Wright writes.....

[MJI]

8 hours ago, MarkC said:

60532 was an impressive performer during her 1990-2001 stint on the main line; I for one am looking forward to her return. A1, A2, A3, A4 gala and comparison runs a la the 1997 Shap Time Trials, anyone?

 

I'll (hopefully) be taking a main line trip behind a Duchess (6233) this year too - I already  have 60163, 60532, 60103(4472) and 60009 'under my belt', as it were, plus 6201

 

Mark

 

I would also like to see a replacement have a go as well, just look at what it took to replace a ECML Pacific.

[Philou]

Staples? Get off my lawn ......... that's just soooo 1960's. When I used to do kit locos then (impact glue, not soldered - sorry), staples including the bend, cut to size and epoxy glued into place were de riguer. There wasn't really anything else that was 'off the shelf'. They're still in place today AND have lamps too (though probably not in the right positions ) .

 

Cheers,

 

Philip

 

[CF MRC]

GC engines get around, you know. Pictured at Bath Green Park, yesterday. 

Tim

[MikeTrice]

15 hours ago, Niels said:

Does it sound to obscene to put this nice 3D printed Cab/Boiler alongside a 9F model (if You have one of course) and make a picture?

Like these?

 

[Clem]

23 minutes ago, CF MRC said:

GC engines get around, you know. Pictured at Bath Green Park, yesterday. 

Simply beautiful!

[robertcwp]

11 hours ago, HEATH STATION said:

I agree completely with what Robert C says here and it is not just restricted to UK publishers - I understand that Owen Russell and David Jackson's work on the 'GC in LNER days' was a similar work where publisher errors arose;

My earlier interests in the USA B&O Railroad saw the Sagle & Stauffer work ' B&O Power' littered with issues that Sagle requested changes for, but which were never instituted, even though he had  written of these  subjects earlier in both the official 'B&O Magazine' and then 'A Picture History of B&O Motive Power' , with access to official B&O records. There was a considerable 'witchhunt', some years after publication, over these alleged Sagle's 'inaccuracies', which also included wrong placement of punctuation!

I know there was some criticism recorded in early issues of the GC journal 'Forward ' over works published by  J C M Healy, but I too have seen nothing to contradict Robotham 's work directly.

 

I should also at this point congratulate Robert on his efforts to publish accurate formation information on Passenger Train consists, which in my eyes take him beyond the status of an accurate modeller to that of a Railway Historian. I am sure that I am not  alone in being grateful for his efforts on behalf of GCs section service  modellers.

Dave

Some of my published articles contain errors, some of my making and others of the publisher's making. Notably in the latter category, something went wrong in the editing of my East Coast Pullmans article, which meant that one bit was complete nonsense. What I wrote was accurate. When I did the diesel hydraulics bookazine for Irwell, Brian Kirby and Mark Jenkins both read through my captions. Even then, Irwell added some other photos and wrote captions late on, which I managed to correct in an evening, along with reversing a few edits of my own captions which made something that had been correct into something that wasn't. And even after that, some on this forum were quick to find fault.

 

I have written another bookazine for Irwell, this time using around 30 of Tony's slides as well as those from my own collection and, again, it's been read through by Brian and Mark. It might still end up with errors in it though.

 

My experience of magazine articles and bookazines, never mind whole books, is that the time taken is wholly disproportionate to any benefit obtained, so don't expect to see much more from me. It's also why I prefer to write things in electronic form over which I have control and that can be updated easily. My GC BR-era train formations record covering the London expresses in BR days is evolving constantly. The notes I wrote on the Bournemouth-York could do with a going over too as I now have more information, but time is the problem.

 

I think "Railway Historian" is kind but generous. I'm more of an accumulator of material, often at very great expense, that I believe in sharing with others as time permits.

[Peter Kazmierczak]

If Robert C isn't a "Railway Historian", than I don't know who is. He uses primary material (eg BR carriage notices/diagrams), interpreting it in/to a wider context.

 

Don't get me started on those who edit ones material. Doubtless with the best of intentions, BUT.......

[robertcwp]

1 hour ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

If Robert C isn't a "Railway Historian", than I don't know who is. He uses primary material (eg BR carriage notices/diagrams), interpreting it in/to a wider context.

 

Don't get me started on those who edit ones material. Doubtless with the best of intentions, BUT.......

It was your articles in Model Railway Constructor about coaching stock over 40 years ago that set me off, even before Keith Parkin's book was published.

 

Carriage workings are not a great deal of use on their own. You need corroborative evidence from elsewhere, such as photos or logs, although even then it's risky as photo dates are often inaccurate and the few spotters who noted carriages probably made some mistakes too.

 

A recent example of where I have put the cat amongst the pigeons is on the Coronation Scot thread, where I asserted that the whole train was turned after each journey. Few, if any, believed me until none of them could find a photo of the train in regular service with the first class at the front in either direction.

[Niels]

4 hours ago, MikeTrice said:

Like these?

 

 Exactly.

Thank You.

My next step is to make a 4-8-0 three cylinder compound version with nicer footplating

 

Edited January 12, 2020 by Niels

[APOLLO]

Danish Kroner wheels - Heljan model ?

 

As to book photo captions my Christmas present was Colin Giffords superb book "Transition" - Captions ? -mainly just a location, month & year. Perhaps that is all that is required  ?

 

Brit15

[t-b-g]

Last time I had an article about operating Buckingham published, I was astonished to see a caption to a photograph that had been changed from what I had written to say that Peter Denny recognised the potential of using RTR items on the layout. It was almost as if the idea that RTR wasn't playing a part somewhere was too much for them to cope with and they had to do something to pander to their RTR obsessed readership.

 

It was a photo of the 3 GWR Clerestories, which he had converted to EM gauge and altered slightly to look more GCR. I spoke to him about them and he told me that it was a lot of work to end up with inaccurate models and he wished that he hadn't bothered and wouldn't be doing any more.

 

Anybody reading that caption and presuming that I had written it would have thought that I had lost the plot completely! 

[Peter Kazmierczak]

34 minutes ago, APOLLO said:

As to book photo captions my Christmas present was Colin Giffords superb book "Transition" - Captions ? -mainly just a location, month & year. Perhaps that is all that is required  ?

 

Brit15

 

Indeed; all his books are like that. 

 

Sometimes simplicity helps to focus on the actual image and make the reader think for themselves. Though at other times and in different contexts, extended captions (if accurate!) add greatly to one's enjoyment and knowledge of what's being shown in an image.

Edited January 12, 2020 by Peter Kazmierczak

[Andy Reichert]

1 hour ago, robertcwp said:

It was your articles in Model Railway Constructor about coaching stock over 40 years ago that set me off, even before Keith Parkin's book was published.

 

Carriage workings are not a great deal of use on their own. You need corroborative evidence from elsewhere, such as photos or logs, although even then it's risky as photo dates are often inaccurate and the few spotters who noted carriages probably made some mistakes too.

 

A recent example of where I have put the cat amongst the pigeons is on the Coronation Scot thread, where I asserted that the whole train was turned after each journey. Few, if any, believed me until none of them could find a photo of the train in regular service with the first class at the front in either direction.

 

By Golly - Logic on a Model Railway forum. . . 

 

Andy

[robertcwp]

31 minutes ago, Peter Kazmierczak said:

 

Indeed; all his books are like that. 

 

Sometimes simplicity helps to focus on the actual image and make the reader think for themselves. Though at other times and in different contexts, extended captions (if accurate!) add greatly to one's enjoyment and knowledge of what's being shown in an image.

It's a matter of personal preference but I don't think Colin Gifford's photos stand out that much from the work of others. They are different in style and it's an artistic style of photography that appeals to many, but not all. I think his captions are often too brief and some more information about the workings shown would be useful, if indeed he noted the details. If not, I think it's better not to make things up as too many captions are inaccurate. Authors often get the blame for this but they don't always do the captions. One book with caption errors is the second edition of Keith Parkin's Mark 1 book, but Keith did not do the captions. Apparently, David Jenkinson did them in a rush. The result is that some refer to the wrong photos and others are simply wrong captions, such as those that confuse Swansea with Swindon.

 

I have been on the hunt for photos showing 1937 Coronation Scot stock in BR days. As I noted on another thread, page 89 of 'West Coast Steam' by Antony Darnbrough (IA 1988) shows a Coronation Scot BFK in crimson and cream, second carriage in the bottom photo on page 89. It is captioned as being in the 11.25 am Birmingham-Glasgow in May 1956 but described erroneously as being a brake third open - no such carriages were in the 1937 Coronation Scot. If you don't know the carriage type, why make it up?

[Hollar]

5 hours ago, jwealleans said:

Staples or .45 brass wire.

 

 

... but you didn't fit lamp irons to them?

Yes, but rarely run tail traffic so durability isn't an issue.

Edited January 12, 2020 by Hollar
spelloing mistake

[Hollar]

6 hours ago, 31A said:

I use staples as well, usually superglued into holes in the loco / vehicle, which in my case is usually plastic.  I must admit I've never had to solder them; I believe they are soft iron so would some kind of special flux be needed?  I must admit I simplify things in not representing the short horizontal piece that the base of the lamp should sit on - I think this might be difficult as staple wire is thicker than the brass which is usually used for etched items.

 

For irons that need a tiny shelf, the advice given to me was to solder a bent one on top of a straight one, file to shape and then jamb it in a bigger hole.  You would have to be very sharp to see it when it's in place, even on a smokebox door.

 

Tone

Edited January 12, 2020 by Hollar

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

18 hours ago, robertcwp said:

Apparently, Robotham marked up corrections to captions which he had not written and text which had been edited and the publishers not only did not amend but instead made things worse. There were probably errors of his too but some were not of his making. This is far from untypical with certain publishers past, and possibly present too. I know someone else who was given only 24 hours to proof an entire book after it had been typeset and formatted and who had no time to ask anyone else to read through the captions (I had been lined up as someone to assist, but never had the chance). 

 

Sounds like the Marketing people where I work.  I can't work out if they're stupid or malevolent, but some of the nonsense they produce and then attach to me and my team is scandalous.  I understand most of them to be graduates from new 'universities' with 3rds in some modern humanities degree or other.

[CUTLER2579]

Do they repeat themselves some times.

[grahame]

12 minutes ago, CUTLER2579 said:

Do they repeat themselves some times.

 

Yep, and fortunately professional and appropriately qualified marketeers wouldn't be moonlighting as magazine editors.

 

[Northmoor]

52 minutes ago, Dr Gerbil-Fritters said:

 

Sounds like the Marketing people where I work.  I can't work out if they're stupid or malevolent, but some of the nonsense they produce and then attach to me and my team is scandalous.  I understand most of them to be graduates from new 'universities' with 3rds in some modern humanities degree or other.

This sounds like the marketing people where I worked for many years.  On the cover of our in-house magazine - which would be seen my many of our customers - there was a photo looking down on an aircraft carrier.  The numbers on the deck were the right way round but the sharp-eyed (and those who'd worked/served on carriers) thought it strange that the bridge was on the port side.  Every carrier in the world has the bridge on the starboard side.  The editors had reversed the image because it suited the cover layout better; when queried they responded that it didn't really matter.  Well, it didn't matter to them, as they didn't have to explain it to our Royal Navy customers who'd picked up a copy of the magazine in reception....

[jwealleans]

Quote

Every carrier in the world has the bridge on the starboard side. 

 

Being utterly pedantic, there is one which doesn't, but it's been on the sea bed since 1942.....

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

16 minutes ago, jwealleans said:

 

Being utterly pedantic, there is one which doesn't, but it's been on the sea bed since 1942.....

 

And a very odd ship she was...

[Bucoops]

The marketing buffoons at my old place used to really wind the R&D designers (me amongst others) up. On a regular basis one would march into the design office with a huge grin on their face announcing they had sold a machine that could do XYZ. XYZ being something none of us had ever done, or had any idea HOW to do.

 

We were all for pushing the boundaries, but they really had no clue. Many a time they had to go back to the client and apologise profusely.

 

How that company is still going i have no idea.

[robertcwp]

50 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

This sounds like the marketing people where I worked for many years.  On the cover of our in-house magazine - which would be seen my many of our customers - there was a photo looking down on an aircraft carrier.  The numbers on the deck were the right way round but the sharp-eyed (and those who'd worked/served on carriers) thought it strange that the bridge was on the port side.  Every carrier in the world has the bridge on the starboard side.  The editors had reversed the image because it suited the cover layout better; when queried they responded that it didn't really matter.  Well, it didn't matter to them, as they didn't have to explain it to our Royal Navy customers who'd picked up a copy of the magazine in reception....

Reminds me of a magazine cover I saw in the 1990s when the infamous Millennium Bridge across the Thames was announced. A image had been mocked up showing it in place, viewed from the South Bank looking across to St Paul's. Unfortunately, the way it was printed, St Paul's Cathedral was back to front.

[Lecorbusier]

Thought I would post a few pictures of the state of play on my Johnson 1F tank build as I now think it is about ready for a thorough clean up in preparation for a coat of etch primer. I have to say I have had a lot of fun fabricating up the various details visible in the prototype photo. I will see if I can post a short video of it running under battery power in due course. A steep learning curve still ... but fantastically rewarding and you definitely can't buy one like it RTR.

Edited January 12, 2020 by Lecorbusier