The Night Mail

[Happy Hippo]

Thanks Jamie, our messages crossed.  you may recall we had a chat over the barriers during one of the lulls in operation at Warley.

 

You are right about the tank engines.  They are magnificent beasts.

[Oldddudders]

14 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

You are right about the tank engines.  They are magnificent beasts.

Not bad in metre gauge either. Even in 1:87!

 

[Dave Hunt]

When I was stationed at RAF Bruggen (with an umlaut) from 1970 - 74 there was a railway line into the station that entered at the east end and ran behind the hangars to, IIRC, an RE detachment at the west end. To get to some of the Squadron car parks you had to cross the track but since it wasn't often used no-one really took much notice of the stop signs until one fateful day when a car and a locomotive met to the car's detriment. Fortunately no-one was hurt but people treated the crossings with a bit more respect thereafter. There was also one memorable incident when after a dining-in night a bunch of drunks (not including me I hasten to add) managed to get into the shed where the little diesel shunter lived and start it up. They were arraigned heading towards the exit gate and the junction onto the main line and the Station Commander subsequently made everyone aware that locomotive theft was, from then on, a real no-no.

 

Maybe a joint services diorama HH?

 

Dave

Edited August 8, 2020 by Dave Hunt
Correcting lousy geography

[Happy Hippo]

4 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

Maybe a joint services diorama HH?

 

Dave

Yes, we could get a few others involved, get totally bladdered then get scanned by Modelu in most inappropriate posed positions.

 

The resulting miniatures could be scattered about the place being rounded up by the Monkeys and the Snowdrops.

[Happy Hippo]

23 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

Not bad in metre gauge either. Even in 1:87!

 

OK Ian, Spill the beans on how much German metre gauge stuff you have regardless of scale!

 

I am a great fan of the bogie coaches with the end balconies, so more info on them would be appreciated.

[Philou]

I note there seems a problem with umlauts - here is little joining gift from me as I have a few spare on my keyboard:

 

¨ ¨ ¨ ¨ ¨          Help yourselves, plenty more .

 

Regarding metre gauge railways, the Haute-Saône, amongst others, developed a rather large metre-gauge system (CFD) to try and bring in development and take out goods from what was (and still is) a rather rural backwater. All started off in the very early 1900s reaching an apogee in the 20s and then motor traffic killed it off. The locos were sold off to China in 1938 (have a photo somewhere of a loco in steam street-running in Shanghai). It used to take 2 and half hours (twice daily) to do a journey that I can undertake in 30mins. There was a weekly replacement SNCF bus service until the early 70s. That went too, but has itself been superseded recently by a four-times daily bus service (school holidays excepted) which is open to the public (apparently). Financial fact: Running this bus service costs the Département €16.5M p.a.

 

Cheers,

 

Philip

 

 

Edited August 8, 2020 by Philou
None

[jamie92208]

3 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

Thanks Jamie, our messages crossed.  you may recall we had a chat over the barriers during one of the lulls in operation at Warley.

 

You are right about the tank engines.  They are magnificent beasts.

Yes I believe that you also conspired with Oakwood Press to force my wallet open by mentioning that they had some sort of sale on. One of the books that I bought was their book about the Waterloo and City that has got my grey matter going.

 

Jamie

Edited August 8, 2020 by jamie92208

[Happy Hippo]

3 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

Yes I believe that younalso conspired with Oakwood Press to force my wallet open by mentioning that they had some sort of sale on. One of the books thatvI bought was their book about the Waterloo and City that has got my grey matter going.

 

Jamie

Although I remember the misery that you underwent as your wallet flew open, I was too much of a gentleman to go back to Oakwood and collect any commission on the sale.

 

Besides, I was later forced to carry a Proxxon table saw all the way home by train, as Axminster Tools wanted me to take a reconditioned one away to save them having to load it into their van.

[jamie92208]

2 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Although I remember the misery that you underwent as your wallet flew open, I was too much of a gentleman to go back to Oakwood and collect any commission on the sale.

 

Besides, I was later forced to carry a Proxxon table saw all the way home by train, as Axminster Tools wanted me to take a reconditioned one away to save them having to load it into their van.

We do lead a hard life don't we. I was forced to take a Slater's Compound kit home from Doncaster, unbuilt, and looking so sad and lonely marked at less than half the rrp. It would have been heartbreaking to leave it on the stall so I took pity on it and it never even got put out on display. I'm so kind hearted. 

 

Jamie

[Happy Hippo]

1 minute ago, jamie92208 said:

We do lead a hard life don't we. I was forced to take a Slater's Compound kit home from Doncaster, unbuilt, and looking so sad and lonely marked at less than half the rrp. It would have been heartbreaking to leave it on the stall so I took pity on it and it never even got put out on display. I'm so kind hearted. 

The North Hipposhire correspondent might not be so flattering about your good nature as it is alleged he was next in the queue!

[Stubby47]

Some mojo has returned today, but has been severely tested and has resulted a score draw between mojo & layout.

 

For: collected new Fruit D's from KMRC.

Against: Fruit D's derail on track.

For: Have fixed hump in track with mallet

Against: Hitting the layout has dislodged one of the point servo links

For: Have got some more ground work done, this involved chiselling off old stuck down debris

Against: Chisel fell to floor and rebounded into my shin, drawing blood 

Have given up for the day.

Edited August 8, 2020 by Stubby47

[Happy Hippo]

Just now, Stubby47 said:

Some mojo has returned today, but has been severely tested and gas resulted a score draw between mojo & layout.

 

For: collected new Fruit D's from KMRC.

Against: Fruit D's derail on track.

For: Have fixed hump in track with mallet

Against: Hitting the layout has dislodged one of the point servo links

For: Have got some more ground work done, this involved chiselling off old stuck down debris

Against: Chisel fell to floor and rebounded into my shin, drawing blood 

Have given up for the day.

Stu,

 

I'd pour yourself a large drink...................

 

But there again, you'd probably spill it all over the layout and workbench knowing your present luck.

[Happy Hippo]

It will be interesting to find out how Bill's day went.

[Stubby47]

45 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

Stu,

 

I'd pour yourself a large drink...................

 

But there again, you'd probably spill it all over the layout and workbench knowing your present luck.

 

A can of Magner's is being consumed

 

Carefully...

[Northroader]

It’s just too hot to do anything here, 31C. I nipped up straight after breakfast and did touch up painting on two vans, and that’s been it, just sat around.

[Happy Hippo]

46 minutes ago, Northroader said:

It’s just too hot to do anything here, 31C. I nipped up straight after breakfast and did touch up painting on two vans, and that’s been it, just sat around.

No such luck here.

 

I was putting out all the garden furniture this morning at about 0900 and it rained!

 

When it stopped, the sun came out so I went next door and let out the guinea pigs:  I decided their overnight quarters required a clean out, so that got done.

 

Then I was required for banking duties on the swing, this being followed by lifeguard duties at the paddling pool.

 

Two track planning sessions also took place:  One in the morning, and the other this afternoon.  One day I will be able to replicate the same one twice!

 

My daughter managed to disconnect all the netting on the raspberry cage, so that required re-erecting before the songbird squadron descended.

 

The Woodpigeon that was sitting on the roof was not so lucky, and had a sudden meeting with Tutu the pigeon fancier.

 

The little ones were watching Paw Patrol at the time, so it was not a case of 'Bring your (grand)daughter to the slaughter'.

 

They return home tomorrow, so we will have a very easy day before getting back to normal again on Monday.

 

I am minded to follow Stu's fine example and open the bottle of vintage cider I have in the fridge.

 

Coffee first.

[Happy Hippo]

Talk of tank engines reminds me of an incident that ocurred when we were in Bielefeld.

 

We had a major exercise, and the chief loggie decreed that the Stores Company would deploy into the field.

 

This in itself was not a problem, except that although the coy had the domestic transport fleet to deploy, getting all the stores out required 10 Regt RCT to uplift everything into location, and then take it back again when it was all finished.  The most awkward store to lift were 155 mm howitzer gun barrels due to their length and the weight distribution which tapered with the barrel!

 

Of course we, were also using 17 Sqn RAF and their Chinooks to assist with more 'urgent' moves, and they were to come in very handy as you will see.

 

One of the problems that we had identified long before the excercise was the lack of heavy lift; the Eager Beavers fork lifts we used did not have the capacity to lift a Chieftain tank main engine.  We had about 30 of these in the stores and we needed to use a rather large 4 x 4 Coles Crane to lift them onto the back of a wagon.  

 

Now there was only one  4 x 4 Coles crane in 1(BR) Corps at the time and it was ours, so although we could put on, there was not take off/put on capability at the other end.

 

Head shed then decided the Chieftain engines would remain in Bielefeld due to the lift problem and all was well.

 

However, the first rule of military exercises and operation is if it will go wrong it will, and half way through the exercise we received a real request for a new Chieftain engine.

 

Change of plan; Now all the high ups wanted to see this happen and for us to sort out the ongoing lift problem at the same time.

 

This is where 17 Sqn stepped in.  As I have mentioned earlier, we held most of the spare underslung load equipment so we were on very good terms.  My uplift team at Bielefeld got the engine onto a 10 tonner and this was delivered to the Bielefeld stores LZ.  A Chinook then lifted the engine out to us at the Corps forward LZ.  It was nearly dark when the Chinook arrived and all the assembled high ups who had crept in to watch what they thought was going to be a mega cock up were a bit taken aback when we  just drove a 10 tonner out into the middle of the field and marshalled the Chinook so that it was able to drop the engine onto the 10 tonner's flatbed.

 

Now that might sound easy, but in a gusty wind, in failing light, it is not easy thing to do with an aircraft the size of a Chinook, especially when he has a heavy box dangling under the aircraft from two suspension points.  Once the nose of the helicopter passes over the drop point, not only has the  pilot lost sight of where he is putting the load down, and is relying on his Loadmaster to direct him, but he in turn has to get the crate onto the centre of the flatbed whilst avoiding the 3 man marshalling team that is also standing on the flatbed.  We were there as when the crate is almost on the deck we can add a little 'push' to assist the crate getting to the right place.  We also needed to be there to both earth the load (Static discharge) and be able to assist with the unhook if the aircraft release stopped working.  However, it is rather surreal watching 4 tonnes of metal and timber being waved around and bouncing up and down slightly in close proximity to you.

 

The crew from 17 Sqn did the business with their usual slick professional performance, and flew back to Gutersloh for tea.  Meanwhile we watched the crowd disperse, and the night set in and there was nothing else to see.

 

This was fortunate as the Chief Loggie and the rest of the high ups did not see that the weight of the engine had bogged the 10 tonner  into the field, and it took all four of my Eager Beavers to tow it out under cover of darkness. 

 

That's tank engines for you!

 

 

Edited August 8, 2020 by Happy Hippo

[pH]

That post deserves ratings of  ‘like’, ‘informative’, ‘funny’ and the much-requested ‘groan’!

[bbishop]

51 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

It will be interesting to find out how Bill's day went.

Gentlemen and monsewers,

One cannot use the "Q" word until the day is done.  But it was quiet, which of course is good news for the London Ambulance Service.  So I read MRJ, kept in touch with The Night Mail and typed out my Number Twos.  For those of you who are not regular followers of TNM, this isn't some weird scatological fetish, but an article on the LSWR works managers and chief draughtsmen.  I've written over 1600 words and have reached 31 December 1922, so just need to wrap it up with obits for Robert Urie and Jock Finlayson.

 

Back home to a red and yellow delivery slip, which means DHL, which means there is a parcel next door containing something black and red.  There is also a Test Match in the balance.  But if I turn on the radio, a Pakistani bowler will get a hat trick, so I collect the parcel.  Which contained a Spur Null BR78.  In British currency this is a Prussian 4-6-4 tank, which is actually quite pretty.

 

Then I watched the highlights!

 

Blindheim is in no fit state to photograph.  I need to lay the track and fit the point motors.  Then I can plant the building that will hide the point motors and then it will be worth photographing.  Just don't hold your breath. 

 

Bill

[Happy Hippo]

32 minutes ago, pH said:

That post deserves ratings of  ‘like’, ‘informative’, ‘funny’ and the much-requested ‘groan’!

I try to please.

[Happy Hippo]

12 minutes ago, bbishop said:

Gentlemen and monsewers,

One cannot use the "Q" word until the day is done.  But it was quiet, which of course is good news for the London Ambulance Service.  So I read MRJ, kept in touch with The Night Mail and typed out my Number Twos.  For those of you who are not regular followers of TNM, this isn't some weird scatological fetish, but an article on the LSWR works managers and chief draughtsmen.  I've written over 1600 words and have reached 31 December 1922, so just need to wrap it up with obits for Robert Urie and Jock Finlayson.

 

Back home to a red and yellow delivery slip, which means DHL, which means there is a parcel next door containing something black and red.  There is also a Test Match in the balance.  But if I turn on the radio, a Pakistani bowler will get a hat trick, so I collect the parcel.  Which contained a Spur Null BR78.  In British currency this is a Prussian 4-6-4 tank, which is actually quite pretty.

 

Then I watched the highlights!

 

Blindheim is in no fit state to photograph.  I need to lay the track and fit the point motors.  Then I can plant the building that will hide the point motors and then it will be worth photographing.  Just don't hold your breath. 

 

Bill

It sounds as if Blindheim is only a few paces behind Pantmawr Sidings:  At least I've got the track down.

 

Work WILL restart next week once the horde have returned to Reading.

Edited August 8, 2020 by Happy Hippo

[Northroader]

Talking of Robert Urie, he was followed by other members of the family in railway service. One was shedmaster at Brighton in the 30s. I was followed a couple of years later on our college training course by another Robert Urie, (grandson?) who went on to a successful career in mechanical engineering at BR Derby. Really charming person, looking at him now you can see a family resemblance with the LSWR Robert Urie.

[bbishop]

Northroader, there were three sons, all of whom worked for the LSWR.  James Johnstone was a draughtsman, emigrating to South America in 1913.  David Chalmers was the very bright one, probably stymied by his father becoming CME, left for Ireland in 1915, very briefly Locomotive Superintendent of the Highland Railway, senior manager in the LMS.  John Chalmers was much younger than his brothers and went into the Running side at Ryde, Yeovil and Brighton.  Robert Urie is his son and I'm in communication with him about his family.  Bill

[Oldddudders]

31 minutes ago, Northroader said:

Talking of Robert Urie, he was followed by other members of the family in railway service. One was shedmaster at Brighton in the 30s. I was followed a couple of years later on our college training course by another Robert Urie, (grandson?) who went on to a successful career in mechanical engineering at BR Derby. Really charming person, looking at him now you can see a family resemblance with the LSWR Robert Urie.

The last-named, I believe, rose to be Assistant General Manager (South) on Eastern Region, until such a post became de trop, and he joined BR Projects, where I met him, in the early '90s. As charming a man - especially given his seniority - as you could wish to meet. 

[Oldddudders]

7 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

OK Ian, Spill the beans on how much German metre gauge stuff you have regardless of scale!

 

I am a great fan of the bogie coaches with the end balconies, so more info on them would be appreciated.

This is tricky stuff - Sherry has been known to read on here!

 

I think I have four 2-10-2s, two 0-6-0s (Fiffi and Pfiffi as they were called), and a 4-wheel railcar. All are DCC but not sound-equipped. There is a sort of layout. Stoutly-built of extruded polystyrene, with some rather inadequate 1" x 1" wooden bracing, it is in three sections. Two are 4' x 4' with balloon return sections, loops with a couple of sidings inside. The main baseboard is 8' x 2' with three platform loops. On a fair day I can erect this lot on la terrasse - which is about 26' long - on folding trestle tables. Rolling stock is not in short supply, including about 16 or so passenger vehicles and at least as many wagons. Radio control is available. There is no scenery yet, but there is now a kosher Harz station building. Eisfelder Talmühle was built from a rather good, if not cheap, kit