Sam Moss

Also depends on the age of the locos. i had two Spam Cans at one point, identical models other than there was about 3 years between manufacture. The older one had much darker, brass tinted wheel plating compared to the new the one which was a much brighter nickel colour. The older walked all over the new ones from a traction point of view.

Couldn't agree more. I bought my house 6 years ago, Built in 1914 in has a double blue brick damp course and thats it which has kept most of the problems at bay. (pretty much all the neighbours have had to have theirs injected) The issues I had was that the walls around the chimneys were damp. Opened the chimneys up, swept and cleaned out so air bricks can do their job. Problem solved. Houses/buildings need to breath.

Hi, I also undertake repairs for the public via Ruddington Model Railway Club based at the GCR-N. We reopen to the public on the 12th April if you want us to have a look at it for you. thanks Sam.

I'm putting my money on potentionally an Austerity/J94 being announced. It also wouldn't surprise me if it was something along the lines of a LMS/Midland 4F though. Would give them a Fowler tender to put behind a decent number of other smaller locos that could be produced for around the £300 mark.

EMU driving vehicles not suitable due to being air only and if you went down the first gen DMU driving car route you'd need an adapter plate to couple the corridor to a MK1, air supply for warning horns (not a problem if its a power car but then you're idling a 130hp Leyland lump just for compressor purposes adding unnecessary wear to the engine. Then if you're running in winter you've also got to take into account heating. DMU's don't have steam heat so you're in the realms of having to either fire up the engine again on your power car or run the diesel heaters on the trailer cars. A job that would require extra training for guards or attention from a fitter in the morning. A MK1 brake, sheet of 18mm marine ply, piece of toughened glass and a brake valve is a weekends work.......

Still the case. the GCRN push/pull method is the guard and loco are in radio contact, guard has variable control of the vac brake (DMU brake valve) and a warning horn. Guard is a forward lookout. 25mph in pull mode, 15mph in push mode.

We've recently bought a new old stock LNER example for the club. Suitably relivered into an Annesley based example it went into service this Saturday and kept intermittently stalling and the front pony truck jumping off. Turns out the guard irons on the front pont were just catching point work. A quick crop with a pair of side cutters has cured it.

Moulding wise, some of the stuff Lima achieved where other manufacturers now rely on etches was second to none. soft spots for me include their 31, 47, 52, 73, 101, 121 and the 156 scrubs up well too.

i've took the gears out of one bogie on both of mine and they run far better. No need for all wheel drive on a single railcar and happily copes hauling a BG or GUV so would easily cope with a trailer car.

Running some acetone into the bearings should soften the loctite

Had them on the club layout but now removed. We've seen no noticeable issues with them gone. we saw it far too risky having them on with the increase of DCC fitted stock being produced and run on the layout without reaslising.

The screw holding in the draw bar needs to come out and then from memory, the one under the NEM pocket on the front. it been a while since i disassembled one and mines tucked away in the loft somewhere.

screw at the back under the cab and then the chassis drops out. The front is retained by two cast lugs.

What about printing the cage area onto clear acetate?

We treated ourselves at the club to a couple of new locos from the Rails sale and one of the O4's turned up completely dead. Motor and pickup connections where fine and all the connnections on the circuit board in the tender were ok. In the end we just took out the DCC stuff and wired the pick ups straight to the motor. Couldn't be bothered to send back. The club won't ever run it on DCC so no harm done.