rockershovel

I would expect that the reason British builders didn’t take to the Norris type, was that its principal advantage - the ability to cope with poor, lightweight track - was of little advantage in the U.K. 

British tracklaying and permanent way practices seem to have been quite high from the outset. High population density, short distances and an established culture of foundry work and engineering canals seem to have carried over into the nascent rail sector. American lines needed to cope with long distances, shortages of labour and engineering materials of all descriptions, and did what they needed to do to cope with that situation. 

12 hours ago, Ian Simpson said:

I'm not sure how Norris managed to get enough weight on the bogie. But I've just read something moderately interesting about the way he distributed weight between the different wheelsets. He arranged the connecting bar between the loco and the tender at an angle, so that it rose upwards towards the loco end. This created a downwards pull at the back of the loco, putting extra weight on the driving wheels. (From P J Long and Rev W V Awdry's 1987 book The Birmingham and Gloucester Railway.) 

I would have thought that having the weight of the bogie itself, the front of the boiler, smokebox, cylinders and valve chests would do the trick... the piece about the angled drawbar tends to suggest that given the low overall weights and slow speeds, the 4-2-0 type would stand all the weight that could be brought to bear, and pretty much look after its own weight distribution..

So the Plymouth job came to a sudden end! I shan’t miss it, or the place itself. It leaves me with various issues to resolve but on the whole I’m not too troubled.

I’m reverting to my earlier role of Project Engineer for various specialised, niche drilling works.

This is a nominal demotion, but as a contractor approaching at least, semi-retirement I’ve long since ceased to concern myself with such things. The money is much the same, the location is better (in the sense of being close to home) and I have the various details at my fingertips. I might even get some time off, which I definitely feel the need of. 

Press on!

Well, one of the last two posts is incorrect... Network Rail does, indeed show waiting rooms on 5/7 and 13/15, no mention of anything on 3

https://cdn.networkrail.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/Bristol-Temple-Meads-Station-Map.pdf

Both were already crowded at 18:00. Neither had information screens, neither was the platform I expected my late-running XC train to appear at. To add to the problem, the cafe on 5 closed about 18:30....

Can’t say I noticed the “finger trap risk” , nor did I venture into First Class, but I did notice that the seats were the same sort of “good for 2 hrs max” that a lot of modern train designs (and aircraft) seem to have. Certainly a quick trawl around the Internet reveals various criticisms. 

But the set was the full length, on time, and appeared to have been cleaned since entering service, so they were ahead of XC on all counts...

I’ve seen several references to The American type 4-4-0 being directly derived from the Norris type 4-2-0. The Norris isn’t really much like the Crampton at all, with its leading bogie, firebox behind the driving axle and internal bar frames. 

I find that Bury locomotives also had bar frames, but their internal cylinders were never an American design feature - I’m not surprised that Bury’s case for patent infringement failed in the courts. 

Interesting stuff! 

Particulsrly interesting that the Lickey Incline was a problem even at that early stage..

The film is essentially a somewhat simplified and condensed account of their successive tours of U.K. and Ireland between 1947 and 1954, which were attended by numerous public appearances to publicise them and boost ticket sales.

Steve Coogan is a very convincing Stan Laurel, the Oliver Hardy part is pretty good too. The personal side, I can’t comment on the accuracy (although it is clearly very compressed) although the feuding between the wives is well known. It’s a fun film for a rainy day.

Six months on and I’m now on another project in Plymouth, bored, stressed and fed up. I’ve also been reminded of the various hidden out-of-pocket costs surrounding contract work in the civils sector... not happy..

It’s not that simple, though. I usually reckoned that Cathay Pacific or Korean Air were top flight airlines, but Indonesian Airways are pretty poor. Indonesia has a very large “budget airline” sector, and I think that rubs off on the national carriers. Emirates, another favourite of mine, don’t use Asian cabin staff, and seem to be the employer of choice for Australian staff in the NH, and THEIR service is well regarded.

I’ve seen a fair amount of U.K. hotels over the past couple of years, and my heart sinks a little (or my expectations do, at least) when I see East European staff. The FSU countries are not places associated with high standards of hotel keeping, and East European staff seem to me to be willing enough, doubtless pretty poorly paid, but all too often, lacking sufficient idea of their actual role to be effective.

You can cut costs so far, and then you cross a threshold where the quality is undercut and cuts actually damage the business. This unfortunately tends to go together with the development over time, of a management who don’t know any other way.

Does it? Got it in one, anyway...

Finished yesterday. The project isn’t quite finished, I could have had a few more weeks out of it but I had an offer of a long run of work elsewhere which I couldn’t really turn down - one of those instances of taking a quick decision based on limited information and background experience...

Interesting work though, definitely something to keep in mind for future reference

Surely “Paul Bunyan”?

That wasn’t really my point... Reg Varney? On The Buses? It’s AWFUL!

Come to that, how did he escape being hounded from the screen by the likes of Ben Elton, as Benny Hill was? I suppose his star had already set...

Twelve months on, the last houseful has departed and the Christmas cooking frenzy is over... we’ve all bitten our tongues (to varying extents) at the continuous repetition of Cliff Richards’ saccharine warblings from the kitchen... my daughter finally swapped the “choral music” iPod back in while her mother wasn’t looking!

I swear she’s even deafer than me.

My good wife has taken to making curries as part of her ongoing diet regime. Mostly they are quite successful.

Twelve months on and its that time of year again...

I see there are a batch of MMI locos on the NG newsletter. Must chase mine up..

After much to and fro, the railway job now appears to be GO for Monday. So, I'm only 2 weeks money out of pocket, for reasons I care nothing about and have no input into, and appear to be more a matter of opinion than fact in any case.

..... and some people wonder why I tend to show a countenance of ill-tempered cynicism and disgust to the world at large....

More "contract work follies"... the Pipeline job reached the point of booking flights, before someone realised that essential consents were not in place, and had been rejected... so THAT one is on the back burner again... still, I've reached the final stage of the selection procedure with a recruiter I wasn't previously known to, so press on...

The railway job has stalled amid the sort of contractual issues that sometimes occurs between purchasers and contract directors, which I have no input into and can't influence. A possible solution is to re-route the job through an established recruiter, although this isn't as easy as it sounds, for various reasons. Ho hum, press on..

Love the whole model, really captures the prototype right down to the bog-mat under one track.

.... so I played a finesse, and found a Victoria Woods Christmas Special, stopped the crooning AND the snoring...

Thanks for that.

Modelling has been a distraction, but my working life has been too much of an "immersive experience" for anything else to succeed, with the exceptions of my long-standing interest in motorcycle racing - probably because that is also a pretty all-or-nothing sort of venture - and my much-travelled tenor banjo.

DCC was (still is) a new direction, and I didn't (STILL mostly don't) have the background knowledge to fill in gaps and provide working assumptions until I can improve my general knowledge of the subject.

Manuals and procedures which can land you in court (and ANY manual or procedure in an industrial context is one of these) are very different from hobby manuals. They MUST work, for one thing.

I actually learnt more useful detail about DCC in about fifteen minutes at Peterborough, than in many hundreds of words of forum Q&A or talking to club members who has embarked upon specific courses for reasons of their own. The club has lately acquired a new member who understands the subject and doesn't subscribe to the existing club orthodoxy on the subject, insofar as there is one, so I'm waiting to see what the New Year brings..