RJS1977

One other aspect of loco shed layouts - from an exhibition manager's point of view: I know someone who has a quite well-known O gauge loco shed layout, which I invited to my show a few years ago. Unfortunately the layout had to be uninvited when I discovered that the insurance value of the stock was more than the rest of the show put together and would have increased the premium too much!

Interestingly that doesn't really look much like a station master's house - it has no discernible "railway style" to it and looks just like an "ordinary house". Though I must say that until I read this, I wasn't aware of its existence, nor of the public footpath that runs alongside it to Silly Bridge and beyond.

That doesn't surprise me - Michael did (I think) all his own stunts for SMDAE - including the 2016 Comic Relief episode. I understand that some time after the series finished he was in an (unrelated) stage show which also required him to do live stunts.

Clearly not a genuine AHB as there are no wig-wag lights. They must have got about a bit filming that episode as the "driving test" sequence also includes Kingsferry Bridge and Sheerness jetty!

Spotted this going across a level crossing in Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em earlier this evening - but what is it?

It's not currently shown amongst the layouts on the DRC website, so it may have been moved on. I hope that if that is the case, the new owner has reunited the two halves as they had been somewhat unsymapthetically split owing to space constraints at DRC. Of course, another layout it would be nice to see back at shows occasionally, say Ally Pally and Warley.

I think for an exhibition layout, a continuous layout has the advantage of in theory being able to keep things moving (unless the operators spend more time discussing what to send next/trying to find it on their handsets than running the trains). However I think the best layout I've seen for "keeping things moving" was the Norwich layout at Warley 2019 which had a high level terminus with a low level goods yard meaning there was always movement going on somewhere. The downside is that it needed 4 operators!

Of course, being home-based layouts, they're not for display so there's no reason for the builder to scenic them (or they may intend to but just not have got round to that bit yet). The question of access is also relevent. ISTR one of CJF's plans with a lift-off village over the fiddle yard where he said that "If you're running an intensive service, you don't have time to look aat pretty buildings."

I notice from this link that the layout is still a terminus for passenger workings, but through goods workings can also take place. The layout is also still available for exhibitions in its original form. Personally I agree with TBG that I'm not a big fan of roundy layouts where most of the circuit is offstage as the trains spend longer moving off-stage than on!

I could imagine Eric going up to the Modelu stand: "If you want me to be a goner. Make me a model of Des O'Connor!"

Of course, had it been in Metropolitan colours rather than District, it could well have found its way to Buckingham via Quainton Road.

I think as far as the GW electrification was concerned, bi-mode had always been part of the plan, if not to the extent that it ended up being. In order to have gone over to 100% electric units on the GWR, electrification to Penzance (via Newbury as well as vis Bristol), Swansea (maybe even Carmarthen or even Pembroke Dock), Cheltenham, and Hereford would have been required. Additionally, unless they were going to have a strategic fleet of diesel locos to assist in the event of closures of the main routes (whether planned, or otherwise), then most of the diversionary routes would require electrification as well, including Swansea District Line, Vale of Glamorgan, Severn Tunnel Jun- Gloucester, Cheltenham-Norton Junction, and Oxford- Marylebone. With the exception of the latter, I suspect most of those diversionary routes would not see enough traffic to justify the expense of electrification. Of course, if time hadn't been an issue, maybe all of this could have been done, but the HSTs would have been very long in the tooth by then!

Misread the scale slightly: The version in "60 plans for small layouts" (the isometric plan) has two 'rulers' beside it. One, for TT, is 5' long, the 00 one is a bit over 6' 8" long. Which, as you say, only leaves just over 2' for a fiddle yard. The platforms could possibly be shortened slightly, losing 6" from them would make them 3' long and the fiddle yard 2' 10" That would be long enough for a loco and two full-length coaches (and possibly a van), or for 3 car multiple units, if a traverser or cassettes were used. If shorter coaches, like the Hattons or Hornby Generic coaches, or the shorter-than-scale Triang or Dublo coaches, were used, "longer" trains could be run.

Depends a little on the length of the fiddleyard. If you use either a traverser or a cassette fiddle yard (so no offstage pointwork is needed), you should be able to do it. Cyril Freezer's original Minories plan was 5'6" long in 00 (not including fiddle yard), so 9' all-in could be done.

It would be an interesting exercise for someone to use that photo to create the beading using a Silhouette cutter! Although closer to prototype than the old Triang shorty clerestories, in terms of detailing, the Hornby coach was a step backwards.

Ross has said he is moving on from F1 to spend more time with his family, and I can't blame him at his time of life. However I do wonder if Binitto might be making the move to Williams...

It is easier to buy a Formula One team than to set up a new one as purchasing a team usually brings with it experienced engineers, mechanics, fluid dynamicists, etc, whatever the team was working on up to the point of sale, the drivers, and quite often commercial contracts such as sponsorship. Of course the downside is that a team that is up for sale may well have less brilliant engineers and technical knowledge than the other teams. Whilst Haas is the most recent "new" team, there have been many others over the years, including Lotus Racing/Team Lotus/Caterham, Manor/Marussia, HRT, Toyota, Stewart (and. as mentioned above, technically Racing Point) - and that's just in the time I've been following the sport. Scuderia Ferrari is of course the only team that can trace its entry right back to the start of F1 in 1950. All the other teams on the grid have been "new" teams at some point.

Your fiddle yard will need to be more than two feet if you are using pointwork, especially with a double track entrance - the pointwork alone will take up most of that. If you want to get a fiddle yard in two feet, you will need to use a traverser or a cassette system.

Or, make it a real sprint race....

Well, as one of the sprint races is going to be in Austin....

The converse though is that so much concrete and labour is being used in HS2 that it is causing shortages in other parts of the construction industry.

The Lichfield Canal already has an isolated aqueduct over the M6 toll road. Following the legal case that determined who was responsible for the cost of the aqueduct, the Government stipulated that never again would a road be built that blocked a canal restoration scheme without suitable mitigation (aqueduct or tunnel) being provided. Whilst HS2 clearly isn't a road, it appears that the same precedent is being followed. (Which does make me wonder what the situation is regarding new roads that block railway restoration schemes...)

I think the track the OP mentioned originally was the old "GT" track made in Italy. It was nickel silver, so won't have rusted away, but it was pretty awful. About half of my father's layout used it until the layout was rebuilt in the late 1990s. (QUite apart from the ghastly look, one of the issues we had with it was the vastly unprototypical rail fixings which meant it wasn't "Universal" and our older stock couldn't really run on it). Apart from Peco, the only other supplier of 00 flexi track I know is Hornby, but Hornby often seems to be considerably more expensive than Peco's, despite being made in China. Other than that, it's down to secondhand or an occasional retailer's sale. I've bought most of my track secondhand and not had too much bother, except for the time I bought several sellotaped "bundles" of "00" flexi track from a dealer I had previously regarded as reputable (they have had a two-page ad in the front part of Railway Modeller for most of the 40 years I've been in the hobby), only for me to discover when I got home that only the outer lengths in the bundles were 00 and the rest was 016.5! Still, it got used - in the fiddle yard!