Aston On Clun. A forgotten Great Western outpost.

[MrWolf]

2 hours ago, drmditch said:

Re: Ursprunge der Autos

Entschuldigung.

Ist mein Skoda ein 'K und  K' Car?

 

Wir mögen Skoda! 

Besonders den halbkettenförmigen Truppen transporter!

 

 

[MrWolf]

43 minutes ago, John Besley said:

Love the transition from tarmac / gravel to grass how it has that scruffy grubbed up look you saw in railway yards...

 

Top work 

 

 

 

Thanks, I've been going round the edges of all areas where grass meets hard surfaces having had a good look at how nature does it. More pictures when I am nearer finished.

Although it is obvious from old photos that there was a great deal of effort employed keeping the stations tidy, even though some were falling apart by the 1920s, I suspect that the area behind the cattle dock would have had the brambles and nettles cut down and that's about all, it wouldn't be perfectly manicured.

[MrWolf]

You will no doubt be pleased to know that I won't now be "sticking a silly face on the 517" as punishment.

I pulled the door off and actually found some moulding flash which, had it been removed circa 1977, the door would have fitted properly anyway.

 

More filler required.

 

We don't do TTTE here, largely because we find people taking it as seriously as Star Wars, Lord of the rings, Hitch hiker's guide  etc. Pick thy pedantry.

 

Besides, if we did, it would soon descend into anarchy...

 

 

 

 

 

Edited March 12, 2023 by MrWolf
Stupid autocorrect

[John Besley]

 

45 minutes ago, MrWolf said:

We don't do TTTE here, largely because we find people taking it as seriously as Star Wars, Lord of the rings, Hitch hiker's guide  etc. Pick thy pedantry.

 

Besides, if we did, it would soon descend into anarchy...

 

 

 

 

Love it we need more "The Adventures of a Branchline that time forgot" 

[MrWolf]

3 minutes ago, John Besley said:

 

 

Love it we need more "The Adventures of a Branchline that time forgot" 

 

Thanks, but I wonder how the people who do silly versions of TTTE on YouTube get away with it? 

 

It sounds like a great idea, but this thread gets derailed regularly enough perhaps.

 

Also, I can guarantee it wouldn't be long before I got told: "someone might be offended...."

 

Good, it's working then!

[John Besley]

Idea... Do a cartoon to get the thread back on track when it drifts orf or you want to get a point across

[Limpley Stoker]

Love the cartoon

 

The headcode discs on your 517 suggest digital command control.

[MrWolf]

I believe it means "Nobody is going to make me go and play with the nasty people.."

[Winslow Boy]

Look just stop faffing about and get that manure turning. It won't make good compost if you don't.

[Sabato]

20 hours ago, John Besley said:

 

Paraffin flare lamp was as good as it got

And gauge glass lamps.

[MrWolf]

1 hour ago, Winslow Boy said:

Look just stop faffing about and get that manure turning. It won't make good compost if you don't.

 

Thanks awfully old fruit, but I already have somebody in place for bossing me about and I don't need to see your picture to know that she's a whole lot prettier than you are...

 

 

 

From "Yeah, she's sometimes kinda pushy and he sometimes feels whipped but that isn't the actual phrase..."

 

(Attributed to:) Geoffrey Chaucer.

[MrWolf]

1 hour ago, Sabato said:

And gauge glass lamps.

 

They look much less likely to burn down your wooden engine shed I must say.

[Captain Kernow]

20 hours ago, MrWolf said:

How the workers managed before the Bardic lamp

Like how footplate crew managed before the days of powerful colour light signals and AWS.

 

Running at high speed, in darkness, on a rolling and pitching footplate, just relying on sighting the correct aspect illuminated by a flickering oil lamp flame.

 

Nerves of steel.

 

[MrWolf]

Absolutely, like flying by dead reckoning.

It's a tribute to the skill of everyone involved that there were so few accidents.

[MrWolf]

More junk has arrived in the post, a spares Autotank. Although some of the body isn't as bad as the previous one, it's still parts for projects or to keep the other old heaps running.

I've decided to build a proper 48xx to go with the autocoach that also needs an upgrade. I've still got the kit in one of the Boxes of Doom. 

But that's an entire train sorted out in two vehicles.

 

Edited March 13, 2023 by MrWolf

[John Besley]

Oooo a half cab 48xx is that r@re... 

[MrWolf]

Elsewhere odd things have happened. 

 

Firstly, the manure pit is part filled and is now known as Westminster, due to both sides of the house being equally full of ****.

 

 

The gate for the station allotment has appeared. There's something rather odd about it standing "in splendid isolation".

It's all looking a bit too C.S.Lewis for my liking...

 

[The Stationmaster]

On 12/03/2023 at 19:55, Captain Kernow said:

Like how footplate crew managed before the days of powerful colour light signals and AWS.

 

Running at high speed, in darkness, on a rolling and pitching footplate, just relying on sighting the correct aspect illuminated by a flickering oil lamp flame.

 

Nerves of steel.

 

If I caught our Lampie producing signal lamps with a flickering flame he'd have hada right going over.  

 

As it happened he got a very comprehensive and final going over asa result of me and a Signalman having to do umpteen lamps which had gone out at Westbury North one Boxing Night.  Now getting back to the question of light how do you climb up to teh platform of a signal gantry and then up the signal posts on that gantry with a Bardic Lamp in one hand and two burning signal lamps in the other hand while holding on to the signal ladder with your other two hands?  

 

Simple answer is don't bother to take the Bardic Lamp then you only need three hands instead of four.  However thanks to the photo by 'Coach Bogie',  from another thread, but included below you might work out part of the answer to the conundrum here because as you can see some of the signal arms are higher than the adjacent road bridge and it  had quite good street lighting so I was only in the dark further down the gantry (but the rain was falling at all altitudes of it).  Also no stupid little working platforms but a nice safety ring to brace yourself against leaving both hands free to deal with changing the lamp.

 

 

 

I was extremely pleased that as a direct consequence of my displeasure the Lampie was Summarily Dismissed the next morning.

[MrWolf]

5 minutes ago, John Besley said:

Oooo a half cab 48xx is that r@re... 

 

It might even qualify for a L@@K!!! R@RE!!! on eBay at least, possibly even Kit Built! because odd bits have been badly glued back on. One for the knackers yard I'm afraid. I haven't tried to get it running yet, but I did find a roof.

 

 

The one I posted the other day with most of the details and the safety valve cover missing, now runs beautifully (despite missing tyres). All  those little plunger pick ups were stuck with muck and oil. I don't know what had been used, it looked thicker than the straight 30 grade we use in the old bikes.

 

 

[MrWolf]

9 minutes ago, The Stationmaster said:

If I caught our Lampie producing signal lamps with a flickering flame he'd have hada right going over.  

 

As it happened he got a very comprehensive and final going over asa result of me and a Signalman having to do umpteen lamps which had gone out at Westbury North one Boxing Night.  Now getting back to the question of light how do you climb up to teh platform of a signal gantry and then up the signal posts on that gantry with a Bardic Lamp in one hand and two burning signal lamps in the other hand while holding on to the signal ladder with your other two hands?  

 

Simple answer is don't bother to take the Bardic Lamp then you only need three hands instead of four.  However thanks to the photo by 'Coach Bogie',  from another thread, but included below you might work out part of the answer to the conundrum here because as you can see some of the signal arms are higher than the adjacent road bridge and it  had quite good street lighting so I was only in the dark further down the gantry (but the rain was falling at all altitudes of it).  Also no stupid little working platforms but a nice safety ring to brace yourself against leaving both hands free to deal with changing the lamp.

 

 

 

I was extremely pleased that as a direct consequence of my displeasure the Lampie was Summarily Dismissed the next morning.

 

Not much would wind me up more than someone who would disappear for an hour or so, fifteen minutes after clocking in and leaving the rest of us to make sure that everything was ready for the next shift or restarting a plant at H hour. It often meant struggling and taking a few risks (I see that you managed your three points of contact with all seven hands and I've had more near misses with harnesses and lanyards than I care to remember!)

The weak links / lazy barstools were often some weasel who either sucked up to his equally bone idle superior or the union rep or both.

I remember my boss saying that a random drugs test was imminent and I said: "Well let's not make it too random shall we? I'll take the first one, and then....

 

Oops.

[brumtb]

8 hours ago, MrWolf said:

 

It might even qualify for a L@@K!!! R@RE!!! on eBay at least, possibly even Kit Built! because odd bits have been badly glued back on. One for the knackers yard I'm afraid. I haven't tried to get it running yet, but I did find a roof.

 

 

The one I posted the other day with most of the details and the safety valve cover missing, now runs beautifully (despite missing tyres). All  those little plunger pick ups were stuck with muck and oil. I don't know what had been used, it looked thicker than the straight 30 grade we use in the old bikes.

 

 

Interesting, despite the age of the models they can still be useful.

I've always found they ran better without the traction tyres (on code 100 track, at least).

Tony

[The Stationmaster]

11 hours ago, MrWolf said:

 

Not much would wind me up more than someone who would disappear for an hour or so, fifteen minutes after clocking in and leaving the rest of us to make sure that everything was ready for the next shift or restarting a plant at H hour. It often meant struggling and taking a few risks (I see that you managed your three points of contact with all seven hands and I've had more near misses with harnesses and lanyards than I care to remember!)

The weak links / lazy barstools were often some weasel who either sucked up to his equally bone idle superior or the union rep or both.

I remember my boss saying that a random drugs test was imminent and I said: "Well let's not make it too random shall we? I'll take the first one, and then....

 

Oops.

The sickness dodge was another one.  I pulled one of my clerical staff about his regular pattern of sickness and he immediately said 'But I never go sick when it's really busy Mike'.  So I pointed out to him that he was correct - he always went sick the week before we started to get to the busiest time of our work cycle, and then stayed off through the hectic week or so.  Fortunately the BR Doctor was 'helpful' and our miscreant was pensioned off on health grounds (which meant that he gota full pension early so I always wondered if that was also part of the bloke's long term game plan?).

 

Going back to the Lampie.  With semaphore signals with oil lamps it was a key job and if it wasn't done properly not only could lamps go out because they didn't last the whole week between being cleaned,  trimmed, and refilled but with lack of proper trimming and cleaning the flame would be all over the place.  A good Lampie was worth their weight in gold, a bad one was usually a major headache.  It's a thing which gets me about electrically lit semaphores on model railways because they are always far too bright - one of the classic signs of an incompetent Lampie. 

[MrWolf]

Today has seen a major step forward as far as I'm concerned. I've finally got the filling and sanding done on the 517 and administered a coat of black primer.

It's made a big difference to the way I've been feeling about this project. 

I'll check it for blemishes tomorrow and hopefully get the green paint on!

 

 

 

 

 

[MrWolf]

After the chatter over on The Sheep Chronicles about Knott End, this is the station after the trains ended but before the fancy revamp which possibly saved it from demolition. It's a picture that reminds me of childhood.

 

 

From: How greasy was my spoon? By Richard Llewellyn, 1959...

 

[St Enodoc]

6 hours ago, MrWolf said:

After the chatter over on The Sheep Chronicles about Knott End, this is the station after the trains ended but before the fancy revamp which possibly saved it from demolition. It's a picture that reminds me of childhood.

 

 

From: How greasy was my spoon? By Richard Llewellyn, 1959...

 

1968 at the earliest, I think, on account of the number plate on the Herald.

Edited March 15, 2023 by St Enodoc