jwealleans

Yep, been there, done that. The currently building club layout has been built using Code 75 and the onus placed on members to make their stock run on it if they want to make use of it on running nights.

Bit of a hiatus coming up, but I'm pleased to say that 3249 has had the chassis stripped, new wheels and drive train and has also now moved under her own power, even with no coupling rods. It's starting to look like Doncaster Works in there:

Awaiting bits from different places, so this afternoon 3249 went into the dismantling shop. This is what it reduced to: I had to break the tender sideframe off to remove the old wheelsets. Although just putting brass bearings into the frames left the wheels too tight to turn, by countersinking them with a 3mm drill I've managed to get them fairly free running and soldered the frame back on. If anyone would like the Ks motor, gear, axles and wheels they are free to a home, good or otherwise. The carpet fairy seems to have eaten one of the wheel securing screws, however. I've made up the other two gearboxes this evening so they're ready for use and the chassis from 3249 has gone into the paint stripper. Something else I've been tinkering with: Thurston goes out to Spalding next month and I like to take something new each time I go, so here are some Bachmann Private Owners, along with a Cambrian open I've been finishing off.

Those two Engineers' trains are beautiful. I think I recognise some elements of them, but I shall be interested to know the rest. In the first one the leading van is ex-ECJS (D & S) and the 4 wheel van is GN (D & S again). The trailing saloon I'm not familiar with. The second one has an ex-NER D 171 van at the rear (D & S or John Fozard). If the crane is D & S then he's done a great deal to it or not used very much of the kit. It's a lovely job.

You're not the first to spot that, Jol. I think the camera has exaggerated it - I didn't spot it when I was putting the pickups in, it runs ok (not fantastically, but it doesn't drag) and we haven't had any problem with it derailing. That leading wheel does look cockeyed on the axle though. As it happens I was on to AGW yesterday and an etched subframe will be on the way to me soon so there is a Plan B in hand. I expected at least one of these tenders to be beyond saving and this is the most likely candidate.

Every A4 ran in black and had the valances removed. There's a very well known picture of Mallard during the war, in black, no valances, half a buffer head broken off, so covered in filth that they'd have been embarrassed in 1968. I think it's in Top Shed by Peter Townend.

Wheels on the way from Alan Gibson Workshop and the WSM chassis moved under its own power last night. To get over those long ladders of pointwork at Grantham, I've put pickups on the tender as well. I was contemplating a subframe and more modern chassis, but this is a simple test of it as it is. The upperworks will need a bit of detailing while we're on. I've been alerted to these handy looking loco to tender plugs to hang it all together. JASd17 and I have been discussing the finer points of C1 detailing this week. Reading Yeadon, I found that 4412 was one of those which never had a smokebox saddle. I was all set to look at renumbering until I checked the model and found that it doesn't have one. think Phil must have removed it when he built it, unless anyone knows if the kit was supplied like that? The Ramsbottom casting has been removed to be replaced with Ross Pops and the anticarbonising device will be replaced with finer wire.

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/64603-lner-b15-ner-class-s2-4-6-0/?hl=+arthur%20+kimber%20+b15

Best of luck with it. When you've made your first million, maybe you could offer to buy the local paper a spell checker.

If I mount them sloping inwards, so they're the right gauge at the bottom?

Experimenting at Ormesby last night showed that the larger wheels still rubbed the chassis on curves. Some brutality has therefore been applied to the front end of the frames to allow the wheels to clear. I'm banking on the Hornby wheels having coarser flanges than the Gibsons so there should be more clearance when they are fitted. I've had to file about two thirds of the way through that front spacer. Some of the other components of the chassis detached themselves in protest, so it's gone into the paint stripper before they're soldered back on. While it was in bits, though, the chance to offer the drivetrain up to the WSM chassis and check it fitted. I had to cut a section of baseplate away to allow the gearbox to protrude slightly below the driven axle. I also removed the lug at the rear intended for an X04, as that makes refitting the body easier. There's plenty of room in there and I hope to get a flywheel into each of them as well.

A highly informative site here - will need translating, but includes a working model of a train ferry - and a page devoted to the wreck of HMS Daffodil (Train Ferry No 2) here. I'll try to remind myself what Dr Ransome Wallis had to say about linkspans this evening, without diverting Dave's thread too far. Edit - Ransome-Wallis doesn't mention the sinking, but does say that the span from Southampton and the gantry from Richborough were installed at Harwich, while the Richborough linkspan went to Zeebrugge.

I have a feeling the Harwich linkspan gear came from Richborough - via the seabed, it sank while being transferred - while the Southampton gear went to Zeebrugge. I may have that the wrong way round - see Ransome-Wallis, Train Ferries of Northern Europe for chapter and verse. It's always puzzled me why the French didn't show more interest in the idea after WW1. Their strategic importance has always been realised: Hitler issued orders that the Zeebrugge and Harwich train ferry berths were to be left undamaged and built new railway wagons to the UK loading gauge in 1940 for expected traffic which never materialised. I'm pretty sure I've read that the order regarding the Zeebrugge linkspan was never rescinded and it was left undamaged in a wrecked port when the Allies captured it although it was 1947 before ferries could access it again.

The linkspan itself is listed, though, I believe? I'm not sure how far that extends to the supporting infrastructure.

It seems those motors were a bit of pot luck. There are engines running - I believe Mr King has at least one - with K's wheels, mechanisms and chassis. There seem to be a great many more which 'used' to have a K's motor. 4444 was the one of my pair which has had all the work done for no better reason than that the motor exploded in a puff of smoke while under test on the bench. The motor in 3249 still works and it has run on Peter Simmerson's Uppingham layout once or twice. (admittedly not terribly well). Metropolitan, on one of his periodic bursts of activity on here, built a K's kit exactly as it came out of the packet and seemed to get it to work, motor and all. I have to say I much prefer a Mashima can and a High Level; box.

Thank you all for your kind words. The Quint has been put aside for the moment and I've been relaxing with some wagons, which you'll no doubt be able to admire in due course should I finish them. Tonight, though, I went back to something else we need lots of for Grantham and another of my favourite things on the railway - C1s. I haven't signed up for the forthcoming Bachmann one as I already have four and even for me that's quite a lot. So we'll be making do with what I have for the moment. First across the bench is 4444, which featured in some of the buildup to Barrow Hill earlier this year and then failed on the day. Messrs King and Mears couldn't revive it at the show, so it's been in a box ever since. Last week it saw the light of day again. The captive nuts securing the chassis had both failed, so it couldn't be assembled, the tender drawbar fell off and the whole thing was a bit of a mess. I managed to introduce Araldite round the nuts to resecure them, and then started looking at the front bogie. I've never been happy with it or the underscale wheels K's used. To give you an idea: On the right the correct size wheels from the DJH kit, on the left the K's ones. Testing with the correct wheels soon showed that they would not fit, there being an overlap with the front driving wheel flanges. Slightly smaller ones will be needed and I see that Alan Gibson do a 10 spoke 12.6mm wheel. As it happens, 12.6mm wheels are fairly easy to find: So far so good but they'll get a thorough test at Ormesby tomorrow. I think they may be touching the frames through pointwork. I had intended to replace the bogie and a number of other components with Comet bits, but in the light of Geoff Brewin's tragic demise I think a lot of bits will have to be recycled. I need to remotor (or motor at all) the others so an order has gone to High Level. The WSM version has already had the gubbins stripped out. I will also start on the twin to 4444, almost 15 years after I bought them both. 3249 still has the K's wheels and mechanism and is still EM gauge. It has run very occasionally in my ownership but will now get the full overhaul and regauging it's always been intended to give it. For anyone else who has one of these, this thread will tell you most of what you need to know.

That's Bottom, not Mr Tumnus, surely?

If this year's show was anything to go by, we won't be modelling the fetching assortment of winter knitwear visible above either. Maybe that's a good thing.

Yes and Neil Rushby is my main dealer.

I've done a similar thing with HMRS transfers, exchanging otherwise unused 'W' and 'S' carriage lettering prefixes for much-needed 'E's.

Sheer quality, Adrian. What was the surface of the print like? Have you done much filling or smoothing to get it to this state?

Just in case anyone has missed it, the Quint was taken up to Grantham again last weekend. By kind permission of Tony Wright, a conscious recreation of the well known works photograph, but taken from the other side of the set.

If the glue fails under load, I bend mine through 90 degrees along the back of the buffer beam then either glue or solder them into place. Really nice job, this.

I've never seen a picture of one in traffic in that colour - wasn't it only goods and shunting locos it was applied to?

Yes, another excellent weekend in splendid company. Sunday proving why I should remain well away from that control panel. Graeme's hoppers were indeed stars of the show, closely followed by his Cock with added wobbly bits. The controller is still there and saw much use for handwarming on Sunday. Manna - the A2s did get to the Cross, although by the time of this layout were probably very rare that far south. I believe there's at least one picture in Top Shed. It should also be said that the running was pretty good all weekend as well, I recall very few derailments or sticky locos and the J69 and match wagon Tony put together were a shunter's dream even over the ladders of dead frog points at each end of the station.