John M Upton

The gears can be forced on to the Bachmann wheel sets (once you have taken off one of the wheels of course!) and need a little care to get them lined up right but it has been worth the effort to exorcise the crudomatics out of the fleet.

...and speaking of oddly coloured BRCW machines, for some reason when I went onto Ebay a few minutes ago, they thought I might be interested in this: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Lima-Class-33-Diesel-loco-in-a-Green-Cream-Livery_W0QQitemZ260643008258QQcategoryZ69804QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp3907.m263QQ_trkparmsZalgo%3DSIC%26itu%3DUCI%252BIA%252BUA%252BIEW%252BFICS%252BUFI%252BDDSIC%26otn%3D20%26pmod%3D130416207535%26po%3DLVI%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D6566121488773632398 I think I will pass thanks... :lol:

All earlier Heljan OO scale models had the crud magnet wheels from new which not only attracted crud very quickly in service but came with it already liberally applied on when new out of the box!! These were changed to much better wheels on all their releases at about the time the first of the 58's came out. I have had both earlier and more recent Class 33's, the most recent releases I have purchased have had the new type wheel and have as a result not needed any drastic action. Up until now to replace the wheelsets on the earlier crud magnet versions, I used the replacement coach wheel sets made by Bachmann (about three or four quid for a pack of twelve sets) and simply transferred the cog from the Heljan axle to the Bachmann one for much improved running.

The nearest I can think of in recent times was when a 8 car Class 377 formation got derailed on a landslip just north of Redhill and once re-railed was hauled to Selhurst by two four car Class 171's. The identical couplings (about the only thing that marks a 170 from a 171) actually made sense that day! Sixteen car train on the Brighton line though, just as well they were not all electric and taking juice!!

Or indeed any form of punctuation it would seem...

It may be an early test shot but I'm delighted to see that the cab face looks pretty spot on to me. The drivers side window needs to be modelled in the open position which hopefully will be done and it is going to have to have a driver in there as well. Love the fact that luggage racks are planned too, never expected that. About the only thing missing will be a DCC programmable micro LED and smoke generator unit attached to an arm at the cab window for the drivers cigarette which will glow and emit a puff when stopped at a station!!!

I was watching an old VHS(!) of Crompton workings and that featured two TC sets in the formation, both in NSE livery but I had to rewind the tape just to double check I was not seeing things, sure enough there were seven cars in the formation with the 33 at the back, the first TC had only three cars so they weren't unknown to run as a 3-TC presumably when the TCF was out of use for maintenance I presume. Newhaven Marine springs to mind, indeed it still fits into that category. It still had a parliamentary train even now but no one can actually join or alight there anymore due to the dangerous state of the station buildings, a taxi would be provided for any intending passenger to meet the train at Newhaven Town. All thanks to the lunacy that is the rail regulations dreamt up by some 'not on this planet' civil servant in a locked basement in Whitehall I presume!!

He is no longer a registered user by the looks of things, methinks either Ebay saw something fishy was going on

My first instincts are this is some mid teens tea leaf (probably one of those featured as a fuzzy blob in a nicked Vauxhall Corsa with no insurance on Police Interceptors on Channel 5) who is offloading some bent goods. Something is very much not right about this... Pity he didn't think to also steal a digital camera so we could see what he is actually fencing selling!!

Further oddballs in the VEP fleet were one unit that had all its internal partitions stripped out in one DTC/DTS long before the 4-VOP concept came along. Then there was the mixing of open plan DTS's from VOP's and DTC's from VEP's to produce half and half mongrels in the closing days of Connex rule. Another oddball was the VEP that had a 4-TC driving trailer inserted in it and ran as such for many years, indeed I believe the driving trailer still exists somewhere. The CIG with the hopper vents was indeed a Ashford rebuild and used CEP hopper vents and tinted glass, it became 1864 at Brighton in later years and on a hot day a burning smell could still be detected inside the affected DTC. Finally I recall a unit numbered 1800 in the Phase 2 refurbished 4-CIG series running on Brighton turns, the thing is it was three cars of a VEP with a 4-CIG trailer (may have been the undamaged leftovers from the Purley crash?) but because only VEP's with their internal door handles and window bars were allowed on the East Grinstead branch and CIG's were not it had to take a number in the CIG series to avoid it getting sent down there, therefore unique being numbered according to the minority of its formation. There is a lot of modelling potential in the VEP's and I can forsee a LOT of money leaving my wallet when they arrive and that is just for all the paint and transfers I will be needing!!

Looking good so far, indeed the only worry I have is how well applied the NSE livery will be. Hornby's record on NSE livery accuracy has been utterly appalling up until now unfortunately. As it is I already have plans to repaint two of these, one in blue/grey and the other in blue/grey Gatwick service livery.

Chris Rea - The Road To Hell Specifically at this point 'Daytona' which sounds more like a Leyland National on full chat than a Ferrari to me but never mind...

Some Lego is now fetching utterly ridiculous sums on Ebay including well OTT prices for sets still available in the shops. Star Wars Lego in particular seems to attract the over enthusiastic full of wallet.

Ah, look at the seller name. SMCtoys aka the late (and very much NOT missed) Southampton Model Centre who shut up their real shop (if you could call it that, they used to shut on a Saturday including the day when the model show was in town!!) and now concentrate on flogging well overpriced Lima tat on Ebay, this being but one of their examples. The prosecution also offers the following into evidence: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Hornby-OO-GAUGE-R6103-Hornby-2000-TANK-WAGON-RARE-/200373499154?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Trains_Railway_Models&hash=item2ea730f512 They also list a lot of the other annual wagons as well and upwards of thirty notes a piece, avoid these cowboys like the plague!!

And swiftly following 47301 onto the depot is NSE liveried 47579 'James Nighthall G.C.': Pity the supplementary plate supplied is just a plain bit of metal with no detail on it. Next up will be any NSE 47 that does not require etched plates as since I last did NSE 47's back in the Lima/Hornby days of yore it appears that the cost of etched plates has risen horribly. Of course a Large Logo with NSE flashes one does appeal but the current large logo model from Bachmann doesn't fit any of the SF or OC allocated ones from the time due to the smooth both end head code boxes.

£128 for a Hornby Class 73?!?!?! http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Hornby-Class-73-Pullman-The-Royal-Alex-Brown-Cream-Li-/400125104372?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Trains_Railway_Models&hash=item5d295090f4 This bloke is having a laugh surely... Also annoying that every word of each sentence is capitalised which makes it look extremely silly. Some punctuation would not have gone amiss either...

Presumably judging by that he will make sure he puts on a warm coat before he starts wrapping up the item!! (Read the first part of the ridiculously over long and silly p&p section carefully ) Also another mis-informed EBayer who believes that if the Royal Mail lose the item it is the responsibility of the purchaser to chase it up, IT'S NOT, it is the responsibility of the seller/sender. The 'here is the tracking number now go away and sort it out whilst I trouser your money as its your problem now' brigade really need a kick in the reality check.

Just to make sure that there is a Railfreight Red Stripe version announced by Bachmann any minute now the paint has dried on my 47301: Still need to tidy up the black cab window surrounds, they are a real beggar to apply neatly. Noted during researching pictures for this one that it carried the older 1960's/1970's style overhead warning flashes extremely late on, indeed possibly as far as when it was repainted in triple grey Freightliner livery. Any liveries anyone want Bachmann to produce as I know if I paint them up now, the announcment will be enivitable... (47579 'James Nighthall GC' in revised NSE next by the way!) EDIT - My digital camera is evil, it has just shown me the cab door window has come away... again!!!

Fresh from the paint shop although still with a few minor bits to do on her is 50027 'Lion': I have a spare donor sitting on top of the mantelpiece at the moment that once I get through my stock of Bachmann 47's may become either 50035 'Ark Royal' in later revised NSE livery (Different treatment of the cantrail white stripe on this and 50033, it didn't have the fiddly to do bit above the cab windows for a starter!!) or 50008 'Thunderer' in Engineers Blue livery. Need to decide though as will have to order the nameplates of course.

Wow!!! Ambitious Buy It Now on this I must say: http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/Hornby-Networker-Suburban-Train-NSE-Colours-Excellnt-/200472004728?cmd=ViewItem&pt=UK_Trains_Railway_Models&hash=item2ead100878 Not worth more than £40 really, especially with that awful 'over burdened if faced with a skin and rice pudding scenario' type motor which would have a heart attack if it even smelt a hint of a gradient!!

Seems to operate a rather bizarre policy on some items where if you purchase a book, he then buys it off of Amazon and then gets them to ship it direct to you which in my book (err, no pun intended!) means he does not actually possess the item he is selling as well as trousering a very tidy profit in the process. VERY dodgy in my opinion.

That may be just a London thing actually as all London buses are definitely required to have their headlights on at all times which is just silly. From what I have seen Stagecoach Southdown and other subsidiaries seem to do the same now although this may be due to manufacturers making buses to 'London' spec and the lights being on permanently by default.

It was 'Dauntless' but it was a full repaint as the Hornby representation of the livery is so horribly wrong I could not live with it. The 'Dauntless' model is based on the Doncaster version of original NSE anyway with the higher white cantrail stripe and more blue on the cab doors and I wanted an OOC version. As I was painting I came across more errors than at first apparent as Hornby had most of the stripes either the wrong width or just completely in the wrong place for either version of early NSE. The shade of blue was slightly off but still acceptable but as for that permatan orange they call warning panel yellow, don't get me started... Just started work on stripping down a 50002 'Superb' in the awful representation of late NSE livery with the way too dark blue, the permatan orange 'yellow' and horrible weathering. It will emerge as 50027 in late NSE some time next week I hope, at least Hornby had the stripes in almost the right place on that one which makes some masking up a bit easier!!

Newly out shopped from the workbench this very morning: 50034 'Furious' in original NSE livery. Had a bit of a debate about the head code box NSE logos at first as the picture I was working from during the repaint (Page 30 of 'Heritage Traction in Colour - Volume 1, The Class 50's')shows it at Waterloo without them but as I was cutting up my transfers ready for application, I came across another picture of 034 at OOC with them so put them on anyway. I have a stock of two "weathered" NSE examples in the spares siding at the moment, one of which later will become 50027 'Lion' in revised NSE with all the trimmings all being well.

The madness does work out the other way though, picked up a as new Hornby Class 50 MIB earlier for just 35 notes... B)