Dan Hamblin

L150 has arrived at Avon Valley Railway https://twitter.com/AVRbitton/status/504977471230730240

Ah, apologies, I thought Bluebell had it for the rest of the year! I must have got that wrong.

Regards,

Dan

I could hook mine up to a Devon Belle observation car

Regards,

Dan

L150 should be going back to Sheffield Park for the rest of the year.

Regards,

Dan

I've run in 4994 now and tested it with a load (23 wagons and 6 Gresley suburban coaches) around my small layout, so it straddles two sets of second radius curves on the inner loop. Performance is excellent, nice smooth control, and the wheels don't appear to slip at all.

Now for a 'what if' - 47994 survived into preservation, kitted out with air brakes and all the other equipment for main line running in the 21st century. Occasional use by one of the freight operating companies on heavy infrastructure and container trains...

Regards,

Dan

Just given my 4994 a quick run before the weekend, lovely model. Very mesmeric watching it going around the layout and smooth over pointwork. Same problem with loose filler cap, but a blob of blu-tack should fix it.

Well done Heljan and Hattons

Regards,

Dan

I think all off us that have Garratts on order are hoping this is a 'Friday afternoon job' that slipped through the QC net. You have my sympathies R-O, as the model is clearly high in potential but let down by the defects. Hopefully Hattons and Heljan can resolve it soon for you.

Regards,

Dan

I had two holes on the tender brake rigging of my 9003 that took a bit of work to push the studded ends into, I think the hole had a bit of mould flashing in it. You have to be a bit careful when handling the tender not to damage the two stanchions for mounting a storm sheet.

Regards,

Dan

Shades of 2006 at Sheffield Park (camera wasn't playing ball on focus and depth of field...):

Someone mentioned different shades of green?

Regards,

Dan

That was reported in latest issue of Steam Railway, would be good if they can pull it off. Also that they were looking into the possibility of transferring the Chesham set to London by rail now the East Grinstead link is open, but usual caveats apply.

Regards,

Dan

It's certainly a lovely model - I've just been running 9003 double heading with 3440 (shades of Bluebell Railway Giants of Steam Gala 2006). I didn't appreciate just how much bigger a City was compared with the Dukedog. First time I've tried consisting under DCC as well.

Kind regards,

Dan

Spotted this in May 2012 whilst out on a test train near Acton Town:

Regards,

Dan

Yep, Schweerbau Rail Grinding Unit (RGU). The fans are to remove diesel fumes and heat, I believe to improve reliability and working conditions.

Regards,

Dan

Don't forget that one of the reasons for building a replica of a H2, as opposed to any other ex-LBSC class, was that the NRM has a virtually complete set of drawings. That should give Bachmann eveything they need to check against.

Excellent news regarding the model announcement, hopefully it will raise the profile of the Atlanic Group that little bit more.

Regards,

Dan

Sarah Siddons is actually providing translation between vacuum brake on the steam loco and air brakes on the rest of the train, plus providing some power as well.

Regards,

Dan

Might be last chance to sample 38TS on the Northern Line - Finchley Central to High Barnet is already converted to TBTC signalling (migration boundary is at West Finchley), next section will force any tripcock only trains to turn back at Archway.

Regards,

Dan

http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawkeye2011/8276000491/lightbox/

Not my photos I hasten to add, but thanks to user 'dennis' over at District Dave Forum for the link.

Regards,

Dan

Ahhhh, the firebox work! I couldn't remember what the event was that preceded the change back to black backgrounds, thought it was during the winter maintenance period. Thanks for the correction.

Regards,

Dan

70000 carries the original handrails to this day, but 70013 has the revised ones. I'm afraid I don't know exactly when it gained them. Until recently it also had one red and one black-backed nameplate - both are now black!

70000 actually received the round cut outs during BR service. When the smoke deflectors became life expired around 1995 / 1996 they were replaced with the original handrail type

I think 70013 had the two different nameplate background colours during 2009 only.

Regards,

Dan

Bought 7029 Clun Castle from The Signal Box in their sale - lovely model and a pretty decent set of DCC sounds as well. Had to do a bit of fettling to the tender electrical pick ups as they sometimes stopped the wheels from turning, but other than that there were no problems.

Regards,

Dan

Any hint at when the LNER livery versions will arrive in the shops? Would look pretty good behind my Bachmann J72.

Regards,

Dan

Although the coaches are superb quality I would recommend beefing up the coupling mechanism on the Bachmann Mk1's because the GAM ones are very heavy, being made of brass. I snapped off a Hornby Pullman coupler towing their Devon Belle car on the back of my Pullman rake! The GAM products are superb quality though, so well worth that little bit of extra effort.

Regards,

Dan

I recall from one of the books on Mallard that Sir Nigel Gresley thought that higher speeds were possible and another run had to be abandoned because of WW2. Even 4468's driver that day thought 130mph was possible.

Regards,

Dan

No need to pack the rear screws - they already had two thin clear plastic washers on them (from memory).

I can't remember now which side I put the spacer! It definitiely had to go one side because of the position of the lugs. I will get around to re-fitting the cab gauges etc. but they might require some thinning down as it definitely seemed like there was less space in there than before.

I agree that there are a few more gaps that have opened up, but the overall effect is much better and hopefully when running on the clubs exhibition layout they won't be as noticeable.

This is definitely the ready to run model which has required the most work despite being brand new. Mechanically though it is sound.

Regards,

Dan

Spaces were a bit of a bodge made out of some spare sections of plastic cut to size using a craft knife. They worked so well that I decided to leave them in there.

I've been thinking a bit more and remembered the conclusion I came to when I found out what the problem was. The cab backhead, being cast metal, does not flex. Combined with a slightly assymetrical shape and a lack of support for the footplate means that tightening the securing screws and thus closing the gap at the front forces the back of the footplate downwards. This creates the bent footplate.

It should be easily fixable by making the plastic lugs on the cab structure thicker I think.

Regards,

Dan

No problem, but I haven't got time to edit the photos at the moment and add captions so these are straight off the camera!

As delivered. Bent footplate clearly evident.

First bit of the stripdown - body off and cab plus backhead sections removed. Note the raised metal platform with two holes. The screws holding the backhead and cab structure to the footplate go up through these holes.

Cab on its own. You can just about see the lug I refer to on the drivers side in the shadow. I removed a bit of excess plastic from the front of the cab as well as I experimented with different methods for repairing the bent footplate. I also had to file off the back of the handrail stanchions as they were pushing the cab sides outwards.

Backhead and cab. You can see that some material has already been filed off to make it fit, presumably on the production line as that is what it looked like after I disassembled it. The seats and most stuff along the top of the backhead is still off of my model, principally because I haven't had the chance yet to refit it!

Cab backhead loosely refitted to show the relationship between it and the footplate (the latter bent back to the correct form). The fallplate has not been added, but sits in the thin slot above that for the drawbar. See the gap at the front of the backhead between the bottom section and the footplate? This is where the cab structure lugs go and with space remaining the overall design means that screwing the screws tight into the backhead pulls the whole strucutre downwards at the back. Bit counterintuitive as you would expect the front to go down first.

Reassembled. Not perfect by any means - compared with the original look there is now a small gap between the cab front and firebox cladding, but I would rather have the straight footplate.

Comparison with the tender.

Hope this helps.

Regards,

Dan