The Night Mail

[jjb1970]

Although, on expensive warranty work nothing car related comes close to some of the mishaps I saw at sea.

 

One of the offshore vessels closed an auxiliary engine breaker out of phase sequence during a commissioning test, the resulting stress ripped the engine off its bed plate. 

 

A very famous and well reputed engine builder got the torsional damper calculations wrong (which were verified by the class society), luckily someone picked up the error and we were ordered to stop sea trials immediately to swap out all four dampers before the crankshafts failed.

 

And my favourite, doing maximum power speed trial as part of the final delivery sea trials all three turbo-chargers failed simultaneously on a 48,000KW Sulzer, the bearings collapsed as the wrong ones had been fitted. Ouch. Expensive.

 

 

[Dave Hunt]

11 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

A technique I still practice, along with other supposedly non required driving techniques such as double declutching.

 

A few months ago I took Jill's car to the VW dealer in Crewe for servicing and picked up a courtesy car for the day. As I drove it away it soon became apparent that the synchromesh on 3rd gear wasn't working (on a car with only 5,000 miles on the clock!). I considered taking it back but then decided to stick with it as by double declutching I could avoid any problem. When I returned the courtesy car later that day I told the chap at the service desk about the 3rd gear synchro, adding, "So I had to double declutch it." He looked blank and said, "Sorry, you had to what?"

 

Dave

[Dave Hunt]

5 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

.....and let me make myself perfectly clear: the stereotypical “emotional Italian“ is the Southern Italian! Most anything in life, south of Rome, is basically an Opera Tragica waiting to happen….

 

When I was on loan to the Italian Airforce for a while in 1997, virtually all the guys I worked with were from the North (actually I think that it was all of them but I can't be certain). One of the Flight Commanders, who was from the Veneto,  was scathing about Southerners, in particular those from the Amalfi coast, describing them as, "Either criminals or Drama Queens," then added, "Actually some are both." 

 

Dave

[SM42]

Apparently an Audi TT headlight bulb change cost north of £200. 

 

Halfords do good business with Audi headlights I'm told

 

Andy

[New Haven Neil]

3 hours ago, polybear said:

 

Is it just Bear, or do gadgets like that sound like a humongous (squared) bill if (when?) it goes wrong?  Eeek.....

 

 

Google Ford 'Powershitft' problems....ooerr.  Many VW's had this box too.

[New Haven Neil]

3 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

Although, on expensive warranty work nothing car related comes close to some of the mishaps I saw at sea.

 

One of the offshore vessels closed an auxiliary engine breaker out of phase sequence during a commissioning test, the resulting stress ripped the engine off its bed plate. 

 

A very famous and well reputed engine builder got the torsional damper calculations wrong (which were verified by the class society), luckily someone picked up the error and we were ordered to stop sea trials immediately to swap out all four dampers before the crankshafts failed.

 

And my favourite, doing maximum power speed trial as part of the final delivery sea trials all three turbo-chargers failed simultaneously on a 48,000KW Sulzer, the bearings collapsed as the wrong ones had been fitted. Ouch. Expensive.

 

 

 

yeah...

 

[simontaylor484]

17 minutes ago, SM42 said:

Apparently an Audi TT headlight bulb change cost north of £200. 

 

Halfords do good business with Audi headlights I'm told

 

Andy

I had a Renault Laguna estate 10 years or so ago i bought it for £1500 one of the headlight bulbs went it was one of those Xenon ones it cost £100 the guy at the garage showed me the invoice from the parts supplier just so I knew he wasn't performing the function of a dialysis machine.

[Northmoor]

3 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

Although, on expensive warranty work nothing car related comes close to some of the mishaps I saw at sea.

 

One of the offshore vessels closed an auxiliary engine breaker out of phase sequence during a commissioning test, the resulting stress ripped the engine off its bed plate. 

 

A very famous and well reputed engine builder got the torsional damper calculations wrong (which were verified by the class society), luckily someone picked up the error and we were ordered to stop sea trials immediately to swap out all four dampers before the crankshafts failed.

 

And my favourite, doing maximum power speed trial as part of the final delivery sea trials all three turbo-chargers failed simultaneously on a 48,000KW Sulzer, the bearings collapsed as the wrong ones had been fitted. Ouch. Expensive.

 

 

I was kept busy in the late 90s flying back and forth to one of HM's ships, which had scuffed the main propulsion gearing on initial sea trials because the gearbox manufacturer made an assumption about oil grades instead of checking.  For info, OM-100 isn't 100 Cst, it's about 60 CSt.

Whoops.  One complete set of gear elements replaced under warranty...... Probably cheap compared to some of yours above though.

 

23 minutes ago, SM42 said:

Apparently an Audi TT headlight bulb change cost north of £200. 

 

Halfords do good business with Audi headlights I'm told

 

Andy

Headlight bulb changes are for me, one of the best indicators (sorry) of whether easy maintenance was even considered by the manufacturer.  Many modern cars are explicitly designed not to be, so that you have to go to the main dealer and maintain the service record.  Two cars we owned and my headlight bulb change times:

- Mk2 Mondeo, 45 minutes including removing and refitting part of the grille allowing the headlight to be pulled forward enough so the access cover at the back could actually be opened instead of being trapped by the battery tray.

- Peugeot 306, 90 seconds, which was the time from locking to relocking the car.......

[Happy Hippo]

Having had a merry time in the garden right hand weeding, I decided this afternoon to have a treat and start to write the operating sequence for Pantmawr North.

 

Cutting out some 2" to the foot paper templates for baseboards, as well as locos, brake vans coaches and wagon rakes, was entertaining using a guillotine and a pair of scissors but did not result in any further reductions of my good self.

 

After about 90 minutes I was happy with what I'd worked out by moving the templates around and writing notes, so I decided to go back to the beginning and work the first 20 moves through.  Firstly, a move is only in one direction, so a loco going to a water tower and then returning after a top up counts as two moves.  Secondly the notes also include not only to/from, but also any special instructions such as signal and point lever positions, (not too arduous with only 5 levers,) or whether the uncoupling is to be done with the electromagnets or the Dingham/Flippem couplers need to be tripped with a shunters pole.

 

All was going well on the run through until I realised that the down coal train which had been  placed into the No2 siding less it's brake van (to be taken up to the off scene washery), has collected it's van and was now out, heading south without any ablutions.  The cause was the shunt required a pause for the brake van to be removed off the running line to allow a passenger train to pass, and I'd stored the brake van  in front of the empties that were awaiting loading.

 

Such a minor error, but I now have to re write it again..... (But only from Move #07)

 

I actually have a better idea now so all is not lost.

Edited July 26, 2022 by Happy Hippo

[Dave Hunt]

1 hour ago, Happy Hippo said:

Having had a merry time in the garden right hand weeding...............

 

I never knew that weeds are handed. Does it affect which way you pull them up?

 

Dave

[Winslow Boy]

29 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

 

I never knew that weeds are handed. Does it affect which way you pull them up?

 

Dave

 

Only if you don't have the full compliment of whole fingers.

 

The vortex caused by only having nine whole fingers means that weeds will become unstable in flight and not always land in the correct place.

[Sabato]

36 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

 

I never knew that weeds are handed. Does it affect which way you pull them up?

 

Dave

 

I'm reminded of the Flanders & Swan song about the bindweed and the honeysuckle romance, and how their children might "turn out".

[newbryford]

On 25/07/2022 at 23:33, SM42 said:

 

 

 

Hill starts now require the use of all three feet.

 

Andy

 

That only works if you live in Burnley....

[newbryford]

5 hours ago, New Haven Neil said:

 

yeah...

 

 

A bit of Radweld, filler and T-Cut can fix that...................

[newbryford]

4 hours ago, Northmoor said:

 

- Mk2 Mondeo, 45 minutes including removing and refitting part of the grille allowing the headlight to be pulled forward enough so the access cover at the back could actually be opened instead of being trapped by the battery tray.

- Peugeot 306, 90 seconds, which was the time from locking to relocking the car.......

 

A Fiesta headlamp change was 3 or 30 minutes depending upon the size of your hands.

Small hands = no need to release the front grille.

3 minutes for me....................... I used to practice light bulb replacement just in case I found a failed one in the pre-driving test check.

Edited July 26, 2022 by newbryford

[jjb1970]

49 minutes ago, newbryford said:

 

A bit of Radweld, filler and T-Cut can fix that...................

 

I wish I had a pound (or dollar) for each of the crazy applications of red stag sealant or thistlebond epoxy resin bandages I saw over my career. It's funny, both are superb products when used appropriately but have a bit of a toxic image in marine engineering because of the way they're abused and misused.

[jjb1970]

6 hours ago, Northmoor said:

I was kept busy in the late 90s flying back and forth to one of HM's ships, which had scuffed the main propulsion gearing on initial sea trials because the gearbox manufacturer made an assumption about oil grades instead of checking.  For info, OM-100 isn't 100 Cst, it's about 60 CSt.

 

That one is surprisingly common, it used to drive me spare the way oil companies would describe some of their products in ways which would lead some to make assumptions about properties like viscosity and TBN. The oil company would say, with some justification, that people should read the product information where the parameters are given in detail. Others would say, with equal justification, using nomenclature which lends itself to such assumptions and mistakes is not very clever. In fairness most of them are pretty good and use sensible product descriptors, but the outliers are a menace.

[Florence Locomotive Works]

Drill all back together and working very well now.

 

 

 

Douglas

 

[polybear]

6 hours ago, newbryford said:

 

A bit of Radweld, filler and T-Cut can fix that...................

 

What Bear wants to know is.....

......what does the cylinder it came out of look like, or did they "get away" with giving it a quick hone? 🤣

Edited July 27, 2022 by polybear

[jamie92208]

16 hours ago, SM42 said:

Apparently an Audi TT headlight bulb change cost north of £200. 

 

Halfords do good business with Audi headlights I'm told

 

Andy

VOLVO V70 headlamps are a pain.  A) small hands and a vanity mirror, b) take out various air filter boxes and hoses or c), put it on a ramp and take the front bumper off.

 

Question for DH,  did the Italian planes have a reverse gear.

 

Jamie

Edited July 27, 2022 by jamie92208

[AndyID]

2 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

Drill all back together and working very well now.

 

 

2 hours ago, Florence Locomotive Works said:

 

 

A more modern version of the same thing. In low gear with a decent drill bit it drills large holes in steel quite fast.

 

 

 

[AndyID]

6 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

VOLVO V70 headlamps are abpain.  A)small hands and a vanity mirror, b) take out various air filter boxes and hoses or c), put it on a ramp and take the front bumper off.

 

 My Volvo XC70 had more fuses than a nuclear power station 😀

[iL Dottore]

Forgive my ignorance @Happy Hippo, but whatever happened to just watching the trains go round and round?

[Happy Hippo]

1 minute ago, iL Dottore said:

Forgive my ignorance @Happy Hippo, but whatever happened to just watching the trains go round and round?

Alas, I do not have a hanger like DH nor an NEC indoor arena like Jamie for my 7 mm stuff. So my poor trains are doomed to shuffle back and forth over an absolute maximum of 24 feet.

 

My 4mm roundy, is still in the planning stages as it involves incredibly intricate negotiation with the main operators (My grandchildren)  whilst the 7/8" emporium (45 mm gauge and another roundy) was lifted last year in preparation for relocating elsewhere in the garden.

 

The 7.25" gauge loco I'm building will have to run elsewhere.

[bbishop]

A bit late to the conversation.  I have a 10 year old, bottom of the range Yeti.  It's petrol, manual and lets me drive it.  Lovely.

 

Double de-clutching.  I was taught to drive by my Dad, who included double declutching and also hill starts on a 1 in 5!  Unsure when I last used either technique.

 

Many decades ago, I had a Terry McCann Capri.  Get the engine speed right and change gear without the clutch.

 

Bill