david.hill64

Yummy! Original or rebuilt?

i suppose that when this thread gets to its 10th birthday, I may begin to get tired of it, but probably not. Keep up the good work!

IIRC you multiply alternate number by 2, add the total and subtract from the next higher multiple of 10. So in the example of 1020 018 you have: (2*1+0*1+2*2+0*1+0*2+1*1+2*8 ) = (2+0+4+0+0+1+16) =23. Subtract from 30 =7. I think I am worried that I remembered this............... Edit to remove the unwanted emoticon that appeared when I tried to type 8) (or 8 followed by a )!

What a great shot!

I am sure it will happen. Not so sure it will be DJH but that's obviously an option for Martin.

Not 100% sure but I would say that it is the tendency for 2 cylinder engines to rock from side to side - the front of the engine moving left to right and back again - under power. A 4 wheel bogie may have been better at containing this. I cannot remember any of my rides behind BR steam in normal operation but I can remember a ride behind a 2 cylinder German loco working hard where even the first coach was oscillating - driven by the movement of the loco.

Gloucester used to see withdrawn locos en-route to South Wales most weekends towards the end of steam. usually 3 or 4 locos at a time, often in the middle of a freight. Coupling rods removed but hot boxes were frequent and locos would end up in Horton Road (Salisbury is a good example https://www.flickr.com/photos/curly42/5610195071/)or in the freight sidings in the triangle between the Midland, Western and Avoiding lines. Edit for typos

Looking good - as usual!

Didn't realise those boxes needed coaling..............

Nice to see you posting again!

I drove that route last year on a San Francisco to New York drive (never again - it's boring in the middle). We spent an hour at 77mph running parallel to a train: never overtook it in that time. It was long - and fast.

And the foreground's not much better. Could have saved some money by cutting 6" off the width of the baseboard if you're not going to fill it with something interesting................

Love the colours in C401. IMHO two tone green really suited the Brush 4s and the full yellow ends and red buffer beam set it off well. Plus of course the various colours in the train. Who needs corporate ID?

Is this going to be weathered to the same fantastic state of grubbiness that your Flying Pigs were in?

Excuse my ignorance, but where was the continuous blowdown valve located?

Reminds me of the major faux-pas I committed back in 1994(?) when a guest on the commemorative inaugural run of a newly refurbished HST Virgin XC set from Edinburgh: I ordered a coke rather than a Virgin cola................. !

To me it looks like the en-suite berths have a private toilet and a handbasin, which is pretty much an essential. There is also an additional circle that might represent a shower head, the position of which suggests you may take a shower while sitting on the throne - Asian style. So water everywhere. It will be interesting to see the drainage arrangements and how they plan to keep water out of the sleeping area.

I have to agree. I can see nothing in these designs that improves the lot of the existing sleeper passengers in either class. The pod class could probably have been constructed out of spare loco hauled Mark 3's (if there are any) and the existing sleepers could have had a major refurbishment and upgrade for a fraction of the cost of the new stock. I could sort of understand the Scottish government going for new build if it were supporting jobs in Kilmarnock or Glasgow, but throwing money at the Spanish rather than supporting English factories does seem to be a wild waste of my taxes. Rant over.

Nice to see you back at the work bench!

Having cut out and cleaned up any burrs on the etches, I put plenty of flux on the faces to be mated and use wooden cocktail sticks through the coupling pin holes to align the parts. I hold them together in a vice, or with magnets or with a clip and tack solder in a couple of places by touching the iron and a small amount of solder to the join. Then, once I am satisfied that the parts are still aligned, I hold the iron on the joint. Capillary action will draw the solder in and it will flow. You will be able to see it advance along the join. You might need to add some more solder to ensure that the entire joint is made. If you are working with nickel silver you will find it much easier than brass, but take care that everything is aligned and don't be afraid to let it get hot. So plenty of flux and plenty of heat, let physics help you!

A good tip is to make coupling road assembly a number one priority and build the chassis around them. For a smooth running chassis you really need the axle spacings to be the same as the coupling rod spacing and the axles square to the frames. Having said that I spent my first 20+ years of modelling fixing the bearings in the frames before assembly and usually got away with it!

The Jinty frames are coming on nicely. The tight axle may be due to a small misalignment. Have you tried fitting the coupling rods to the axle alignment jigs?

May I make a suggestion for next time? Even if the instructions suggest soldering the axle bushes in place before assembling the frames, I suggest leaving them unsoldered at first. Then when you slot the frame spacers in position you put some lengths of 1/8" rod through the front and rear axle holes and stand the assembly on some graph paper to check that all is square before first tack soldering and then if all still square finally soldering the frame spacers in position. If you have an engineer's square you can use that to align the spacers while you solder them to one side first. Once the frame spacers are firmly fixed you can check the alignment of the axle bearings and then solder them. If you have an alignment jig then making up the coupling rods and using that to ensure all is square will help. If you solder the axle bearings in place first you run a small risk that there is a misalignment that might be tricky to re-align. Having said that, I always used to follow the instructions and solder the bearings first but experience has taught me that waiting is better. Anyway looking good and good luck!

The issue about manning is important, but if we broaden the scope to include metros, UTO (unattended train operation) is becoming quite common. Evacuation is a key issue for UTO services, but operators - and their regulatory and safety approvers - accept that directing passengers using communications from the control centre is perfectly acceptable. I am presently writing the signalling safety case for UTO operations in Delhi. Society has accepted unmanned people movers at airports for a long time. I can even remember lift operators in a department store, and my mum being worried about how safe the new fangled lifts without operators would be! Times move on, technology changes, and we now have a railway that is significantly safer than before even with many services being DOO. Personally I think that the traditional role of the guard is dead, but I welcome having customer service (hate that term) / revenue protection staff on board who have been trained in safety procedures. Train managers are a good concept with a title that is apt.

And the same thing happened on the Southern when we were trying to get the Notworkers accepted. The test equipment went bananas when a train of 4-Ceps rattled past. Far more interference in all parts of the frequency spectrum than from the dreaded AC drive units!