Early Risers.

[southern42]

Evening all from a rather wet and soggy red dragon land.

 

It took me a while to notice there wasn't an 'e' in the name of our steam loco to Minehead, Castle class 5043 Earl of Mount Edgcumbe.

 

 

There's obviously a pattern there....as I realised when we headed for Bridgnorth (for the Severn Valley Railway) on our way back home.

 

That's rebuilt West Country 34027 Taw Valley behind which was rostered the previous week.

 

Laurence Llewelyn Bowen in China on tv now.  Met him in 2009 while he was researching Hidden Houses of Wales (BBC2).  Found out he was covering Glynllifon - a neo-classical mansion near Caernarfon where I had undertaken a one day a week Welsh language course in the 90s.  The best bit of the day (but don't tell the the tutor) was the walk round the wooded grounds after the two course lunch. 

[Barry O]

Wey hey!  A win over a stubborn Duchess.... one "City of Carlisle" sound fitted!! woohoo......

 

and BoD you are very close to the Woooopppppppidddddoooooooo! day!

 

 

Baz  a very happy sound fitting person.

[AndyB]

Evenin' all. 

Not sure whats going on - for the 2nd day in a row I've been out to the garage and done some work on the layout.

Tonight's effort centred on taking the station building off the layout, muttering "that's nowhere near good enough" and starting to scratch build a replacement. 

Anyway, night all. 

 

Edit: Well done BoD. I'm sure there are many, many pupils who have reason to be grateful for all of your hard work. Now, have a break and a Kit Kat.

N.B. other breaktime chocolate biscuits are available. 

Edited July 13, 2015 by AndyB

[NGT6 1315]

Evening all. Chuffed and about to commence mattress listening duty. Some photos of today will (likely) follow tomorrow a.m., so, night, all!

[colin penfold]

I sincerely believe Andy's post and the subsequent outbreaks of silliness were all profoundly tongue in cheek. A bit of friday fun with no malicious intent against poor punctuation. Given the current standard of typesetting and quality control on BRM, it couldnt be any other way

I have tonight found where the line is drawn in the battle against bad grammar.

 

Faced with an advertisement where an individual says "can I get a big mac?"

 

Apparently it is excessive to shout loudly at the television "No you cannot, you ar$hole, but you may wait there whilst a member of staff prepares one for you!"

 

We live and learn.

 

Especially when married.

[emt_911]

Revision for my first days ejumacation completed ready for another day sat in the classroom. My brain cell is now officially frazzled.

 

Night all

[station cat]

No e it is.  Oxford Gold in this case, quite a pleasant drink.  I recall having Brakspears Special, but it was a while ago.  It was in the Hole in the Wall opposite Waterloo station IIRC, on our honeymoon, 31 years ago gone March!  Yet the Oxford Gold brought back the memory of the taste of the Special, so it must be roughly similar.

 

As for Donk, he's on a tight rein at the moment, after flirting so dangerously with Dr SC.  He'll have to speak to Mike to ask for her hand in such a cross-breed marriage!  They did look very happy together, Donk has shown good taste, Dr SC is a nice girl/woman/lady * (*delete as appropriate to not cause offence) as well as obviously highly intelligent.

 

Well there's only one possible rating for that post - thanks.

 

Donk is a gentleman. Must be the influence of the company he keeps.

[tender]

Evening all.

Damp and dreary today so after a quick visit to the supermarket to top up with provisions spent most of the day in the new shed pottering.

 

Baz, you've just reminded me I have a few sound decoders to fit before our next exhibition - at least I've now got somewhere to do it apart from the dinning room table.

 

Ray.

[Smiffy2]

I used to annoy kids who asked 'Can I go to the toilet?' with the reply 'I expect so, you look quite normal.'

 

I was a bit of an ar$hole, too.

[The Stationmaster]

No e it is.  Oxford Gold in this case, quite a pleasant drink.  I recall having Brakspears Special, but it was a while ago.  It was in the Hole in the Wall opposite Waterloo station IIRC, on our honeymoon, 31 years ago gone March!  Yet the Oxford Gold brought back the memory of the taste of the Special, so it must be roughly similar.

 

As for Donk, he's on a tight rein at the moment, after flirting so dangerously with Dr SC.  He'll have to speak to Mike to ask for her hand in such a cross-breed marriage!  They did look very happy together, Donk has shown good taste, Dr SC is a nice girl/woman/lady * (*delete as appropriate to not cause offence) as well as obviously highly intelligent.

Alas Brakspear's former brewery site is now converted into various residential type units and a Hotel du Vin - the town thereby losing one of its largest employers.  The name was taken over by a concern in Witney and they allegedly brew to the same recipe but of course the water is different and it is very difficult for any brewer to capture exactly the art of another hence even beers with the same name will taste slightly different while the really good one of the old brewery ('Old' - only brewed and sold in the period before Christmas) has never yet been faithfully copied despite the name having been used at least once.  I suspect there was a bit of secrecy about the brewing of Old which was rather carefully guarded - it certainly wasn't one that any of the brewers were ever keen to talk about and it's possible, more like probable, that molasses might also have been involved in it.

 

The brewery was in fact my first extended period job as I worked there in the summer between leaving school and joining BR.  the money wasn't bad, the company was extremely paternalistic being run entirely by local people who cared about their products and workforce, and the beer breaks were a nice alternative to a tea break although the stuff we were given was quite amazing and could never be sold as it was what was left from racking-off to fill barrels and topped up, when necessary, with what ever was last coming through the pipes on the bottling line, anything from LDA to Guinness.  Very sensibly anyone under the age of 30 usually drank it with more than a touch of lemonade - which at least was the pure version as bottled for public sale - and of course the taste and flavour varied from firkin to firkin depending on what had gone into it. The official allowance was a half pint before starting work, another mid morning, one on knocking off at dinner time, another before restarting in the afternoon, another for the afternoon break and the final one after knocking off - so 3 pints in all.  One chap who worked in the brewhouse used to have a pint instead of a half (many did that of course) but he used to also take a quart jug full away with him - 4 times a day, remarkably not only did he go out and spend every evening in a pub but he also fathered a quite sizeable tribe of offspring; but kidney failure got him in the end.

 

Saturday overtime on the drays was really hard work - not just getting stuff off or onto the lorry but trying to keep up with the regular draymen who seemed to down at least two pints at every pub we called at.  The town round - which I never did as it didn't run on a Saturday - was usually horse drawn and probably just as well as the draymen on that seemed to rely on the horses knowing the way.

 

Alas a way of life replaced by redundancies, posh flats, and most of the towns pubs either closed or turned into eateries/wine bar type establishments.

 

G'night all

[Jock67B]

Evening/Morning all,

Just crawled into my pit after a fairly full day which saw both little Freddie and son in law taken ill - both have now seen relevant medics and have begun their different courses of anti-biotics! I just did the driving, but I stupidly decided not to wait for help from two very busy grandsons and cleared a fair number of bags of garden rubbish from the garage - it's now in the local civic amenity facility, along with some bags of rubbish left over from Thursday's barbecue! (This was to avoid the bags being ripped open by marauding Herring Gulls as it bin bag night tonight).

Sorry to have missed your anniversary Pete(trisonic), I hope you had a pleasant time and wish you many more of them.

Jamie, hope Beth and you are enjoying your French break. Loved the shed - you could move up to gauge1 in that!

Being a fan of Father Ted years ago, I was quite tickled to read AndrewC's post where he mimicked Father Jack (as others noted!). Good luck with the Swansea project which seems to grow and grow.

Neil(NHN), I loved the 'Donk' pictures, and how lovely to meet up with Mike and Dr Station Cat. One of the things I regret most about being unable to make it to such exhibitions, is the opportunity to meet up with fellow RMwebbers - it must be great to picture them in your mind as you type a relevant post. Like Andyram, I too would love to see some SVR images!

BoD, I agree with AndyB that you will be sorely missed as experience such as yours is going to be hard to match with a replacement. Have you, like my sister had when she retired (junior school headmistress), simply become sick and tired of the interference of beaurocrats? I'm sure that, despite your obvious joy that retirement is imminent, you will miss the times when the success of your pupils made your efforts worthwhile. No doubt a 'list of a thousand chores' is being prepared as we speak!

Mike(SM), nice to see the good Dr and yourself enjoying a chat with Neil (I assume Debs was behind the camera?). I liked your story about the demise of the old Brakspears brewery - sadly the fate of so many of our old traditional businesses, such is the way of our modern world. I am (sadly) old enough to remember horse drawn delivery vehicles, having sat on the 'wagon' seats in the parking lot behind the Co-op in Hurlford, Ayrshire. Seem to remember pretending to be driving the Pony Express!

Hope the rest of this week goes well for everyone - I'm rather excited about what could be this year's most important astronomical event, the arrival of NASA's 'New Horizons' spacecraft at it closest point whilst passing Pluto. It has already given us lots of information and will be closest to the Dwarf Planet in twelve to fourteen hours time. Progress and images can be found by simply googling NASA.

Kind regards,

Jock.

G'night all!

[skipepsi]

Good Night all.

[Tony_S]

I think some people at Aditi's college may be grateful she is retiring. The departmental budget could be balanced by not replacing her.

[Two_sugars]

It's time to lay my heavy head . . . 

 

So. . . Goodnight all, I'm orf to bed. .. 

 

Pleasant dreams everyone . .

 

John

[NGT6 1315]

Mawnin' awl. Dreich is the word for today, though strictly speaking, it's not cold. Slept like a rock and I should remember taking some additional snacks with me today!

 

Oh, and the photos of yesterday. – 

 

We were on training car 5001 again and due to better stock availability as a result of the school holidays, did indeed get to ride with a NB4 trailer. Which massively affects driving characteristics indeed, as you do need to floor the power pedal to get going, especially on inclines.

 

 

 

At the Miltitz loop, 5001 and trailer 928 display their rather incongruous appearance. – It is also worth noting that on these trailers, it's always a bit of a gamble of how quickly the brakes react. On some trailers, they'll apply a fraction of a second earlier than on the motor car, or a fraction of a second later on others. In any case, some degree of jolting simply cannot be avoided.

Our trailers are outfitted with electrohydraulic brakes with additional spring load holding brake function. These brakes are designed fail-safe, so in the event of a total breakdown of electric power supply, they will apply.

 

 

 

Here, we are stood in the Naunhofer Straße loop in Wilhelm Külz Park, which is the usual southeastern terminus of Line 2.

 

 

One thing I like about our training is that we get to drive to all sorts of unusual, little-used locations, such as...

 

 

…the Deutscher Platz loop which is adjacent to the Old Trade Fair grounds. This area has been under conversion to a business park for years, and is where a particularly good supermarket (which I may have mentioned before), set in a nicely restored former fair hall, is located.

 

Here, we took some time to get a closer look at the trailer's technology and at troubleshooting options. Which I think I can summarise as, for one, limited, and, for the other, less than practically usable.

Note the information signs in the trailer's rear window. It is mandatory for training cars to carry these additional plates because per our operating rules, other drivers are required to double their distance to marked training cars as they must expect training cars to perform emergency braking practice at any time.

 

 

 

And from the front end of the consist. We later dropped off the trailer at the Wittenberger Straße depot near the end of our shift as it was needed there.

 

 

 

I also got to drive Line 4 up to Landsberger Straße, which passes near our home. It was drizzling on and off for the entire afternoon and evening, so with the northern section of Line 4 being on an ascending gradient, this made driving interesting, shall we say. In such weather conditions, it's advisable to put out some sand prior to every stop so as to give the wheels something to grab onto when continuing.

 

It's also worth noting that the Landsberger Straße loop was, in fact, once co-located with a fully fledged depot, whose car shed was on the grounds behind the advertising billboard to the right. It's quite interesting that in the past, there were many more depots – some of them fairly small – across the city, of which, in turn, several can still be recognised if you know what to look out for!

 

I am happy to report that none of us had any real difficulties handling the trailer formation, especially considering the somewhat crummy weather!

Edited July 14, 2015 by 1216 025

[Gwiwer]

Morning all.  Mention of Breakspears reminds me that it's bitter here too and not in a drinkable way!  Polar gale blowing up for the Southern Ocean might yet bring showers of penguins .......

 

Chatham ..... dated a lass there once.  Just once.  I think "incompatible" would be an understatement despite a degree of mutual attraction at the time.  Lots of steep hills there.  Ask anyone who's tried to reach the station from the shopping centre.  And anyone who's tried the hike to Hempstead Valley which is surely some sort of misnomer!  One of the longest and steepest was always that up to Luton where the buses used to live.  Hands up who knew that Luton was in Kent?

 

Trams ..... ah yes, I watch them roll past the Palace of Attendance at the rate of two a minute in peak hours and about one every other minute in the quieter times.  "Fahrschule" on the front of Dom's reminds me of my first ski-ing trip to Austria where to a 13 year old it was somehow amusing that every ticket on the lifts and cable car was emblazoned with the legend "1 Fahrt"

[Robert]

Morning All,

 

It is a little on the dreary side here this morning, but still quite warm. Looking at the south eastern sky, it wouldn't surprise me if we have a thunderstorm on the way.

 

Nice to see such an interesting report from Dom - you seem to be really enjoying it, which is great!

 

Have a good day everyone...

[bluebottle]

 

Trams ..... ah yes, I watch them roll past the Palace of Attendance at the rate of two a minute in peak hours and about one every other minute in the quieter times.  "Fahrschule" on the front of Dom's reminds me of my first ski-ing trip to Austria where to a 13 year old it was somehow amusing that every ticket on the lifts and cable car was emblazoned with the legend "1 Fahrt"

 

When I was in nominal charge of a group of uni students on a trip to run in the German Universities cross-country championships in the late 70s, I had to explain to some of them that when somebody said "Gute Fahrt", he wasn't congratulating them on breaking wind...

[Barry O]

Morning all.

Dom looks like your new job suits you very well!

 

Today is tidy up before kitchen rebuild starts on Friday (3 days earlier than expected).

 

Brakspeares Old.....mmmmh memories of shopping that by a roaring fire in the Red Lion in Blewberry on winter Sunday evening. Great times!

 

Now off to drink my first mug of tea of the day.

 

BoD not long to go till poetr day.

 

Ray hope the sound fitting goes well another Duchess and a Caprotti 5 are next.

 

Baz

[emt_911]

Morning all. Another grey day where it appears that the traditional British summer is definitely here.

 

Another day of ejumacation with only one more left including exams.

 

Dom - You certainly seem to have found your ideal job.

 

Have a good day everyone

[NGT6 1315]

Thanks for your comments, folks. I should like to add that holding brakes on trams can be implemented with different release mechanisms. On the T4Ds and Leoliners, it is solenoids, while the NGT8 and NGT12 cars have electrohydraulic holding brakes. Braking force, on the other hand, is provided by powerful springs, so that (as on the trailers) a total loss of power to the braking circuit will remove the releasing force and yield automatic brake application.

Mechanically, the holding brake on the T4D is configured as an outside drum brake, while the other types have brake disks and callipers.

[Smiffy2]

Top pf the morning to you all. A rather dull one here in Carshalton sur Mer as we prepare for the transhumance that is the Smiffy summer. We will swap the whelkmen of Surrey for les pêcheurs du bulot in deepest Normandy. Today, of course, les pêcheurs will be celebrating the festival of the quatorze juillet, the anniversary of the liberation of the pêcheurs from les aristos de buccin who controlled the trade in the 1700s.

 

Coffee is at hand, the day beckons emptily (apart from packing the car, which Julie does because I annoy her by being messy. Suits me). So I leave you to your trams and fahrting as I simply tram about. Apparently I need to clean the cooker...

 

Have a good day, all. 

[Happy Hippo]

Welsh Geography??

 

LLANFAIRPWLLGWYNGYLLGOGERYCHWYRNDROBWLLLLANTSILIOGOGOGOCH

 

 

Anyone requiring detention will write this out 500 times!

[roundhouse]

Seeing Petes comment above, I feel the same except for wanting a beer instead. Wetherspoons start serving beer at 9am :drink_mini:

 

Last night me and my other half did share a small bottle of Eton and Riverside Brewery Conqueror but the  special one at 7%. The finishing touches on TAVISTOCK didnt go all crooked either.

[Tony_S]

Morning all.

Slightly less cloudy today and it has stopped raining now.

Nothing specific planned for today though of course meals need preparing and Robbie will need a walk.

Matthew is working steadily on his dissertation, though not yet today. I think he didn't exactly go to sleep early. He has been in contact with some of the people he will be sharing a flat with in Utrecht.

Tony