dibber25

17 hours ago, Trainshed Terry said:

 

Did you receive an email from Rails to pay the balance of the order.

 

Terry.

No, nothing from RAILS, just a notification from bank that a payment had been taken.

My account has been debited and that's the only thing I have on order from RAILS. (CJL)

I think the above is pretty ruthless dismantling of at least half a century of 'OO' layout building by some hundreds of modellers. There's really just two types of GWR branchline layouts - the slavishly accurate representations of a particular place at a particular moment in its railway history and the fantasy layouts that don't claim to be anything else other than how someone dreams a place that he dreamt up might have been. Neither is more valid than the other and something is only 'inappropriate' if its on a layout that is claimed to be an accurate representation of a real place and really shouldn't be. The WR branch line terminus has been my first love since I 'discovered' Fairford closed and derelict in the early 1960s but it was the fictitious GWRBLTs that first attracted me to model WR branch lines, (K's 14XX + auto trailer AND diesel railcar. And yes, Fairford, Tetbury, Staines all had the goods shed/cattle dock/engine shed/coaling stage/water tower etc just as described as did lots of others- true Fairford's loop wasn't in the station platform and it also had a turntable.  (CJL)

On 30/09/2019 at 20:37, rovex said:

I think it depends on the branch line. Some branches for example St Ives would get coaches off the Paddington train which would be worked down the branch. Some would have a dedicated coach which simply shuttled down the branch to the junction or major station. I think Watlington branch would be an example of that. Others would have whole trains that came from a major terminus -the Windsor branch would I expect be an example of this.

 

I've seen somewhere I think it was the three volume series on modelling GWR branches that showed the workings for an autocoach service. Which started on one branch then up another before travelling along a third.

 

However I expect that you have in mind the typical bucolic branch line most of us GWR types model. Depending on era then I expect you would probably see a cascaded down old corridor coach or ex slip coach shuttling back and forth 

Rovex

But St.Ives only had one through Paddington train - at least in BR times - it was only only on summer Saturdays and was in fact the whole CRE apart from a couple of through coaches that went on to Penzance. The rest of the time the branch had its own non-corridor stock, trains being strengthened at peak times with extra coaches but simply running back and forth to the main line. Unlike the SR with its through coaches to branch termini , the Western ran comparatively few through trains to minor branch lines and passengers changed trains at the junction station. Windsor & Eton Central had only one through Paddington train in the morning and evening peaks, as, I believe did Henley on Thames although Henley may have had one or two workings through to Reading General. (CJL)

14 hours ago, Pannier Tank said:

 

Chris, take a look at your post on the previous page.

 

 

 

Yes, old age - memory isn't what it was. (CJL)

On 23/01/2011 at 13:03, The Stationmaster said:

 

The traincrew for the filming were Westbury men. I don't know who the Driver was but the Fireman was 'Moocher' Green - who later became a Driver at Westbury - and is fairly clearly visible in one of the shots of 'Lion' working the Inspector's train, albeit he's dressed up to look like the Bishop.

 

Way back, in Steam World - probably 1990s, I interviewed the driver who brought Lion from Westbury every day. Afraid to say I can't remember his name but Simon Carstens knows who it was and has noted it elsewhere on RMweb on one of the many threads relating to this movie. The digitally enhanced version now available on Prime is well worth a look. (CJL)

5 hours ago, Willoughby Glen said:

But doesn't that contradict what a review is.  In any field a review is carried out of the item you have purchased straight out of the box, not of the replacement.  If it was of a replacement and we found out after the review that they had swapped it, would we not then loose confidence in the reviewer, especially if we bought it and then found the faults seen with the first one.

As I mentioned in an earlier thread these from a distance look fab, its just let down by the issues with the front bow and more importantly the issue that it cant pull prototypical length formations.

 

A genuine reviewer will want to give a product a favourable review if it is possible to do so. If one gets an apparent 'dud' (and it does happen from time to time) then I would expect to contact the supplier for a replacement. The review would then be a distillation of the two models, pointing out that there were issues with one (hopefully not both) of them. (CJL)

On 08/08/2021 at 23:11, St Enodoc said:

I've still got some carriage nameboards somewhere!

We did fold-out cards of both carriage roof boards and a huge array of signs and posters more recently in Model Rail. I don't have the dates of the issues concerned, though I did keep a couple of the sheets for my own use. I guess they were about 15 years ago. They were much more comprehensive than the MRC ones (although I'll readily admit that I copied the idea) and it took me ages to compile enough to fill the sheet. They were mainly 'OO' but there were some 'N' and 'O' examples, too. (CJL)

8 minutes ago, Phil Parker said:

 

Not sure where you got that from. The plan had to been to allow 750 in for a morning and slightly less for the afternoon session. There were tickets left for both, so in the end they abandoned the two different sessions and let everyone in all day. There was plenty of space and a pleasant time was had by all - but the crowd was less than 10% of a Warley. OK, the NEC is two days as opposed to one for the NGRS, but they are different beasts.

And the Peterborough Arena has just won a major award for the best venue over 8,000sq.m for its Covid-related management of events. The garden railway show was a well-handled, well-spaced event but you're right PA isn't the NEC and the Garden Rail show is very different from Warley. It does give hope, though, that the right event in the right venue can work in spite of Covid. (CJL)

Scale drawings (we shouldn't have called them 'plans') have always been a problem as far as I was concerned as an Editor. Firstly, you need a reliable, accurate, draughtsman to produce the drawing. Sad to say, many of them weren't. The notable exception were those from Paul Bartlett and his colleagues, which were always reliable. I had a drawer in my office, full of 'plans'. Some had been there for many years. They included the originals of the Roche drawings, all of which had been published in books, and the originals of the Bulleid coach drawings which subsequently appeared in a book. The Bulleid coaches were drawn on a type of film which was disintegrating with age and they were literally crumbling to dust. There were lots of others, on paper, that could have been used in MRC but their accuracy was in doubt. Occasionally I would publish one, only to have its accuracy shot down in flames by knowledgable readers, the moment it appeared in print. I recall some drawings of the Liverpool Overhead Railway stock. I particularly wanted to publish them but a quick look at some photographs showed obvious discrepancies. I don't think I ever used them. So, one came to rely on newer contributors whose work was known to be reliable. But, the budget never allowed for them to be paid the commercial value of their work. Basically, they had to have done the drawing for their own benefit and to be willing to accept whatever the mag could afford to pay for a one-off use. Of course, if the drawing had been commissioned and the copyright was owned, it could be repeated as many times as one wished. In the case of Model Rail's original fold-out drawings, they were part of the launch strategy and they were all by the late R.S. Carter, whose family had agreed to their use. We used most everything that was available but when the stock of drawings ran out, the fold-outs were dropped as commissioning new drawings was prohibitively expensive and willing, accurate, draughtsmen with the right research material were difficult to find. I hope this provides  a bit of useful background. Editors seldom do things on a whim and there are good reasons why few drawings are now published - not least the fact that there are fewer and fewer scratch-builders who need them. I do still have a book of Midland Railway wagon drawings (GAs) that I acquired somewhere along the way. I've never published any because they don't carry enough detail for modelling use. I built one of my only two scratch-built locos based on a magazine drawing (not naming the mag or the draughtsman) but it was lucky I noticed that the drawn cab-door cut-out was the wrong shape before I started filing brass! (CJL)

On 14/03/2019 at 11:35, Godfrey Glyn said:

MRC wasn't the first model railway magazine I bought, having spent my teenage years in south Somerset, Peco and the Railway Modeller (then based in Harbour Road Seaton) was my first introduction to the hobby. However I soon started buying MRC and during several house moves they were the ones I saved, largely for the ideas and the regular supply of prototype drawings. Thanks Chris, I owe you a lot and I suspect many other modellers here do too.

 

all the best

 

Godfrey

Thanks to everyone for your kind comments. A lot has happened since the end of MRC - the original 1963 team are all still around but its sad that Steve Stratten passed away some years ago - he was 90-something, though. The 1963 team - David Percival, Alan Williams and Colin Gifford, and me, last got together way back when Colin's postage stamps were launched but I've corresponded with David since then in connection with Steam World. My Black Dog Halt layout, which I was building in the final issues of MRC is now, in truncated form, in Chippenham Museum, I believe. I tend to think of Model Rail as a continuation of MRC as I was able to do with MR many of the things I couldn't do with MRC. Times do move on, though, and sadly things like scale drawings are no longer practical in a monthly mag. In the meantime I've just built a OO9 circuit so I can test an L&B loco and complete a model of Bratton Fleming station. Who ever thought we'd see ready-to-run L&B locos and kits for L&B buildings? (CJL)

This was taken quite a few years ago and I wasn't quite sure where I was so I'll caption it as what I think it is. A brace of Southern Railway of BC (Washington Group) switchers (SW900s?) head a long train of triple-deck auto-racks over the bridge to Annacis Island (over the Fraser?). From memory they approached across the street but I missed that shot due to having to change the camera battery at the wrong moment. (CJL)

1 hour ago, hmrspaul said:

Irrespective of Chris Leigh's concern over the cost of producing plastic injection moulded wagons I think the most surprising aspect is that there is a 7mm product, produced in just this way and only pence more expensive. Have BR and post privatisation modellers so overtaken the 4mm hobby that an injection moulded version isn't viable? I agree with Nick Holliday, the finish might be suitable for reproduction of a wooden bodied wagon, but to capture the appearance of these vans a very plain finish is necessary. 

 

As to condemnation details they will be in the tomes of GWR Stock register at the NRM. 

 

Interesting to be reminded of the dispute about 64 and 32nds of an inch back in 2014.

 

Paul Bartlett

 

 

I don't think I said that an injection moulded model wouldn't be viable but if I did, that's not what I meant to say. Anything can be viable if you can get enough people to buy enough at a high enough price. That, I suspect is largely why most wagon models are now being sold in multi-packs - in order to squeeze a bit more margin. Tooling costs are now VERY high but there are ways they can be justified. A couple of years ago Rapido said that making freightcars was no longer viable due to manufacturing costs. However, later, they found that freightcars were a useful item to manufacture in the gaps between locos, when assembly lines would otherwise be idle. Costs have also been pushed up by the need to make a new chassis for virtually every model in order to satisfy the requirement for accurate detail for every variation. I wonder who will make the most from their model - a precise Iron Mink to 21st century standards with every detail spot-on, or the Hornby-Dublo/Wrenn/Dapol dynasty that put GWR gunpowder van bodies on a generic chassis, pretended they were Iron Minks and made them in every known livery and a few invented ones? (CJL)

On 11/06/2021 at 12:04, The Stationmaster said:

Yes - it was part of some wheel/rail interface testing programme according to various sources and that is why the bodywork was modified due to teh way test programmes were conducted using one of the bogies as the test area.

 

I'm more inclined to describe the rust in the bottom curved part of the bodywork as rot as it looks as it you could give it a poke and watch it fall to pieces in front of you.  So  far more serious than ordinary rust although it could no doubt be repaired with new panels - at a price.  Whether the loco could ever be made workable as a gas turbine is a very open question as it's far from clear what changes were made inside and above the bogie at the end where the fairing was provided.   So it might involve major interior body alteration in order to accommodate re-powering.  and obviously there would be the turbine itself plus all the associated systems to find and install.  A certain Mr Dyson has an original Whittle turbine and it has been restored to full working order so at least one exists but it needs an awful lot more than a replacement Whittle turbine to recreate 18000 as a working gas turbine loco - even if Mt Dyson is prepared to donate his.

Having been inside it, there is nothing whatever inside the body - it could be made into quite a nice meeting room! The worst of the rust or rot, as might be expected, is in the lower sides and the rounded bottom 'edge' has largely disappeared and would need complete replacement with new steel formed to shape. I'm afraid it reminds my of my 1960 Hillman Minx - Rootes Rot - from which there was no recovery. But 18000 was made from rather thicker metal. I'm afraid, unless someone comes along with cash and manpower 18000 will quietly rust away. (CJL)

40 minutes ago, Compound2632 said:

 

What quantity would you have done, by what production method, and at what price? And how would you raise the capital? As you've been involved in a number of magazine commissions, you probably have a more authoritative insight into the economics than the vast majority of other commenters here.

In the end, you can only go on gut feeling and what the economics dictate. As I haven't undertaken a four-wheel van project I can't answer your questions but tooling and production costs for rolling stock are very high at present and that makes the 3D print process an attractive option. 

On 22/07/2021 at 21:44, The Stationmaster said:

I can't give the exact numbers (I wonder if the original HMRS booklet quotes any 0 can't lay hands on my copy at the moment) but in BR days there were very few in traffic use and I doubt they lasted beyond the mid '50s (if that late) although i have seen a secondary source stating 1956.

 

However they were around in goods yards being used for storage of paperwork much later and still carrying traffic numbers  - I saw them at various places in the late 1960s including at least one painted in faded departmental black livery.  But any around that late probably had turned a wheel for quite a long tme.

I photographed one in Kidderminster yard - approximately where the SVR ticket hall now is - in 1966 or 1967. From memory it had no markings on it and obviously hadn't moved for a very long time. If I can find the photo, I'll scan it. I wouldn't have done this as a limited production. Should sell like hot cakes and a much better bet than the (similar) gunpowder van, in my view. (CJL)

Of course, there was the 'incident' in which the Class 33-hauled Fawley-Bromford Bridge was bisected by an LMR '8F' coming off Didcot shed. (CJL)

On 29/06/2021 at 21:25, billtee said:

Thank you, everyone! Obviously COLOUR photos from the early days of the BR days of DMU interiors are extremely rare.

I think I will have to visit a heritage railway which just happens to have a DMU (class 121 or 122!) in my favoured green (with whiskers) livery. I am not needing photos of the external liveries because there are plenty of photos available, but interiors are much more difficult to find.

My O gauge model will be as detailed as I can possibly get it, which is why I have asked for help from the huge and very keen railway modelling crowd.

Anyway, thank you all again?

Bill

I don't know of a preserved 121 or 117 in anything like original (or restored original) condition, particularly inside. They were refurbished - extensively - and pretty much everything inside got changed or painted over. The 122 at Buckfastleigh has, probably, the best external restoration, as all the later stuff, high-intensity lights etc has been removed. I don't know what its like inside. However, most preserved railways opt to retain the later fittings and work the old-style liveries around them. (CJL)

On 28/06/2021 at 15:15, Mike_Walker said:

The Railcar website https://www.railcar.co.uk/ contains a wealth of detail and photos.

 

The early ones are mostly B&W but the descriptions should suffice.  The 121s started with wood effect Formica panelling and darker wood for the window surrounds.  The seats were moquette which I recall was dark red set off by tan Rexine on the headrests and seat dividers.  The floors were green linoleum.  The driver's desk was black and the seat green.

 

Yes, that's pretty much how I remember them. Terracotta lino on the floor? Big dark green Loudaphone mounted on the side of the driver's seat. I think it got moved or removed later. (CJL)

On 27/06/2021 at 15:40, Dzine said:

Hi John, Fantastic, the books give a great insight into what was happening at the time and they look fab too.  Just for my own interest, do you, or anyone else reading this post know who did the cover artwork?  Kind regards Paul

They were done by A.N. Wostenholme, who did a lot of work for BR at the time. I had some of his original artwork in a plans chest in my office at one time. There's a fabulous colour poster of all the 'new' BR locos in the 1950s - the Standards plus the gas turbines, 10000 etc which he also did. A personal favourite is the AC railbus he did for the Tetbury/Cirencester branch posters and flyers.

The BSK weighs 830gm. I weighed one recently for a review. (CJL)

Would be nice to have a ready-to-run 0-6-0 tender loco of some sort. Wasn't it the most common wheel arrangement in the UK? (CJL)

13 hours ago, SamThomas said:

My post on Saturday @ 13:17 explained it, in a nutshell.

 

You will find that other outfits that import/distribute/wholesale to the trade that also have retail outlets operate in the same sort of fashion.

Exactly! Unfortunately there's none so blind as those who WILL NOT see.

That is awful. A while since I've been there and scarcely recognisable. Looks like the public footpath beside the railway south of the crossing has been obliterated. Those new-build apartments are on what was a used car lot. North of the crossing I guess the Heathrow fuel sidings have been disused throughout the pandemic as there won't have been many flights. I think the fuel trains only supplemented what went in via pipeline anyway. Here's a couple of Colnbrook shots to enjoy. The Colas 60 is assembling the empty tanks and was taken about 4 years ago from the A4 Bath Road bridge. The cab view was from an up train held at the signal, I think, to await crossing the down working of the morning through train to Paddington. (CJL)

Had some slides scanned recently and couldn't resist posting this one, taken at Lillooet on the British Columbia Railway in 1981. The chop-nosed Alco and single passenger car formed the morning school train for indigenous children from Seton Portage. They would return home on the southbound regular passenger train. The coach (heated by a log-burner which w3asn't necessary in the 95deg heat when I was there) was named Budd Wiser, a gentle poke at the line's regular passenger RDCs. (CJL)