Atso

What a great find Robert! Any idea what the working is?

As the other person that had to make the difficult decision to redesign and retool alongside Adam, I can only echo his comments. However, I feel that he is being very modest about the amount of work he has done to be able to get to the point where where we are now expecting the new EP. While my own direct involvement with this particular project ended last year, we both greatly appreciate the disappointment our decision to delay may have caused but we are both confident that a better model will be the result. Many thanks for your continuing patience. Steve Da Costa Development Manager, Dapol Edit: Just to clarify (in case of confusion) that Richard is still with Dapol and is now overall Development Director of our expanded team.

Who is paying six-figure salaries to designers? I'd like to apply!

Wow, quite awhile without an update! To prove that progress hasn't completely stopped on Hadley Wood, I'd like to present a couple of screengrabs of my work on the main station building. A fellow modeller in Australia managed to find some of the original architect's drawings and was kind enough to share them with me. This reveal some errors in my own assumptions about the long gone station building - mainly the heights of things. Nothing more happened for several months until I suddenly got the urge to try rending brickwork in CAD again! Those who know me will tell you that I detest doing brickwork in CAD as it takes forever for the computer to do it's work and seriously slows everything! This time, I've worked in small sections, piecing everything together in STL format which has proven just about quick enough for me to maintain my sanity. Also, I only draw half the station and mirrored the STL file, saving it under a different file name and then importing the original and joining the two halves together. All of that has taken most of my spare time over the last couple of weeks... Anyway, enough waffle (typos and all!) - to the pics! As the screengrabs show, very early days and much more to be done!

I've only painted one BR Green locomotive and used Ian's recipe of Humbrol gloss tan with a little red mixed in. I cheated by spray a piece of decal paper with this mix and then ruling on the black line before carefully cutting out to leave a thin strip of 'orange' lining on either side. No prototypical in the lining style (missing the tiny green lining between the black and orange lines)but, in N gauge I don't think it is noticeable. I still had to hand paint the corners though. After getting matted down, the 'orange' looks better than RTR to my eye but I'm bias! Sorry about the poor quality photos (again!) but I can't get any better as I don't own this locomotive.

Hello everyone, I've not been doing much modelling recently but the discussion regarding RTR vs Kit/Scratch building has been interesting. Tony, your K4 scratch build is very good; as the the painting an lining on it. While my knowledge of the items available in 4mm scale (and larger) is limited, I have found that available items for my chosen period (1930's) and scale (N gauge) is limited. Therefore I had a choice of not bothering at all, making do with what is available or designing/making my own bits and pieces as well as adapting RTR/kits where appropriate. Through this, I've designed my own models using CAD and realised them using 3D printing and/or etching. More recently I have become the owner of a small milling machine and lathe (both manual) and I am slowly learning how to use them. Many of the photos below have been shared here before so apologies to those who have seen them previously and for my poor photography skills. Above is possibly my favourite locomotive, or rather the one that I am most satisfied with. Very much a learning curve getting her to run and haul well - and a crash course on the importance of balancing a 4-4-2 wheel arrangement. 3D printed body on top of (mainly) adapted RTR components. The tender chassis and bogie were originally 3D printed as well but have since been replaced with machined brass components (the bogie is sprung). A much better photo (thank you Tony!) of my D49, "Yorkshire". Again, 3D printed body on adapted RTR components. A buffet car for my Cambridge "Beer Train" set. 3D printed body, interior and solebars with a mix of etched and scratch built items below the solebars. The figures are cheap 160 scale ones found on eBay. A part complete GNR 8 wheel brake van spliced together from two BHE etched kits of the 4 wheel version and W irons/axle boxes from the 2mm Association. I really must finished this one! Some etches I've designed for a few bits and pieces but mainly to obtain an ex-GNR BFK/FK twin for one of my KX - Leeds expresses. Amazingly, it when together pretty much as designed on first attempt! I've recently returned to this project and filled the gaps in the roofline with Milliput. Another piece of rolling stock long overdue for finishing! I'm not sure that I'm a convert to only kit building or scratch-designing (I can't really say I scratchbuild!) as I happily use RTR items (usually modified) wherever they available.

This is what happens when I'm bored and get a crazy idea... Two Peco brake vans (one NE and one LMS) cut and shut to scale length (1:148 scale) and narrowed to something approaching scale width. The roof is the Peco mouldings similarly cut and shut. To keep with the theme of this model, the chassis will also be a shortened Peco product but using the 15ft wheelbase brake van chassis which is on order. Not up to the finesse of the 2mm etched kit (of which I've built two so far) but a fun and quick 'layout' model.

Impressive Tim! I wish I could build chassis that quickly!

What's the prize Jerry?

On the subject of weight, may I please share my progress on my N gauge O2 build? The current state of the locomotive with its test weights fitted. These are made out of tungsten rods and took three diamond cutting discs and a hammer to cut/break to the required length! The chassis is milled brass and the wheels are 3D printed and pressed onto steel tires. Slightly earlier photographs showing the 7mm motor and gear train. The chassis was placed on some old Farish wheels at this stage for testing. The gears are also Farish spares (from a 4F) and freely rotate on brass pins soldered to on side of the chassis. The gear reduction is a smidge under 70:1.

Having not read Simon’s book yet, nor many of the other books cited, I have hesitated on commenting. I still hesitant about commenting but wonder if the following may be insightful or helpful. First off, a disclaimer; I am not an academic, just somebody who has been in various management roles from a young age. I later got my degree equivalent in management studies and came across the ideas and teachings of Professor Edward Deming (1900-1993) during this time. For those who don’t know, Deming is generally regarded as one of the father figures of modern ‘Quality Management’ practices – his contributions certainly had a very big impact on the post WW2 Japanese economy and, much later, for Ford. Data is highly important, but I think it is a mistake to place 100% confidence in it. This is because data is generated from a variety of sources. The more sources (i.e. employees) generating that data, the higher the likelihood that there are errors, omissions and falsifications and the harder it becomes to successfully manage the system that generates it. This is because of human factors and pressures of (or on) the system they operate in (see the talks on Youtube by Behaviour Economist Dan Ariely about his experiments). This is not necessarily because people are overtly dishonest but rather due to fear of the consequences of delivering bad news – those little ‘white lies’ that we all tell from time to time can have an accumulative effect. Three quotes by Deming that I think are relevant here are: “Every system is perfectly designed to get the results it gets” “Fear invites wrong figures. Bearers of bad news fare badly. To keep his job, anyone may present to his boss only good news.” “85% of faults lie with systems, processes, structures and practices in an organisation and only 15% is down to operator skill and it is the responsibility of management to fix this.” I have used these three quotes to attempt to illustrate how a bad system can affect the generation of accurate data from the lower levels of an organisation. Professor Brian Joiner explained this is further detail: “There are three ways to get better figures... Improve the system... Distort the system... Distort the figures” In my experience, distortion of the system and figures happens quite a lot on a daily basis but is either purposely ignored at lower levels of management or simply goes unnoticed. The result is that more senior managers unknowingly receive a distorted picture that they are quite likely responsible for generating. The activities of Nick Leeson and the effect it had on Bearings Bank is an example of this at an extreme level. Intangible human factor should not be underestimated, and I think it is also relevant that previous CEOs of successful businesses often spent a lot of time seeing how the data was being generated. Jack Welch’s (another divisive figure) management of GE is an example of this. Or as Deming stated: “The most important things cannot be measured” This may have already been considered here or in the various publications mentioned and, if so, please accept my apologies.

Hello Tony, So sorry to hear about your bother. Please accept our condolences as well. Best regards Steve

I'm not sure I'd agree but it depends on where your expectations of good enough quality are. N gauge 1:148 scale C1 printed loco and tender bodies on some heavily adapted commercial spare parts and aftermarket bits (i.e. buffers and handrail knobs). This one was printed a few years ago and affordable hobby printers have improved in resolution since then.

With regards to Jesse's weathered A4, I think that he has captured the look pretty well. My only (constructive) criticism would be that the cleaners would have probably done a better job of getting behind the handrails, just leaving the immediate area around the handrail knobs as a dirt trap. With regard to photographs, I can think of two that show the weathering on fairly new A4s. The first is on page 55 of 'The Big Four in Colour' which shows 'Sparrow Hawk' approaching New Barnet with the 10:15am from Edinburgh in the summer of 1938. The top of the tender shows some great staining from (I assume) coal dust which almost creates the illusion of a black panel in that area. The second is on page 69 of 'LNER Locomotives in colour' which shows 'Dominion of Canada' departing King's Cross with the Down 'Westriding Limited' in 1939. The caption even makes reference to the locomotive's 'less than pristine condition' and goes on to suggest that 4489 may have been covering a failed A4 at short notice. I offer my own take on a work stained (n gauge) A4 representing the prototype 'Silver Link' following an Up run with the Silver Jubilee. 'Silver Fox' will represent the return working and be much cleaner than this (apologies for the derailed 'cartazzi truck'). As this is a quick repaint of a garter blue model, there are some incorrect features on this model - it'll do as a 'layout loco' belting through Hadley Wood at 80ish!.

Just catching up properly after some time not posting. Tony, I am glad that you are feeling better and I hope that Mo will be in the near future too.