Hornby dublo

[Il Grifone]

I've just unearthed these pictures of my old Dublo Layout (from something like 15 years ago when I was a freshly retired Grifone instead of an ancient one.

RmWeb would only allow me to upload these despite them only being 3.6MB so i'll have to investigate why.

There are a load more so if you don't want to see them please say!

I'll have to crop the third one; it shows up my rubbish woodwork.

 

 

Edited January 25, 2023 by Il Grifone
Woodwork of course

[Great Eastern]

Hi MikeCW,

Thanks for the reply, very interesting ! Sorry I didn't realise you were in the antipodes !!

You get very good results without a primer, I have found a few problems after I did an HD loco without, but then I'm not using the same enamels I suppose. Now, I prep the surface to remove dings and moulding glitches in the mazak, even using tiny bits of filler (car types usually) and then either use a rattlecan primer, or a filler primer, again rattlecan (Halfords etc) . I find the filler primer will cover 5 thou probs ok, sometimes more. I sometimes mask this or even just hold a bit of paper or card around the edge to screen the spray pattern, so as to preserve fine detail. Here's a pre-war  GWR clockwork body I got for a fiver ! (no safety bonnet), done like this.

 

 

 

Fascinating what you say about mixing thinners and paint in the jar and looking for it clearing, I'd noticed this but not thought to use it in quite that way. I'll give it a try.

I'm surprised you spray at such a high pressure, I use about 10 to 15 psi at the last pressure gauge, allowing for a few psi drop (due to surface wall friction) over the last hose, (which of course has to be lightweight and flexible without the encumbrance of another gauge). I use multiple gauges; compressor, air tank, regulator to keep an eye on things. However, clearly what you're doing works, I must experiment again. From memory I think I was using 30 to 50 psi to spray my cars, but obviously with a full size spraygun.

 

I've often fancied nickel / chrome plating and have done a few experiments, but as you say it can be a bit of a palaver. Can I ask what voltage / current / timescales you use ?

I'm in the process of restoring an old motorbike myself at the moment. Some of the chrome has really had it, with badly pitted bits. Obviously there are chrome 'coloured'  spraypaints which I'm a bit dubious about, however there are now these coatings you can spray on over a painted base which then dry as a chrome surface, they seem to use various chemical washes, depending on the manufacturer, but they'll work on any surface you can paint the black undercoat on, even wood!!.  Clearly these are no substitute for real chrome plating, but for tatty old bits of trim that need a bit of filler first it may be an option for me.

 

 

3RAIL TRACK

I've gone over to modern plastic sleepered track for several reasons;

1 Conductivity of NiAg rails, circa twice that of Dublo.

2 It looks better, I know it's not authentic Dublo, but I can run all sorts of modern stock on the same layout.

3 I can run 2 or 3 rail Dublo at the flick of a switch.

 

I use a combination of mainly Peco with the SR / Underground Peco third rail down the middle trick, as well as bits of Marklin stud etc.          Also Tillig dual gauge track, like this ....

 

 

 

Now the thing is the 3rd rail isn't in the middle, but it's so close that it still contacts the various HD spoons/plungers etc.  I don't know if it's different now but when I was buying it the only points were to divert the gauge, ie standard gauge straight on narrow gauge off to the right or whatever.

 

Your Launceston Castle looks superb !! As you say A fine model for 1958.

 

By the way (message to anybody) I have seen a Barnstaple with a half inch motor chassis !!!!  This appears to be a genuine HD loco, presumably some sort of prototype. Anyone else seen one ???????

 

GE

Thanks for the likes guys !

 

 

 

Edited July 10, 2022 by Great Eastern

[MikeCW]

Track and Dead Frogs.  Il Grifone’s comment about the problem of converting Peco points for 3 rail operation without relying on an electrically dead crossing or frog set me, first, thinking and, second, out to the shed to check on my 3 rail test track. The latter has two aged  Peco points – one insulfrog and one electrofrog – in the formation. Both work fine.

 

The crude sketch below shows what I understand to be the conventional way a scratch-built, 3-rail turnout would be wired.  There are no doubt other ways of doing it.

 

Black – negative. Red – positive. Blue – no power.

Stock rails A, D and crossing/frog F are all wired up together.

Stock rails and closure rails A/B and C/D are not electrically bonded.

The insulating gaps between closure rails B and C and the crossing/frog F is set close enough to the crossing to avoid 3rd rail collector shoes or plungers touching the crossing F.

 

When the turnout is set for the straight road as above, closure rail B is powered either by blade/stock rail contact or by supplementary switches on the point motor. Closure rail C is unpowered.

 

My adaption of an early Peco Code 100 electrofrog point for my three rail test track involved some minor modifications.

In addition to installing the third rail - soldered to tiny staples fitted through pre-drilled holes in the sleepers - the modifications were (a) breaking any wire connections between stock and closure rails (b) wiring together the crossing/frog and stock rails and (c) cutting insulation gaps between frog and closure rails close to the frog as indicated by the yellow arrow in the picture below.

 

 

Set for the diverging road the point shows live positive rails red; live negative rails black; and unpowered rails blue.

It’s all pretty straightforward, and easier to do than describe.  The frog/crossing is always live; no polarity changing switches are required unless you want to avoid relying on blade/stock rail contact for electrical continuity, in which case the supplementary contacts on your favourite point motor can be used to power the closure rails.  I didn’t bother.

 

The suggestion that phosphor bronze wire can be used as a third rail is an interesting one.  My initial reaction is that it would have to be reasonably thick or well-supported at close intervals to avoid sagging as a result of the constant passage of shoes and plungers. Plungers particularly seem to rely on the third rail being at, or even a whisker above, the running rails. But, as always, I stand to be corrected.

 

Mike

 

[MikeCW]

On 10/07/2022 at 08:32, Great Eastern said:

I'm surprised you spray at such a high pressure, I use about 10 to 15 psi at the last pressure gauge, allowing for a few psi drop (due to surface wall friction) over the last hose

Your comment sent me to check the setting on my airbrush pressure gauge. The airbrush set up is mounted on the workshop wall and consists of: a detachable feed from the workshop compressor tank (set for 50psi) which is 20 metres of hose away; a pressure gauge; a moisture trap; and then 5 metres of hose to the airbrush, the first 2 metres of which run up the wall as a further moisture trap.  A squint at the airbrush pressure gauge on the wall showed it set for 25 psi. Given the 5 metres of hose between pressure gauge and airbrush I suspect that barely 20 psi makes it to the Badger nozzle.  So my spraying pressure isn't that much higher than yours. Also, I'm not spraying in close in a spraying booth.  I generally stand in the sun at the open workshop roller door with the locomotive bodies suspended on wire, and blast away from a few inches further out than I suspect is the accepted standard. I then hang the parts in a sunny spot in the workshop to dry and, in colder weather, sometimes give them gentle encouragement with a heat gun!

 

I'll send you a PM about electroplating old motorcycle parts.

 

Cheers

 

Mike

Edited July 14, 2022 by MikeCW
spelling

[stewartingram]

That electroplating sounds interesting! Completely OT, I run a Rover 75, and I am at present dismantling my old one after an engine failure, transferring many parts either to its replacement, or my spares stock. In particular, I have a couple of the now very rare 'torpedo' badges from the front doors; plastic & chromed, with '2.5 Litre' embossed in black on them. Problem is, I have a small chunk of chrome missing from one of them, and I'm looking to replace the badge (next to impossible and very expensive) or repair (how?).

Stewart

[Il Grifone]

The safety valve casing  on a Dublo GWR tank is not a great loss. It bears little resemblance to the real thing! (Come to that the whole thing bears little resemblance to a 56xx!)

RMweb wouldn't let me post any more pictures, so I can't post the one showing mine. I'll try again!

(some nonsense about a 10MB allowance. These three are 3.6 in total!

 

The wiring diagram for the 3 rail pointwork is correct, though Dublo leave the closure rail permanently dead, Another point to watch is that the blades move far enough to avoid the rear of the wheels touching them. The normal 1/8"  (3/16" for Trix and Tri-ang!) throw is quite enough!

EDiIT

I tried and here it is. The GWR tank is a bit in shadow but visible.

Edited January 25, 2023 by Il Grifone
Added photo

[Il Grifone]

It looks like my poor 8F is going to have to keep her Tri-ang pony wheels  :(  . A search through my spares found 3 boxes of Dublo metal rolling stock wheels and a 8F pony truck missing its wheels, but no pony wheels, either plastic or metal. * This is presumably why she got Tri-ang wheels in the first place, but one of my engines has one metal and one plastic, so there should be a matching pair somewhere.

Edited July 10, 2022 by Il Grifone

[SR71]

One of these?

 

 

Yours @Il Grifone but you must rehouse the fluff that comes with it too.

 

Anyone done suburban bogie riveting? I've got enough parts for some more coaches but I need to swap bogies/wheels around.

[Il Grifone]

That's the beast! Thanks for the offer,  but I'm returning to Sardinia shortly (to get away from the heat!) and won't be around to receive it. She's existed all these years as is so can continue to do so. She appears in one of my photos and must have had them then.

 

I replace the rivets with Meccano nuts and bolts. (One bolts and two nuts to locknut - you could use 4MA but that would be cheating! ) The bogies could be carefully drilled out tapped and refitted but life's too short!

Having written the above I remembered that Dublo coaches use two types of rivet. The neat brass type I was thinking of on the longer ones and a eyelet for the short ones. The latter is flattened over inside the coach. With care they can be prised up and then reused to fit the new ones. The nuts and bolts are less hassle!

There are four kinds: the Gresley types used on the LNER and early BR(E),  a Stanier type used on the LMS and early BR(M) coaches, and a BR (alleged) type introduced with the suburbans. This was then used for all the coaches with different positions for the pivot leaving M or E in the undrilled position to indicate the type, The last BR(E) coaches had these too (Even at the age of  9 or 10 I knew this was wrong!). Anyway, one can always drill the bogie to convert from one type to the other.

The SD6 coaches had a new design of bogie.

Within the limits of Tinplate, the original coaches are quite good and based on real prototypes. The LNER are 52' 6" coaches (not really the proper thing for an A4 but never mind and pre-war were available correctly as an articulated pair (brake/third and third) and a composite. Post war they split up the articulated pair to separate coaches (I would have thought post-war shortages would have encouraged the saving in bogies). With the BR liveries the third was dropped altogether. The LMS coaches are based on Stanier prototypes, but like the LNER coaches are a bit short for some reason. All have correct prototype numbers (as do the wagons). Later they tried to pass off the Staniers as BR standard coaches (at least the BR(W) ones) (naughty!).

 

I've been droning on again My excuse is that the alternative is weeding (or more exactly deforestation - we have some championship thistles and brambles). I  chopped them down the other day, but this usually only seems to encourage them to grow!

Edited January 25, 2023 by Il Grifone

[Great Eastern]

Hi Il Grifone,

 

Any luck identifying your LMS 10001 kit ? Does it look like my Q kits one ? I've tried to sort out piccies with a good perspective on the nose shape for comparison, as you mentioned that yours wasn't quite correct. Bung a piccy of yours up if you like, I'd be interested to compare. I snapped a piccy of the distinctive Q kits box too, if you've got yours ?

I've got another bodge up Q kit, a Class 41, that was a real challenge !! I'll get some pics ready perhaps.

 

As regards the Dublo GWR 062T, you're right it bore little resemblance to the 56XX. There were Barry Railway and Rhymney Railway locos that were a closer match to the Dublo casting. However, I'll have to modify another (whitemetal kit ) safety bonnet to match, or failing that carve one from plastic. I've  got another GW, postwar, one to copy as I've been collecting,  sorry, hoarding !!  Dublo for half a century now !!  I'll put the clockwork one on an electric chassis, I think it'll have to be a postwar horseshoe chassis with unfortunately postwar hooks, as I'm unlikely to find a prewar one. Even prewar hooks are rare nowadays, although repros are an option.  

 

 

As an ornithologist you must obviously need to have a patch of wilderness garden to provide fodder and cover for the local avifauna, that's the reason why you couldn't  possibly hack it all down !!!!  Nothing to do with railways !!

 

GE

[Il Grifone]

I'll try and take a photo - if I can persuade a camera to work! I actually found where I'd stashed her away yesterday! No box unfortunately.

It shouldn't be too difficult to bodge the GWR tank. A piece of kit sprue of suitable diameter and sharpen the end in a pencil sharpener. Then and cut to length and add a disc of plastic to the top paint gold and black on the top (the original is notable for lack of detail) and there you are! The prewar couplings are a pain and post-war are a much better option.

 

The local avifauna has plenty of wilderness around here! It does not need my garden. Hack it all down is a no chance' situation anyway - i  produced enough to fill a brown bin last night and there's still plenty left. It'll soon grow back anyway.

I thought I'd dealt with the brambles etc, a couple of years ago. You wouldn't think so! In return the bramble has produced some delicious blackberries. It must be the domestic variety. I think it was actually our neighbours', as the main stem seems to be their side of the fence, but it has taken advantage of covid and our absence to spread....

We returned home and saw a heron on a neighbour's roof  some time ago (pre-covid). I was quite excited, but SWMBO showed a complete lack of interest! ????  Usually we get pidgeons (wood and common or garden variety), seagulls (herring and black head) and the usual; starlings, sparrows crows, magpies, etc.)

 

I dug out My copy of 'Thorburn's Birds', but it had little to add on corvus cornix. There is a picture (plate80), but ours have less black.

I have been told to reduce my library!!!!!!! (and there was I adding to it (How was I supposed to resist 'London Tilbury & Southend Railway and its Locomotives' in a local charity for only £1.50?)

 

Edited July 21, 2022 by Il Grifone

[Great Eastern]

Hi Il Grifone,

So my wilderness garden excuse won't work with SWMBO then !!!!!!! What a shame !!!

 

GE

 

Is there no heavy duty machine that might help you? 

 

Edited July 11, 2022 by Great Eastern

[Il Grifone]

It might work, but the female mind works in misterious ways....

 

Warning - the following has nothing to do with trains!

The local shops have nothing and a longer expedition is out with this heat (32 degrees last time I looked). I told the family,  who are still in Sardinia and got the reply, "What do you think it is here?" True, but. according to'Metro', the UK was hotter than Sardinia yesterday! The other difference is that Italian houses are designed to keep the heat out, while British are designed to keep it in!

Sardinian supermarkets are always well stocked with suitable gear on the other hand. They do tend to try to flog battery powered rubbish though. Been there! Done that! Got the dud batteries to prove it.

Disposal of these means a trip to the local tip recycling centre. The last time we went, we came back with three puppies, so are rather loathe to go again!

There was a long queue, (there always is, but this was at the height of covid!) so we decided to take our dog for a walk, as far as the railway line and back. He then showed great interest in the hedge at the side of the road. Investigation revealed a sad little nervous brown face staring back. Further investigation showed another behind him and a third (white and female this time) behind that. The first was a bit snappy and had to be wrapped in a raincoat, but the other two came readily. (I carried one under each arm - I couldn't do that now!*) They soon realised that they had been rescued and happily settled down in the back of the car.

 Our first dog was Louis, but we respelt it Lewis and the other three became Drake, Arran and Skye. Now we had to look for homes for them. In the end Arran stayed and became dog number two. Drake is now Brad, but Skye is still Skye. She was adopted by a friend of my daughter (also into animal protection) and still recogises us and goes berserk with joy went we visit.

* Arran is now something like 35kg! It is a bit difficult to pick him up at all to weigh him, so it could be more.

 

Lewis is a Maremmano and we are told the other three are Maremmano/Caucasian crosses.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maremmano-Abruzzese_Sheepdog

 

If you approach a flock of sheep with one or more of these on guard, they will quickly make it clear your presence is not required. It is good practice to take the hint. Gently and calmly, but go....

It is considered that three are enough to deal with a pack of wolves!

 

Edited July 12, 2022 by Il Grifone
gash 'c'

[Great Eastern]

Hi MikeCW,

Thanks for the electroplating post.

Unfortunately I stumbled across this by chance, and can't now find it !!!!   How do I navigate to it?  I've spent ages searching to no avail. Not your fault, it's just that I can't find any instructions anywhere on this site.

Does PM mean Public Message ?

Many thanks,

GE

[Il Grifone]

Private message!

 

Try the little envelope in the top right hand corner.

 

Havig a collection of first series Tri-ang station buildings, but only one chimney, I ordered some 3D printed ones from eBay along with the end cradles for a Dublo chlorine tank wagon.

They arrived this morning Excellent! The colour of the chimneys is a very good match to the original, The tank wagon was grateful too! I need some more parts so will be making further orders in due course. Highly recommended!

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk

 

{If anyone is interested in the canine saga (probably not - feel free to skip), I found my (1966) copy of 'The Observer's book of Dogs' (I don't seem to have the Cats version???} which has a page on the Maremanno.

Obviously book this was bought for the splendid rough Collie on the dust jacket. Our first dog - Duke -was a tricolour Rough Collie - my first anniversary present to my wife in 1974 . He got on well with our cats. We came down one morning and found them all together in his basket with Tyger kneading his back. We seem to only do sheepdogs - the second - Leda - was a black Alsation. We always said she was a Belgian Shepherd, but could have a been a black German Shepherd or even a cross. (Apart from colour, there is not a great difference between the breeds.)

Sheepdogs are always loyal to their owners (once they've decided that these strange looking sheep are their responsibility!), but do tend to wander off on their own (at least ours did/do). We had a friend looking after Duke when we visited my parents in England one year. (We were living in Diano Marina in Liguria at the time (so about 1980), very near to the coastal railway line to France.) He lived several kilometres inland from Imperia the next town. Duke escaped and was found the next day having made his way back to our shop in Diano! (It must be something like 10-15 kilometres). He must have headed down to the sea and then along the coastal road. (It appears they have finished this now. It was a semi-derelict abandoned construction when we were there.)

Lewis escaped one day and set off with Arran in tow (he is his number 2 dog) and me following at a distance (they are both much faster than I am!) by the time I caught up with them they had gone down the river (exaggerating a bit) valley and nearly to the next village, then they came to a stop with three large white dogs barring their path (see previous post) and I could see a fourth to the left and a fifth to the right. Discretion was considered the better part of valour by all three of us and we made a dignified  retreat. Then the dogs insisted on taking the wrong path back up thre hill (well it was level rather than up at 45 degrees). Luckily they realised that perhaps master knew best after all....

Edited July 12, 2022 by Il Grifone

[Great Eastern]

Hi Il Grifone,

Thanks, that's great I've found it now.

Cheers for that.

GE

[Il Grifone]

I found some wheels for my 8F! They are not Dublo (I have no idea whose they are), but have plastic centres and metal rims, are 12mm* in diameter, and have 10 spokes so will do!

 

* Larger than the originals, but nearer to the prototype. There appears to be plenty of room under the frame block.

 

I find I have a BR(E) brick wagon with a single bogie. I seem to recollect that in came as part of a job lot. It's in  quite good condition, so I'll have to look for one next time I'm in the UK. I could fit the Ratio ones I've fitted to my Tri-ang brick wagons, I suppose, but Dublo tinplate really calls for originality rather than detailing.

I also found a 'Vacuum' tank wagon (part of the same job lot IIRC). Apart from lacking the tank support and one of the wire tank trusses (easily fixable), the top of the tank has faded to pink. I tried lightly buffing it, which has improved (and cleaned) things a bit, but still pink. Does anyone had any ideas?  or should I just leave things as weathering? It's too good for a drastic repaint into a new livery.

 

I'm supposed to be here tidying and sorting things out. Despite loads of graft* (no fun anytime and above all not in this heat! - today's Metro was on about 40 degrees next week - luckily I'll be in Sardinia) it looks like I've done nothing , so I'll hear all about it (Nag, Nag, Nag!. Daughter is coming here later in the month...).

 

* Just the garden filled a bin (tamped down hard - I heard them struggling to empty it!) and a load more to go!

Edited July 15, 2022 by Il Grifone

[Il Grifone]

I knew I had some! I've just found a large box full of wheels and within a bag of Dublo bogie/pony wheels - every variation. Of course I found it after I'd fitted the other wheels and put her away again!

 

I also thought I'd found a rare gem - a first day cover for the 1948 Olympic Games! However a quick check on the computer came up with £2.95! There was also a Christmas card from Dad to Mum dated 1943 (folded paper - there's a war on!) He was hoping that they would spend Christmas 1944 together....  (This is obviously not going anywhere!)

Somewhere there must still be the glass that I was given at school for the Coronation in 1953, These lack any value either (£1.99 on eBay, The postage is twice this - it would probably have been 3d or 4d in 1953.) Apparently 85% of the population were born during the reign of Queen Elizabeth and only around 100,000 are older. (I didn't count them so can't swear to this!)

 Back to Sardinia tomorrow, where it's a degree or two cooler!. I found the fan I'd bought in Maplin's closing down sale for my computer, which was running rather warm*. Great! I thought, My HD Marshal II can power it (the label says 12 V  3,4 W and the Marshal is rated for 8. However it spun listlessly a few times and that was that, The label says, "Brushless". They obviously meant, "Worthless!" I can't even take it back. The building still proclaims, "Maplin" but I gather it is a (or is to become) a medical centre. I'll chuck it out along with the computer it was destined for.

 

*It never got fitted of course and I've just slung out the computer (Vista...) The hard disc was a generous 1 Terabyte Seagate, so I recovered this for storage memory and the rest is destined for the tip. The computer it replaced (XP this one) went at the same time This only had 500GB, but I kept it as well, There was even a nice little cage for two hard drives to keep them tidy.

 

 

Edited July 15, 2022 by Il Grifone

[Great Eastern]

Hi Il Grifone,

The red pigment on Dublo tinplate wagons seems to be particularly prone to fading, I know what you mean about pink tankers, I've got a few of those.  Also my SR meat wagon lettering has faded on one side too. The SD maroon carriages also seem to suffer, but at least that gives me an excuse to neverwazza in green or cream and crimson I suppose.

You throw away new fangled computers running XP or Vista !!!!!!!  I'm still running one I built 20 years ago (mainly for railway stuff), that's running Windows 98 !!!!!!!! and it still boots / shuts down quicker than my Win 10 machine !!!!! Also it isn't busy running TI workers installer, or some garbage, in the background when I'm trying to work and taking up 99% of CPU runtime. Plus if I want to change a hard drive I don't have to ring up Bill Gates and get his gracious permission, I can change what I want, when I want. Such is progress in IT !!!!

 

Have a safe trip to the Med.

GE

[Great Eastern]

  I don't know if anybody might be interested  in another one of my bodge ups, (Il Grifone mentioned using two Triang Electra bogies for his 10000). Here's one in similar vain. I know Triang is not always appreciated by Dubloists, but IMHO if one cherrypicks the better examples, especially from c 1960 on, there are some good body mouldings, albeit somewhat let down by the mechanisms which can be problematic ; stalling / sintered iron wheels that want to arc-weld themselves to the track / lack of adhesion/weight etc....   Anyway, this is my Class 37  "collection-of-bits"....

 

 

The body is a slightly later Margate split headcode one with various repainted bits etc.  I chose this body simply because I rather like the look of the split headcode type, plus I've already got the original green Triang headcode box type. The coupling on the other end is the Triang tension lock.

However, it's the chassis that's the more pertinent bit....

 

I did a cut-and-shut with two of the *Triang goose-neck chassis; the white triangular bits are reinforcements to take the strain of two motors / weight of the profile-steel block in the centre. The idea being that one motor will pull the loco and a few carriages (ie like Triang), the second will enable it to tackle a full rake of Dublo SD carriages. It runs ok, but I still want to change the wheels for something more modern/conductive.

 

*(Time was, many years ago now, when you couldn't move at swapmeets for being knee deep in Triang loco bits, I spent months trying to find a spare second chassis for this loco a couple of years back).

 

The track, by the way, is another bit of the Tillig dual gauge "3-rail" I mentioned before.

 

GE

Edit  Thanks for the likes 

Edited July 17, 2022 by Great Eastern

[Il Grifone]

I believe it's a general failing of red dyes and paint

I didn't throw the computers out for being XP/Vista, but for not working! There's nothing wrong with either operating system:; they are just victims of planned obsolence. 

Apparently you can't even change the battery on an iPhone. (Not that I know personally; I could never see the point of paying twice (or more) as much for Apple rubbish! My daughter was keen - she was involved with graphic design and video editing (for which Apple appears to be an industry standard), but has since seen the light!). I have a notebook running Windows 7 (it refused the free update to 10 - several times!) (and they know where they can put Windows 11. (As far as I can see there is no advantage over 10, bur several features have been removed.) Fine for playing

Now back in Sardinia. Baggage check was rather concerned over the trains I brought with me (2 Tri-ang TC coaches* (R.24 & R.25), The tender from my Lima 2-8-2 (why this was in England I don't know!) and my Märklin/Lima hybrid DSB MY Co-Co diesel (likewise).

Maybe I can finally get this last one going. It was started back in the 80s! The body cost 65.000£it (£25-30 at the time) as  a spare and the chassis came from a sun damaged Lima MZ from Turin 'Porta Palazzo' market).  She runs fine until she gets to a curve. Then she derails due to the bogies catching on the body.... I think the original Märklin ones a trifle short in the wheelbase to overcome this I've have to dig out the drawings.

Talking of Märklin, I found a rather nice Br89 body (it even states 'Deutsche Reichsbahn' rather than 'Märklin' or worse 'DB'* It appears devoid of maker's name and I had forgotten I had it. Possibly it can replace the rather crude body of my recent purchase.

* Not being one of the better standard German locomotives, they were either sold off to private industries or it was arranged than they ended up in Eastern Germany....

 

* My US coach (passenger car if you prefer) of choice (very Grifone-friendly price - I have paid as little as a couple of quid. They are quite reasonable models (if 'only' a scale 70 ft. long rather than 85- not alone in that!), The bogies leave something to be desired (the earlier die-cast type - the later plastic type are awful! Are these perhaps trying to be something Australian? or a designer's nightmare), but are inconspicuous under the coach and easy to replace anyway. I think I even have some Peco replacement wheels somewhere, but proper metal ones would be better. The hook and bar couplings will have to go of course. Kadees or even a piece of wire in the middle of a train. The hardest part is lettering them for 'Santa Fe' or 'Southern Pacific'. Both of these are/were 'Railways'!

 

EDIT I wrote this earlier but neglected to 'save'....

Edited January 25, 2023 by Il Grifone

[Il Grifone]

Off topic!

I finally saw a hooded crow today (birds generally have been keeping a low profile in the heat)  - no camera of course!. It was a bit beat up (the grey was all brown!), but showed much less black on the head and shoulders than the illustrations.

I have finally given in to filial pressure and bought a mobile on eBay (it's not exactly new (2012!), but was cheap!) so should maybe will be ready nexrt time....

I am at present looking for 8 sets of 10.5mm (3 foot) wheels for the two passenger cars (plenty of 9.5mm freight stock wheels...). I think I have some Peco conversion wheels (perfect apart from being plastic), but they are in the UK.

The DSB MY was a little hesitant, but, once I sorted the power supply deficiencies, off she went! She's fine on the three foot plus radius curves of my US station, but I have doubts about the radius 2 curves at the ends of the layout. My plans are for  two layouts:- US one side and Italian the other and Danish ferry terminal* (just to be original!) to British Branch line terminus (again original). End to end this one - maybe I needn't worry about MY1147's* inability to go round corners after all!

*The ferry project is long term (all those portholes!) and is to be named 'PRINCESSE ASTRID' after my daughter. Another project to rename Dublo 1st Class Pullman Cars 2 & 3 (back on topic!) 'LUCIANA' and 'ASTRID' (wife and daughter) is likewise long term....  (I do have the transfers, but....)

** My birthday is 1/47. Coincidence or what?

Edited July 21, 2022 by Il Grifone

[Ruffnut Thorston]

Also Off Topic. 🙂

 

Another Astrid. 😉😀

 

Astrid Hofferson...

 

 

 

🐉🙋🏼‍♀️

Edited July 21, 2022 by Ruffnut Thorston

[Il Grifone]

The first 'Dragon' film was great, the second less so, but we have still to see the third...

Must get the Blu-rays!

[Ruffnut Thorston]

Sorry that this is a bit off topic...🤷🏼‍♀️

 

 

Hiya David.

 

There's a lot more to the Dragons Saga than the three main movies! 😉😀

 

Note, these are screenshots...

 

The links are not live here  🤷🏼‍♀️

 

 

 

🐉🙋🏼‍♀️