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Corrugated "iron" panels were 26" wide (allowing a minimum 2" overlap) and regularly available in lengths between 6' and 12' in whole feet increments, the corrugations were at 3" centres. You didn't cut the stuff unless you had to but there must have been some sort of tool for bending a sheet at 90° along a corrugation as one often finds a single corrugation bent round in this way at corners. Even from this distant view that starts to provide some possible dimensions. The hut looks to me to have been provided specially for a motor trolley rather than previously having had some other use. While on the subject of the CH&P, around forty years ago I cycled the length of the High Peak trail and took a number of photos. I have been able to identify the precise location of all of them (even MP 13 by Croft Farm) bar one which should be obvious but isn't, at least to me. I have attached it below and would really welcome suggestions, it is looking away from Cromford.

That certainly sounds just the job. If I were to make one, and I might well do, I think that I would use the smallest size (1/16"?) of square brass tube instead of a strip of brass (easier to drill holes through and stronger for its size) and then solder a pair of household pins through the holes in it, trimming the pins to length after soldering (again the steel pins would be stronger for a given diameter than brass wire).

Even better than a screwdriver is a home made tool which uses an X-Acto holder no.2 fitted with an adapted no.18 (chisel shape) blade. To adapt the blade, grind off, or at least blunt, the sharp end and then grind a slot in it wide enough to take the wheel boss (so that it looks rather like the special screwdriver for Romford wheels but with a wider slot). For 2FS you may need to grind a taper in the sides of the blade too so that it will fit within the rim. Of course, the canny ones among us will utillise a well-used blade that has already become less than sharp. It is easiest to use in wheels with an even number of spokes but it seems to work OK with an odd number too even though it can't quite be centred on the wheel.

It was effectively a station (St.Helens) to station (Bembridge) move (albeit within the one OES single line section), propelling at start of the service day, pulling back at end of service day. The connections to both Orchard siding and the goods siding were facing to arriving trains, the latter via the loop. At the end of the day after the arrival of the last passenger service, the loco had to run round the carriages via the turntable before it could pick up the empty wagons from the two sidings (and the points had then to be reset to the mainline by the guard before the OES staff with its Annett's key could be released from the frame in the box enabling the loco and wagons to precede along the branch). In the morning the arriving propelling move had to wait at the station throat while the guard used the AK on the staff to unlock the frame and hence work the points for the sidings, once the wagons were safely deposited the points were reset for the mainline and the loco was able to immediately couple up to the stabled carriages in the platform. Then the regular day's routine - arrive, run round via the turntable, depart - set in, broken only if a PLA (passengers' luggage in advance) van had been added to the branch train at Brading, in which case it was necessary, after the run round, to shunt with the whole train to deposit the van in the goods siding (or to pick one up for taking back to Brading). I think that the PLA van movements were normally confined to Fridays for arrivals and late in the day on Saturdays for departures. The PLA van was normally unloaded and loaded in the platform (most of the luggage would belong to patrons of the Royal Spithead Hotel just across the road and their staff would help) and stabled empty in the goods siding.

There was in later Southern Railway and early BR days an example of a goods train being regularly operated without a brake van and that was on the (to all intents and purposes level) Bembridge branch in the Isle of Wight. Although no mention of it appears in the IoW Sectional Appendix, the practice was sanctioned by the Assistant (to the General Manager), Isle of Wight, apparently dating back to Macleod's days in the post. "In reality the goods train was the first arrival of the day, having started out from Ryde and being propelled from the junction at Brading (where reversal was necessary). It shunted St.Helens Quay en route where the brake van was left, so that it arrived at Bembridge with just the wagons which were shunted into the two sidings. The loco then picked up the carriage set which had been stabled in the platform overnight and worked the day's passenger services. At the end of the day, it left the carriage set in the platform, picked up empty wagons from the sidings, then called at St.Helens Quay to pick up wagons and the brake van, and continued to Sandown where the wagons and van were left to be worked to Medina Wharf via Merstone the next day, the loco finally working back light to Ryde. Only if there were no wagons for St.Helens did the brake van reach Bembridge for stabling, something that was rare pre-WWII but which became much more commonplace thereafter." The guard rode on the loco footplate between St.Helens and Bembridge in each direction.

Not just normal signalling practice but required by law unless the connection from the siding(s) was controlled by an immediately adjacent ground frame. The signal could be a ground signal (or even just a point indicator) or a subsidiary arm mounted on a post.

That view is April 1974 by when I assume that there was less demand for Conflat As for carrying small containers. The decks of the two in the photo appear to have minor modifications to enable the compressors to be secured safely which makes me wonder if they had been allocated their own TOPS code.

I have already stated that the LNWR used blue over black, and as far as I know that was the only colour combination, as opposed to a single colour, that the LNWR used (at least with any frequency) on their levers. That colour combination didn't feature in the standard list of lever colours implemented by the LMSR in 1934 and that, apart from the signalman's mode of attire, was the basis for my original statement that the photo predated the mid-1930s.

That is certainly the sort of thing. Being the LNWR, the wagon turntable probably wouldn't be released directly from the frame but via an Annett's key, possibly housed at one end of the frame, which would be released with the lever reversed and then used to unlock the turntable.

The two-tone lever is blue over black, widely used in LNWR boxes for any sort of lock other than FPLs which were plain blue.

The lever colours are those of the LNWR which remained in use, unchanged, by the LMSR until a revised specification dated May 1934 was put into effect, so the photo is no later than the mid-1930s. The signalman's mode of dress (striped shirt without collar and rolled-up sleeves plus a cloth cap) might suggest a date earlier than this but it is difficult to be certain. The other man, obviously in uniform, may well be a district signalling inspector or a station master. I don't know enough about LNWR and LMSR uniforms to be able to say whether it might help with dating, but quite possibly not.

Green paint came first from late 1956, wasp stripes weren't applied until spring 1960, so there were no black 350hp shunters with wasp stripes. Electrification flashes started to be applied in summer 1960, but were done at depots as well as at overhaul, so the whole fleet acquired them quite quickly. There were a few green locos, both as built and from overhaul, with the old style BR logo as transfers were used up, but again always without wasp stripes; much the same applies to the old style 13xxx numbers. The overhaul period for 350hp shunters seems to have been very variable almost from the outset and, given that livery updates usually resulted from a works visit, it is very difficult to predict without a dated photo which livery any particular loco was in at any one time. It isn't clear whether any Darlington built 350hp shunter initially had red-painted coupling rods as colour photos are rare and it is almost impossible to be certain from b/w photos.

There cannot have been a general rule that gangwayed full brakes received crimson and cream as some MkI gangwayed full brakes were turned out in plain crimson (and others in crimson and cream, of course). IIRC suffixes appeared almost simultaneously with the move of the number from the LH end of the vehicle side (as viewed) to the RH end. I would have expected that by 1955, if not earlier, it would have been unusual to come across a vehicle in service (as opposed to stored) which still had an unsuffixed number at the LH end.

whose principle purpose was to prevent sparks setting fire to the decking of the Liverpool Overhead Railway whose viaducts often ran over the top of dock lines. The locally-based L&Y Pugs had a circular metal plate on a "stick" which could be swung over their funnels and which served the same purpose.

I must admit that, without having looked again at the RCTS photos, I did wonder whether the WIMs (and SLs) were coupled normally within the set. As you say, the RCTS photos show that the WIMs certainly were, and one suspects the SL sets also. The plating over of some toplights was to enable the SOUTHERN RAILWAY legend to be "painted" in its normal position, it certainly still appeared on 1811 in October 1950 and quite possibly until withdrawal.

Southern suburban electric units only had a single central (and quite short) buffer between carriages within the set. One ex-SUB all-steel trailer was converted to a non-powered de-icer vehicle c1960, with the intention of running it between two 4-car sets (in service if necessary, although I only ever saw it being used with the two sets not in service). Apparently the fitment of ordinary buffers plus buck-eye couplings at each end proved so troublesome, and thus expensive, that a continuation programme was cancelled and a number of 2-car self-contained de-icer units converted from otherwise redundant vehicles instead.

CUL1457 and CUL1458 in the RCTS photo collection show 1811 at Wimbledon in October 1950 and show just two non-smoking compartments plus, I think, a Ladies Only compartment next to the van in the other carriage. They also show that the righthand window in each smoking compartment had the (SMOKING) signs etched into the glass. Incidentally, the fact that the SL sets were built by contractors and not by the LBSCR themselves isn't relevant in this particular respect. The LBSCR was an all non-smoking railway with smoking banned not only in trains but on stations as well. In early Southern days, probably when the SL trailers were converted to the 2-WIM units (although I am not sure that that was how they were described until the last few years of their lives), the etched (SMOKING) signs were added to indicate where smoking was permitted and the SR-style NON-SMOKING signs followed soon(?) afterwards (or during WWII?). BR-style NO-SMOKING signs were substituted for the SR-style ones at the first overhaul after nationalisation so a few sets may never have displayed them.

I too found your model of a 2-WIM impressive, significantly helped by the roof colour which certainly matches memories. I did wonder if you had over-provided the designated non-smoking accommodation, which was quite scarce in the early 1950s and which I suspect was limited to the two third-class as built compartments as I think that there may have been a swinging door in the side "corridor" between these two compartments and the five first-class as built ones. I did wonder, too, whether some at least of the smoking compartments might have had the frosted-glass (SMOKING) signs, certainly some of the ex-Brighton SUB sets did.

There is a photo currently for sale on eBay which shows 58047 on a passenger train at Burnham with the three-window arrangement plus an external box under the middle window which had been removed by the time your 1952 photo was taken (and which must have been in position prior to the repainting of the box into GWR colours). This photo must date between May 1950 when 58047 was renumbered from 1303 (LMS) and August 1952 when it was withdrawn (from Highbridge shed). There is a photo in the NRM collection showing the later two-window arrangement and the modified downpipe which is dated 20 September 1958.

The 1952 photo appears to show the box in GWR colours (two shades of stone) so it had probably been repainted just after engineering responsibility (inter alia) passed from the Southern Region to the Western in 1949 (? IIRC). The 1960 photo shows the box in WR colours (chocolate and cream) so it had been repainted again (and necessarily, given the alterations) before responsibility passed back to the Southern in 1958 (? IIRC again - and might this bit have remained WR?). Note that the downpipe had changed between the two photos too.

That would appear to be a non-corridor London area 4-set which, IIRC, were broken up during the war years following the abolition of 1st class on London area suburban trains, but would have still been in their normal formation in 1939. There were 4-sets in the Birmingham area too and it seems possible that they might have worked down as far as Oxford, with the Fairford branch as a fill in turn.

I have shown the minimum signalling for the layout but have since realised that that layout would not have been retained at electrification. If parcels traffic was worked in off-peak, which is certainly possible, the SR would have removed the run-rounds in the platform roads but added a run-round crossover, hand-worked, between the two middle roads, which in turn would have converged before joining no.1 platform road prior to the road over bridge which constrains the layout. This would have resulted in rather different signalling arrangements which would include the access to and from the "berthing siding" alongside the route towards East Croydon (which I had forgotten before). The mid-1950s schemes used both three-lamp feathers and theatre-light route indicators but access to the platforms would have been indicated by the latter - and with only one signalled "small yellow light" route into the middle sidings (a hand lever selecting which siding), the platforms can assume their obvious designations of 1 (north) and 2 (south), which is what theatre-light indicator could display. There are, in effect, calling-on signals because, until the December 1957 box at Cannon Street, the SR used a yellow light to permit access to a partially occupied terminal platform, a green light indicating that the road was clear to the stops. New installations from late-1958 showed a green light for a clear road and a red plus a pair of position lights for calling-on (the initial installations displayed a C in the third aperture on the position light signal but that practice was soon discontinued). SR colour light signals at that period did indeed have pigs ears and they also had long "ARP" hoods, making them very distinctive but raising the possibility that in N and 2FS merely modelling the signals accurately might well be sufficient without actually lighting them. In fact, away from the beam, it was remarkably difficult to see if the real things were lit (which is why the pigs ears were provided for trains drawn up to a signal). I will provide a diagram of what I think the layout and signalling would have been from the 1955 resignalling but I am away for a few days and diagrams take some time to prepare. All the features that I have mentioned can, in fact, be found somewhere on the Gloucester Road and East Croydon box diagrams that I posted in pdf format and which repay study as they represent an interesting period of colour light signalling using Westinghouse miniature lever frames (which, I might add, were an absolute delight to work).

If the crossover is between two sidings (as you say) then it would be worked by hand levers, quite probably a separate lever for each end, and there would be no fixed signals, ground or otherwise. The responsibility for safe working would lie with the shunter if there is one or otherwise the loco/train crew, speeds would be low anyway. The shunter would communicate with the loco/train crew using hand signals as comprehensively described in the Rule Book. If there was a train involved and there was no shunter then the guard would effectively take the role of the shunter, and if there was just a loco involved without a shunter the fireman/secondman would take that role. In some locations it would be necessary to come to understanding with the signalman as to the shunting to be undertaken (for example, if the shunting in progress would prevent the acceptance of an arriving train into a reception road) but in others that was unnecessary.

Having sworn and cursed on more than a few occasions, I eventually developed a method which is relatively simple and works well. Firstly I create the trapezoidal sides of the roof, with adequate support to ensure that they are stable and at the correct angle, but marginally, say 1mm, under length. Then I create the ends in a slightly thicker material, eg 30 thou if the sides were 20 thou, cutting them marginally oversize to start with and then trimming them until they will just pass into the triangular openings at each end, noting that they will probably end up marginally different sizes and thus need orientation markings. I then drill or punch a few holes in each of these ends. Then I cut two triangular pieces of, say, 20 thou which are perhaps 3 mm wider than the marked ends and weld them to these ends, the holes facilitating a good flow of solvent. When properly dry, these are added to the appropriate ends of the roof using plentiful amounts of solvent. Finally when these joints have dried thoroughly the ridges resulting from the oversize lips can be sanded down and one ends up with a nice stable hipped roof.

Down road Three aspect G/Y/R plus miniature aspect Y plus theatre route indicator 4/3/2/1 sited immediately prior to the first crossover encountered. Up road Three aspect G/Y/R sited at exits from platforms 4 and 1. Three miniature aspect G/Y/R sited at exits from sidings 3 and 2 (which would be trapped). Four aspect Y/G/Y/R sited at exit from branch on to up local line. Motor-worked floodlit round red disc sited immediately before crossover facing to trains shunting back into platforms or sidings from the up road (no route indicator). The southernmost platform would be platform 4, then sidings 3 and 2, then platform 1 alongside Katharine Street. The miniature aspect signals are the same as the other signals in general dimensions but have a partially obscured lens. The crossovers near the buffer stops would be worked by a 4-lever ground frame sited between the two sidings, two levers being the (electrical) release from East Croydon box, the other two levers working the actual crossovers, probably mechanically. There would be a shunting bell by the lever frame.