Kelly

Those sorts of games are money sinks for all the expansion options they make. 

1 hour ago, boxbrownie said:

That’s the Siemens research project, it’s been a limited success in trials more because of opposition from hauliers apparently, I don’t think they like the complexity. It’s bad enough keeping vandals and thieves out of BR property can you imagine at the side of a Motorway in the middle of the night? 😉

The current plans as stated by UK government are for this system to be implemented by 2040 and all hgvs to be diesel or petrol free by that time (new sale), so I expect most hauliers will buy lorries in 2039 and use them as long as possible before being forced to go to electric,  hydrogen or otherwise. 

Of course the clean air zones around cities will be continuing to expand and start. Already Bristol and Birmingham have them in place. Coventry fought against the government forcing them to implement one,  but if their proposed measures don't work they will have to implement one soon. Leeds and Bradford have schemes starting or started too. Some schemes were pushed back by the pandemic though. 

Those clean air zones are going to have an impact on people, exhibitors and traders getting to shows. Ally pally for instance with the expanded London zone has this impact,  meaning some traders will stop going. If traders won't go to shows then shows won't happen really. 

3 hours ago, boxbrownie said:

I think for the purpose of hydrogen or battery powered vehicles anything larger than a commercial Van is large, trains have plenty of “room” for the mechanics and storage of hydrogen generation and storage onboard, as do large trucks (think under the trailers specifically) and buses are already running around our nearest City with huge LNG tanks on the roof, would be easy enough to do the same with hydrogen.

 

Production I doubt will be seen very much on an actual vehicle. Instead it will most likely be compressed storage tanks. Which as you say for trains, lorries and busses makes the most sense vs battery. Battery is likely to be the best option for light vans, cars, taxis and motorbikes. Though the UK and German governments have been looking at HGVs powered by overhead electric like the system used by trains, with batteries to cover any gaps.

Unfortuately we're a long way away from efficient green hydrogen production. Production is currently very inefficient, though companies are researching and working on it, and the majority is produced as a by product of gas or coal production. Efficiency of vehicles using it is also lower than petrol is, but again research is ongoing. However, the area getting the most investment seems to be batteries, with some on the horizon which would eliminate or reduce significantly the need for rare metals or things like lithium, but they're a few generations away probably still, in the mean time solid state batteries (and maybe Teslas's Cobolt batteries) are probably the next generation on the horizon.

On 09/08/2022 at 22:30, Classsix T said:

Absolutely and wonderfully in the game medium we're also not unfamiliar with multiple endings to the same story. However my mind is lodged in reality and how the games industry can work. For example:

Deus Ex, left hanging after the second act of what many fans took to be a three-parter when the Publisher sat on the IP (hopefully resolved).

 

 

 

 

Deus Ex and Tomb Raider are both now owned by Embracer group, so they will probably make new games in the coming years. Square Enix had decided both were not worth continuing with and moved to focus on their 'Games as a Service' games and Japanse RPGs, so sold off almost all their Western IPs to Embracer. Embracer now owns a LOT of developers/studios.

2 hours ago, Northmoor said:

These could well be the most likely to be produced as the economics could be in their favour. 

• Three/four vehicles with very similar bodysides would mean much reduced costs of body mouldings (compare that with the 4-VEP where each vehicle is significantly different);
• Being only 3-4 car sets, they would be cheaper than the 4-6 car newer generation EMUs;
• They have a wide geographical coverage so should appeal to more than a purely Scottish or Southern unit, for example;
• There is the opportunity to sell them in many different liveries - I can think of about 15 options across all the classes.

Plus they have been used for some departmental use, including as barrier coaches for unit moves. Doing the translqtors could open them up to modellers who would not normally have a interest. 

7 minutes ago, Paul.Uni said:

 

 

If Bachmann are still working on the 170 (which in my opinion is likely) we won't here anything until they are about to be released.

If we're going to hear anything I expect it will be at Warley or in February potentially now. Though they've moved to the every 3 months model of announcements so there could be some surpises in October.

53 minutes ago, Traintresta said:

The interesting thing is that the EE engine has always been very solid and often wasn't pushed to the limits because the Sulzer had suffered from being pushed too far, but they both ended up giving good service in the end.  EMD suffered the same problems at the top end of the 567 and 645 ranges as they tried to obtain more power so the same problems would have existed using EMD products, and they weren't getting to higher power ratings any quicker than EE or Sulzer were.

I was always curious why they didn't push the 31's to a higher power rating by fitting a new generator.  I would have thought that the old generators could have been sold off or put to good use elsewhere, even as spares?  There were plans afoot to make them type 4's by uprating the Mirrlees engine, that would have required a new generator so to add a new generator when they were re-powered wouldn't be too far a stretch, except maybe for the accountants!  But it might have changed the landscape a bit in terms of the power requirements and orders.

The work EE did with the locomotives for South Africa and the Southern Railway as well as the LMS for 10201-3 and 10000-1 really helped them get a solid foundation for when they produced the 40s, 37s and others which carried lessons learned from those 3 locomotives forward.

32 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

If BR had focused on the good designs there were good home-grown designs and I'm not sure buying EMD would have been much better. The EE designs were very good and gave good service for many years, the engines weren't the last word in efficiency or high technology but the 20's, 31's (after re-engining) 37's and 40's seem to have been solid and reliable. Albeit the 31's and 40's were rather heavy for modest power. And although the Deltics were a bit of a one trick pony they were pretty good at that trick (express fast passenger work). Many of the Sulzer types gave pretty good service too.

A lot of the trouble came from I believe companies that had much more experience building steam engines, and were building licenced copies of German engineered engines. At the time it was politically too sensitive for a German company to be allowed to supply all the engines, hence licence building. Of course trouble came from the steam heating equipment too and BR was generally rather slow to move to air braking and electric train heating compared with the continent.

30 minutes ago, Flying Pig said:

 

And how many sets of loco hauled stock would you need? And how many extra locos just for variety? 

It is a bit of a piece of string argument really. It depends how long your layout is and whether you have a layout capable of taking a full length HST or loco + 10+ coaches or just a loco + 2 or + 4 or a 4 car unit.

6 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

Unfortunately, any energy carrier with sufficient energy density to power something like a train for any distance is always going to represent something of a hazard in the event of a release of that energy I think. Are the railways considering ammonia?

Quite a bit of experimentation is happening with hydrogen in Germany and other countries I believe.

1 minute ago, Covkid said:

 

 

 

Battery technology has advanced tremendously since 2017 and with 25kV at each end of the Marston Vale line there should be a battery option.  I personally doubt the EWR will actually get beyond Bletchley towards Bedford, and it is planned to diesels anyway, so a golden opportunity exists for some new 25kV + battery railcars  - which would give the option of eventually extending the OLE along the branch from both ends.  

Maybe 350/2s when they come off lease fitted with batterys and SDO for short platforms 

Quite and new battery technologies are on the horizon from Tesla and Toyota amongst others. Toyoya working on solid state batteries, which make them lighter and thinner as well as much harder to set on fire.

1 minute ago, Flying Pig said:

 

Modellers generally prefer loco-hauled trains and will clamber through hoops to justify them, but many of the locations they model would be more realistically operated by units. 

When I said less likely to be needed for a given layout, what I meant was a Class 37 or 47 will potentially have more than just passenger service uses, so more options are potentially needed. A DMU or EMU will be typically a couple, one for each direction at minimum, dependant upon length that might be 4 or six.

4 minutes ago, Dunsignalling said:

I don't think Accurascale (or anyone else, bar Hornby when the red mist descends...) would intentionally go "toe to toe" on any prototype when there are plenty of potential subjects where no (known) clash would exist.

 

OK, there are "staples" of which it could be argued that everybody needs to grab a slice of the action (Classes 08, 37 and 47) but the Voyagers and 170s you cite are, absent from more routes than they run on. Both have been done by Bachmann sufficiently long ago that there's a reasonable chance there are retooled models of them in the pipeline.

 

All part of the risk vs opportunity analysis that Accurascale no doubt perform for every idea they consider.

 

John

 

Quite people need enough things like 37s, 47s, 24s etc that with multiple options there's plenty to choose from. 

Units are typically in the less demand and less likely to be needed for a given layout depending upon the length. So already there is a limit of how many customers you can reach. Then you factor the geographical locations and their livery plus being in service a lot less time and again the potential market is smaller. 

It appears that the manufacturers in some cases by the factories get told that they should reconsider as the factories know what is in development. 

I still think that the electrostars would be a good idea for someone to do with so many variations that it could be a range stable for years. Again though targeting a rather small number of modellers in general compared with locomotives. 

42 minutes ago, mdvle said:

 

Except the 15x units are all still in service I think, so it wasn't a question of life renewing those - they were simply deemed to be necessary elsewhere.

 

So the choice really came down to redoing the ex LU stock and creating the 230/whatever units or ordering new.

Ordering new was never going to be on the cards unless it was on another line and caused cascading again. 

There will be new units in the next 5 years probably,  but gradually they may well not be diesel if the fuel costs keep going up. I expect we'll see more battery units potentially,  especially on relatively short lines or maybe hybrid units. Hydrogen still remains a possibility. 

15 minutes ago, The White Rabbit said:

Afternoon all,

 

I saw the news about our impending hosepipe ban. It's probably sensible - but so would fixing some of the many leaks in their pipes, which would cost money ... 

 

I did some research the other day into baked bean brands (don't ask, long + rather boring story) and came across something which caught me aback. No, not a catering pallet load of tins but one, repeat, one, tin. Never mind the 'e-Bay madness' thread, I think this one belongs in an 'e-Bay rip-off' thread. 

 

I confess I do like baked beans - but not at this money! (Nor do I rate Heinz very highly, we normally go for Branstons). 

 

 

Due to the prices for heinz these days we've been giving the various supermarket own brands a try. Surprisingly I have not been able to tell much difference! Perhaps a bit more gloopy with some and not as much sauce with others. But otherwise perfectly fine. 

38 minutes ago, jamie92208 said:

I vaguely  remember you  mentioni g something about that when you came out of hospital, now. My forgettery had obviously been at work.

 

Jamie

It was back in late March and the world has gone even more bats*** bonkers since. 

7 hours ago, Trevellan said:

 

As others have noted, the noise from the underfloor engine packs is much lower than expected, with an EMU soundtrack being more the norm. Personally, I think the interior layout is quirky, while recognising that this will often be a compromise. As a six-footer I found the directional seat spacing to be rather tight, but there were other, less cramped options. Overall, I think the 230s are perfect for such a self-contained service with short journey times.

 

The seating/interior is down to the operator to choose. The comments early on about the seating of them were all against demonstration seating thatd been installed I believe.

11 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

The grabirons would be firmly attached to the studs; I am basing that on similar construction methods over here.

 

That reminded me of a trip to a drug store with a friend. While he was getting his prescriptions taken care of, I wandered around in the non-drug part of the store and found a pair of shoes (for diabetics apparently) in my size and tried one on. It was like putting my foot into a cloud; I took them (well, the box with my shoes in it as I was wearing the new ones) up to the counter to pay for them. The clerk would not let me buy them as I did not have a prescription! For shoes?? So I put my shoes on and put the new ones back on the shelf. Note that I was willing to pay the full price on the box, too. I wished that I had remembered the brand and later looked on line for them.

The studs in the case of Richard's bathroom are behind tiles. I expect that the reason they won't do them on studs is because a) they take supposedly more work (more cost) and possibly b) they don't want to be left liable if the studs aren't strong enough later. In a lot of cases the landlord/housing association has to approve the installation as well, some will refuse unfortuately.

5 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

 

 

 

PS  @Kelly, are  you in touch with an Occupational Therapist, they should have all the contacts for the various aids and appluances plus the orthotics department.

 

Jamie

 

 

Unfortuately until I change my GP to be over at Richard's (which I can't until we've sorted the last of the moving out, which should hopefully be soon) I can't access the Occupational Therapists as everything they do goes through your GP for funding. This meant I couldn't have any aids or things like district nurses when I got out of hospital unless I was at my flat in Coventry, which is now pretty much unusable until we empty the last of the things, organise a house clearance and hand the keys back (it's been on hold whilst I recovered as Richard didn't want to get accused of not packing something I wanted to keep etc and lack of time off to do much recently). When the move is all officially finalised I will be able to get help hopefully from the OTs.

Kelly

2 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

My own preference would be to renew the trains they had before, despite the higher engine noise I prefer the 15x series of trains. 

They were probably much more likely to be cascaded than renewed for where they were. 

My view has always been that there was plenty of life left in the d stock, especially as the bogies and motors had been refurbished not long before retirement by tfl. It is far better in these days of expense and such to reuse where it makes sense. 

If they're only ever a stop gap until other units become available that is still better than things like 142s and the like continuing in service decades after they should have gone for scrap!