Peterborough North

[bigwordsmith]

Gilbert, 

 

this is could be the answer to your access problem...

 

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07DJPZFGT/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

 

You can can set it up with one end on the floor, and t’other on the windowsill.

 

tradesman then climb ladder, walks across plank, and does the job.

 

we use one for getting over a hedge where the ground is 3’ higher on one side

 

 

ATB

 

peter

[great northern]

Many thanks for those contributions chaps. I shall consider everything very carefully when I have more time. At present though, as there is another engineering possession scheduled for today, I need to concentrate on that, so I'll just post the morning images for now.

 

 

Grand Parade having a nice long rest.

 

 

and yet another WD making its way along the Down slow.

 

 

 

[Clive Mortimore]

51 minutes ago, Oldddudders said:

I have no curtains. All my windows - which open inwards - have external shutters. 

There you go Gilbert........pretend you are living in France and have shutters like Dudders has.

 

 

 

And see how many months it takes for some of your nieghbours to copy you.

[geoff west]

10 hours ago, great northern said:

Many thanks for those contributions chaps. I shall consider everything very carefully when I have more time. At present though, as there is another engineering possession scheduled for today, I need to concentrate on that, so I'll just post the morning images for now.

 

 

Grand Parade having a nice long rest.

 

 

and yet another WD making its way along the Down slow.

 

 

 

Really like the going away shot of the WD Gilbert.

[great northern]

Big step forwards today. When the fiddle yard was first laid, we somehow forgot to put in a crossover at the North end, thus ruining my plan to have things able to run both Up and Down from both sides of the yard. When we discovered this, we put one in, and I accepted that it meant I would have one short stretch of 24 inch radius curve coming out of the Up yard. That has caused unreliability issues, or derailments if you prefer me to avoid politician's speak.

 

TW has pointed this out to me quite regularly, and Tim has also been less than impressed. He also told me he could improve things. Today he came, he saw, and he duly improved things very considerably. We had run out of time before I could take photos, but I will do that in due course. Trial running showed just how much better everything now runs, and I am jolly pleased.

 

You Know by now that Tim's visits also produce goodies, and today was no exception. The first of them was the return of one of his previous conversions, from a Bachmann 04/1 to an 04/8. I was very pleased with that too, but Tim decided that he could and should do better, so a while ago he took it away again. As soon as I saw this I understood why he wanted another go at it, as it is very impressive indeed. Images were taken in rather dodgy light, and don't in my opinion quite show the full impact, but even so you get a very good idea.

 

I'll return to the several very helpful suggestions which have been made shortly, but for now, here are both sides of the 04/8. There is another loco to show too, but I don't want people getting over excited at this time of night.

 

 

[A Murphy]

Love the O4/8.  

 

Alastair M

[great northern]

Morning all. I was about to start replying regarding blinds and so forth when golf club politics hit me between the eyes again. I need time to deal with that, so here's some more WD photos to look at while I do so.

 

 

 

[Clive Mortimore]

Hi Gilbert

 

I have an idea to keep those golfers under control. Ban your mates. The ones that cause the trouble will be to frightened to step out of line.

[phil.c]

It looks like there's a lot of golfers here, it might be of interest to a few that when the Ryder Cup tournament was at the Celtic Manor a few years ago, I engraved the official Ryder Cup Gun, just type Ryder Cup Gun ( Holloway & Norton) into Google for a look see

Edited December 17, 2019 by phil.c

[great northern]

59 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Hi Gilbert

 

I have an idea to keep those golfers under control. Ban your mates. The ones that cause the trouble will be to frightened to step out of line.

But it is my mates that are causing the trouble Clive. Some of them anyway. It's all a bit of a nightmare.

[great northern]

 Nothing more I can do with the golf stuff at present, so let's get back to more interesting things. First, windows and blinds.  No-one will now look at working higher up on the exterior of our houses without either full scaffolding or a cherry picker. It is a very long way up, and 'elf and safety apparently doesn't allow ladders that long any more. We've had estimates just for clearing out gutters, and they are eye wateringly expensive, so I have to rule that out.

 

The problem with working inside is that one slip would potentially mean disaster. The thought of somebody landing on those station buildings doesn't bear thinking about.  Again the expense needed to reduce that risk would be so great that I can't justify it. I shall have to work with what I have, and stop moaning about it, though I probably won't.

 

On the operational side, again I have to decide what I can live with. I think I've got a long way towards making that decision. Scott makes a very good point. How often do I just watch trains go by? Hardly ever, and I should do so much more often. I shall do what I'm happy with without stressing myself unduly, and I shall remind myself of my good fortune when I get obsessive about small detail. You may remind me if I am seen to be failing to do that.

[davidw]

13 hours ago, great northern said:

Big step forwards today. When the fiddle yard was first laid, we somehow forgot to put in a crossover at the North end, thus ruining my plan to have things able to run both Up and Down from both sides of the yard. When we discovered this, we put one in, and I accepted that it meant I would have one short stretch of 24 inch radius curve coming out of the Up yard. That has caused unreliability issues, or derailments if you prefer me to avoid politician's speak.

 

TW has pointed this out to me quite regularly, and Tim has also been less than impressed. He also told me he could improve things. Today he came, he saw, and he duly improved things very considerably. We had run out of time before I could take photos, but I will do that in due course. Trial running showed just how much better everything now runs, and I am jolly pleased.

 

You Know by now that Tim's visits also produce goodies, and today was no exception. The first of them was the return of one of his previous conversions, from a Bachmann 04/1 to an 04/8. I was very pleased with that too, but Tim decided that he could and should do better, so a while ago he took it away again. As soon as I saw this I understood why he wanted another go at it, as it is very impressive indeed. Images were taken in rather dodgy light, and don't in my opinion quite show the full impact, but even so you get a very good idea.

 

I'll return to the several very helpful suggestions which have been made shortly, but for now, here are both sides of the 04/8. There is another loco to show too, but I don't want people getting over excited at this time of night.

 

 

Looks terrific - I know Bill Bedford has plans for and o4/8 and has just made available the o4/7 for which he's done 12 different varieties. The o4 derivatives have been on my radar for a good while. Gilbert was the o4/1 less popular than the o4/7 or 04/8?  As i don't seem to be as many photos as there are of the o4/1 as there are of the  o4/7 and 04/8 .

[great northern]

42 minutes ago, davidw said:

Looks terrific - I know Bill Bedford has plans for and o4/8 and has just made available the o4/7 for which he's done 12 different varieties. The o4 derivatives have been on my radar for a good while. Gilbert was the o4/1 less popular than the o4/7 or 04/8?  As i don't seem to be as many photos as there are of the o4/1 as there are of the  o4/7 and 04/8 .

The original 04s were very popular engines David, as evidenced by the fact that some lasted to the end of steam on the Eastern region. I can imagine that the 04/8 may have been popular because of the fully enclosed cab, but otherwise I don't think there was much to choose between them. 04/7 I know very little about, but there were comparatively few conversions to that part, so it can't have been considered to be an improvement on the basic machine.

[great northern]

 OK, now we will have a look at the other transformation performed by Tim, and returned to me yesterday. A4 60003 Andrew K Mc Cosh was far from a favourite, as it was still basic Hornby green, and one of their less realiatic efforts at the correct shade as well. It also had over large cabside numbers. I would very much like to put up a picture of it how it was, and Tim kindly reminded me how to use the search function yesterday, which allowed me to access images further back on the thread. I found some, was invited to save them, and did. However........ my PC is not prepared to enlighten me as to where it has saved them. If anyone much cleverer than me can find a "before" image and add it to the "after" images below, I would be very much obliged.

 

 

 

 

This is another remarkable job. 60003 does not seem to have been a first choice for top link duties, even after it got a double chimney, and was not generally kept to Top Shed's highest standards. My brief to Tim was that it should be not as clean as for example 60014, but not as dirty as Gatehead's 60016. As usual he found a photo of the engine in the condition I asked for, and his work transforms Andrew K into a real loco, so far as I'm concerned. Subtle differences from any of my other Timmed A4s, and a real pleasure to see.

 

There are still a few more to get the treatment though, so watch this space.

 

 

 

[Timara]

21 minutes ago, great northern said:

 I would very much like to put up a picture of it how it was, and Tim kindly reminded me how to use the search function yesterday, which allowed me to access images further back on the thread. I found some, was invited to save them, and did. However........ my PC is not prepared to enlighten me as to where it has saved them. If anyone much cleverer than me can find a "before" image and add it to the "after" images below, I would be very much obliged.

 

 

Hopefully these will suffice!  (lifted from page 600, 2½ years ago...)

 

 

 

Cheers,

Tim

[Clive Mortimore]

That is an impressive DC control panel Tim is sitting at in his avatar.

[60027Merlin]

4 hours ago, great northern said:

 

On the operational side, again I have to decide what I can live with. I think I've got a long way towards making that decision. Scott makes a very good point. How often do I just watch trains go by? Hardly ever, and I should do so much more often. I shall do what I'm happy with without stressing myself unduly, and I shall remind myself of my good fortune when I get obsessive about small detail. You may remind me if I am seen to be failing to do that.

 

 Always better to adopt the pragmatic approach Gilbert. (plus a regular glass of red)

 

Eric

 

[phil.c]

6 hours ago, great northern said:

Morning all. I was about to start replying regarding blinds and so forth when golf club politics hit me between the eyes again. I need time to deal with that, so here's some more WD photos to look at while I do so.

 

 

 

Have you tried holding a sheet of white paper to reflect some light onto the engine fronts with shots like these?

[great northern]

42 minutes ago, phil.c said:

Have you tried holding a sheet of white paper to reflect some light onto the engine fronts with shots like these?

I have been so advised, remembered for a while, and then forgotten again. In some ways, I am a hopeless case. I even have an appropriate piece of card, kindly given to me for the purpose, and it is somewhere very close. That I know, but precise details escape me.

[Clive Mortimore]

15 minutes ago, great northern said:

I have been so advised, remembered for a while, and then forgotten again. In some ways, I am a hopeless case. I even have an appropriate piece of card, kindly given to me for the purpose, and it is somewhere very close. That I know, but precise details escape me.

Do you want me to ask the cleaning lady which safe place she put it after she tidied up ?

[phil.c]

Seeing as it's a special piece of paper for the job...she's probably thrown it out 

[St Enodoc]

2 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Do you want me to ask the cleaning lady which safe place she put it after she tidied up ?

Interesting. Are we the only people who clean up and tidy up before our cleaning lady comes?

[jukebox]

Gilbert/Tim - can you gents just confirm that 60003 has only been renumbered, not repainted, and that the transformation above is solely down to the "Tim"™  treatment?

 

If that is the case...  it really is amazing.

 

Cheers

 

Scott

[Clive Mortimore]

48 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

Interesting. Are we the only people who clean up and tidy up before our cleaning lady comes?

Mrs M doesn't have a cleaning lady. I am pretty nifty with the vacuum cleaner. 

[great northern]

4 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Do you want me to ask the cleaning lady which safe place she put it after she tidied up ?

 

56 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Mrs M doesn't have a cleaning lady. I am pretty nifty with the vacuum cleaner. 

No to the first bit, as she is forbidden from entering the room, but please let me know your hourly rate. If you are cheaper, I may have an offer for you.