of Terry Gough's conversions but I couldn't remember who wrote the articles. I started getting the Railway Modeller in late 1974 and I think his articles were appearing irregularly around then.

In the early to mid 1960's there was a series of articles in the Model Railway Constructor about the Isle of Wight Railways and one article used these coaches as a basis for IOW stock. A S/H coach (repainted into GW brown) that I had bought had been weighted using 2p coins, 5 I think, I haven't got inside to have a proper look.

The loco looks very similar to my loco that I bought in about 2005; I've not made any alterations to it, yet! Shown here on a previous garden railway of mine on 25/2/2009; not long before we moved to our present address.

Just bought this issue the other day at Sainsburys and for once the magazine packaged with it (Narrow Gauge World) was one I hadn't bought! Apart from my usual moan of pictures across the (im)perfectly bound issue was the feature (which I found useful) on using various garden flower products that surely should have been called an "Advertorial" for Golden Valley Hobbies! I enjoyed the article on Heybridge Wharf but a few photos giving a wider view would have been welcome. Talking of which, why are fiddle yards in the magazine just shown as blank spaces when they are sometimes they are as important as the public side of the layout? PS "Upcycling is a word/phrase I find more annoying than train station! - also if I remember correctly Joueff/Playcraft products were made to 3.5mm/1ft scale.

Bit late to the topic (as usual....) here is a photo of Motor Rail loco 1944 of 1919 at Mold Synthite Siding near Mold, dated 28/8/1981. I believe it was later purchased by Ian Jolley after rail traffic ceased.

When I was at Hooton in 1976, partially fitted trains from Chester direction to the Helsby Branch (and vice-versa) that needed to run round had a brake van at either end and were allowed 20 minutes to run round. If a train had only one brake van they were allowed an extra 10 minutes to run round the brake van as well.