Chubber

There are certainly some chuckles here! My only experience of pet-sitting was to agree to look after a little old lady's budgie when she had to go to hospital, a friendly little bird that would say 'Gip's a lovely boy' and run round his cage dinging his bell. The day of the handover I was given a biscuit tin with his feed in it and a bunch of millet spray on a string. I rested his cage on the tin, got into the lift to go downstairs and moved over to let a lady holding a baby in beside me as the doors closed. The cage slid a little, the bars rested against my face and like a striking peregrine falcon 'Gip' shinned up the side of the cage and, seized the side of my right nostril in his beak. My shout made the baby cry, the blood [gallons of it...] poured out and as Gip flailed away with his wings it went everywhere in a fine mist............ The lady was screaming, and I was shouting things roughly like 'Silly budgie, DO let go!!!!' as we reached the lobby and the doors opened to group of residents waiting for the lift. Gip dropped swiftly to the bottom of the cage and began to run round, dinging his little bell in its orange plastic ball. To this day, the sound of a little bell makes me shiver. Doug

We went to Discovery Cove to swim with dolphins for SWMBOs 60th. As I hate flying and detest 'theme' parks I was not too keen but as it was her special trip I wasn't going to be miserable. Discovery Cove was wonderful! Our dolphin encounter was late in the day, so I had no choice but to 'stick it out' all day BUT it was great. Snorkelling around a reef with 10ft rays and huge coloured fish, feeding shrimps to smaller rays whilst wading in a shallow lake, tropical birds that feed from your hands, 'free' food and beer all day and as we were the last group of six meeting the dolphins, all those who hadn't done a turn came out to play and we petted and rode beside three of them. No rides, no music, absolutely no aggro and admission limited so it wasn't crowded. Though not cheap, the tickets included parking all day and 'return as often as you like' for a week, and similar entry to Busch Gardens and Sea World. We did do Sea World, there it is a theme park, and you paid for parking and all food and drinks. We saw the Sea Lion Show, and performers being thrown high in the air by dolphins, manatees, sea-lions etc. I'm rather proud of the picture below.... Doug PS The Avondale? Next to the Dockyard gate? A chippy next door selling 'Oggie Specials'? D

Geoff is on the button. The machine takes multiple images at finite small intervals. Your rig will have moved 'X' feet during the sequence indicating your speed during tha flashes and the Mercedes will be shown to have moved a greater distance in the same time scale indicating higher speed/later entry to the box. Worry not. Keep on trucking. Doug

Those of you missing the Navy Lark, Goons and Round the Horn will be doubtless pleased to know that they are available on the BBC I-Player radio site. Those, and others were once available on BBC Radio 7, but when BBC Asian Radio was to be cut to save money, all sorts of people objected on all sorts of grounds so Radio 7 got the axe instead, and it has combined with Radio 4 Extra. My favourite there is 'Yes Minister', clever comedy to my simple mind! Doug

I think it depends on your pocket and patience! The inexpensive Dapol figures are made of a nice easy, soapy plastic, ideal for adapting exactly to your own needs, thi may help.....if that's the way you'd like to go. http://www.rmweb.co....__1#entry235970 Doug

For more pubs, see here. http://www.portsmouthpubs.org.uk/ A brilliant site, with modern and archive photographs. The site owners, Richard Collins [pub pictures] and Ray Scarfe [signs] are happy for them to be reproduced as elements for model rail construction [signs, backscenes textures etc ] without restriction, which is very nice but if reproduced on the forum as part of a discussion they should include the attribution 'Copyright R Collins and R Scarfe'. I hope it is of interest to RMWeb members, Doug

I' ve got one here........ http://www.rmweb.co....ntry-pub-model/ and here http://www.rmweb.co....h__1#entry34061 [scroll down......] how the heck do I re-paste pictures in an RMWeb post that I have previously posted inan RMWeb thread????? Doug

This chap http://stores.ebay.co.uk/Handsignalman-LEDs not only got my order to me within a week [good for here in France] but included some extra resistors, free wiring diagrams and 'how-tos' and 10 free red leds. I shall use him again. Doug

May I add my thanks for that info, too, Paul? The grab is very convincing and plenty of scope for 'spilt' coal around there, Dave.

As far as I know they would have to be heated somehow to discharge their content. I did once find it in a web topic but despite lots of searching can not find it again. I remember it saying that either train steam could be used or an auxiliary boiler at the point of unloading and there was a photo of a smallish [10ft high with chimney] boiler with wooden slats for insulation like a vertical boiler from a steam lorry [sentinel?]. A lot of 'Tar' wagons I don't suppose actually contained tar, but carried creosote, and a tar/oil mixture that was sprayed to make macadam so they may not have been heated. Every now and again I have another trawl, if I find it you'll be the first to know. Doug

It certainly has all the solid looks of the original, Dave. I wonder if it was 'D' shaped in order to have easily supported heating coils inside on the flat bottom plates? Is there any information on how the tar was heated to become liquefied enough to be discharged? Doug

You plastic enthusiasts get quite worked up over slates, but, forgive me for presuming that this below is what you want to achieve.............. By all means use plastic [for the flat layer] onto which you stick overlapping strips of thick cartridge paper [for O gauge] or 90gm ms quality writing paper [for OO gauge] using MEK applied witha bruh at the upper edge of the paper. Then attack them with a thick knife blade like a Stanley knife, wash over with watercolour/dilute acrylic and that's it. If you progress up the roof, using an old plastic ruler as a 'guard' for each successive higher layer, you can fairly belt along. Afterwards, a coat of matt varnish. I think Cap'n Kernow uses something like this method on his lovely work, but paper on card. Beware modern slates roofs, the slates are thinner than you think [or at least than I thought!]....from the WSR I appreciate that it is not 'individual slates' but it looks pretty convincing [iMHO] and might be worth a little trial run on a scrap bit somewhere....... Hope this helps, [Apologies for semi-hijack] Doug

Mr Rusty, How appropriate, I have posted elsewhere asking if anyone had any links/pictures to unloading asphalt/tar at a small yard, i.e. heating boilers vs loco steam etc! 'Watching with interest' as these forum chappies say......... Doug

A triple-bypass gravy strainer? Nope? You've got me floxed, thought about Nissen hut too.... Doug

Luffly! [minor, well intentioned critique, wouldn't there be a bit of spilt stuff splashed around?] Doug

The tank could be serviced by an imaginary pipe under the track, rising to a valved connector anywhere in reasonable reach of the road, couldn't it? Just thinking.... Doug

Trevor, given that you could scan, copy and resize/paste elements like the windows and the doors, or use some from texture sites it shouldn't be too difficult to do a very low relief model using John's dressed stone, for the colour you could alter the hue on your printer, too. The office block below is just 1/8" thick, window photographs pasted onto cream brick paper and a stretched roof line photograph. Hope it gives you an idea, Doug

Thanks, Tim, you've got the look just right! Doug [Apologies for tardy response...]

Looking very good, any details on the canopy construction, Tim? That really does set it off and adds a lot of credibility to the building, I'd like some like that on one of my projects. Doug

cactustrain Cactustrain, that is the poodles doodles........ Doug

Welsh warehouse

I can't do trains, [or stations like the ones shown above...] but are little buildings allowed? I still think Pugley's 08 on page ! takes some beating........ Doug

As a scratch-builder I'd like some 'planks of wood joined together' to make fences, wooden door carcases, crates, in narrow and wide configurations, perhaps regular 6" boards, some random width boards, wagon floors etc. Anyone else like this idea? Or some generally 'woody' sheets! Doug

Hi, Perhaps Martin hasn't come back to this thread and you are still waiting, if so, below is a drawing of my connections [for SEEP but the idea is the same], briefly the switches on one motor change the frog polarity for the opposite end of the slip, once that is in your head you are half-way there. I have also connected my track feeds at A and B. Hope this helps, Doug