t-b-g

Not so unlikely. Cock O'the North once derailed while shunting a horse box in the goods yard at Bawtry. It was on a running in turn on a stopping passenger service and some shunting was needed. The locals reckoned that the ancient track in the yard just gave way under the weight of the loco.

Just home from the show. Although not on the scale of former Wakefield shows, I enjoyed the visit and the Wakefield club is one that I have known people from for over 40 years and is well worth supporting. The mix of layouts wasn't really to my taste but that is really down to my obscure choices and doesn't reflect on the quality. Layouts like Deadmans Lane are worth a look no matter what your own interests are. If you like the more modern scene and plenty of diesels then there is some fine modelling on show. I can't recall a general club show that had no layouts representing the BR steam era, the LNER, LMS, SR or the GWR before. There are a few oddities like light railways, the LMR and suchlike but of the "mainline" type layouts, two are pre-grouping and the rest from the last 40 or so years. The highlight for me is Eyemouth. Pre-grouping NBR (with a slightly out of period LNER interloper standing in until another loco is built) it is a lovely layout and ticks all my personal boxes. If you are going tomorrow hoping to make some purchases from Squires, they are not there, having gone home last night after a disagreement. Wakefield club have had a difficult time with shows, venues etc. recently and I was happy to go along to put my £9 in the kitty to support them. The show seemed well attended today and I hope it is the same tomorrow.

I have been a big NCIS fan for many years and now that Gibbs has left, Ducky was the only character left from the very start. I read that he worked so hard to get the character right that he learned all about what a ME does and would have been able to perform a real autopsy if required. His scenes were always amongst the best on the show.

His character in NCIS was Dr Donald Mallard (which naturally gave rise to his nickname "Ducky"). In his Autopsy Room in NCIS he had a model of the A4 Mallard on a small shelf and mentioned it at least once as having the same name as him. I suppose the end comes to us all but he was another of those people who seems to have always been around from my childhood in the 60s and 70s through to today. Even in the 70s, when I was at school, the girls seemed to take a shine to him although he was old enough to be their dad! At one time, probably during the "Man from U.N.C.L.E." years, he was famous for receiving more fan mail than Elvis Presley. He had recently spoken about starting to wind back on his workload by appearing less often on screen in NCIS. It can't be bad still working (and enjoying it) at 90. NCIS has made lovely "tribute" episodes when actors who appeared regularly have passed away. "Ducky" certainly deserves that. R.I.P David.

A good friend of mine is building a 7mm model of Framlingham as it was in the early BR period. As part of the model, he has built a granary building and would like to model one of E G Clarke's lorries. We have several black and white photos that show the bodies are a dark colour but neither of us knows much about road vehicles and we don't have lots of books, information or resources and we don't know the actual colour. Neither do we know where to start looking. We wondered if anybody might either know or be able to point us in the right direction to seek out details. Thank. Tony Gee

When I built my NuCast K2, probably around 35 years ago, I was just glad that I got the valve gear to work at all. It was my first kit built Walschearts gear, although I had replaced the crosshead and slidebars and added the missing bits on a Triang-Hornby Britannia when I was still a teenager. I am not too sure that mine ever received any brake gear but I did cut new frames out of brass armour plate to replace the whitemetal lump. Once Malcolm Crawley produced the artwork for the London Road kit, my model was relegated to a box and hasn't been out since. The new one was just so much better looking. Tony's Nucast model already looks far better than mine ever did especially above the footplate and it looks no worse than mine below. One thing that would improve the look of the loco Tony has built would be the addition of balance weights. I don't know if they are absent deliberately or have been forgotten but they are quite large on a K2, especially on the centre wheels and their omission detracts from the appearance of the loco far more than the slightly chunky valve gear to my eyes. Especially when other locos on the layout have them.

Not all the Barnums had the ornate handrails even in GCR times. Images of carriages with the simpler handrail appear here: https://www.steve-banks.org/gcr/339-gcr-barnum-carriages-design The simpler handrail is much easier to model than the fancy one (obvious statement of the year award nomination please) but they are still quite a bit longer than the ones fitted to Tony's models. The do still have a slight S bend at the top and bottom but they are not difficult to make.

One of my all time favourites was a layout set in the USA that referenced song lyrics. There were two premises next door to each other. One had a sign that read "Trailers for sale or rent" and the one next door had "Rooms to let 50 cents". I thought it was a brilliant use of popular culture on a model railway.

I agree with all that everybody says. The conclusion is that nobody really knows! The one thing I wouldn't query was Malcolm's memory. If he was ever not sure of anything, he would say so. I can't recall all the details myseolf now but when we were looking at Butler Henderson and he commented on the red oxide tender rear on a black loco, he told me the name of the chap at Gorton, the year he went there, what he was sent to Gorton for and chapter and verse on the whole story. The chap had been in Gorton paint shop since GCR days and by the 50s was in a senior position. He told Malcolm that black locos had red oxide and green locos in GCR days had the crimson lake colour. It stuck in his mind as he had never noticed the red oxide before. In service, it quickly got very dirty and the difference in appearance of a dirty red oxide tender rear and a black one that was weathered and rusty was not great. There are very colour contemporary photos showing that part of a tender and those that do exist it is not easy to tell whether they are rusty and weathered black or mucky red oxide. The comment from Percy Banyard was when John Quick sent him some green samples and asked him which he thought looked most like GCR green. Percy replied that they all did as no two locos looked alike. I recall he gave an example of turning up at work and there being 4 green locos lined up side by side and they were all different shades of green. In that respect, Buckingham is spot on as various different paints have been used on the green locos and they are all different. Just about the only combination of colours I haven't seen mentioned by anybody is a green tender with a red oxide rear. So my green tenders have the crimson lake interiors. My black locos have red oxide. I have one with no rear coal divider and that is painted red oxide but was then very weathered until it is almost black. I cannot say with 100% certainty that they are right but equally, nobody can say with 100% certainty that they are wrong. The same is true if somebody wants to paint theirs black.

When Butler Henderson was withdrawn and repainted in GCR livery, there were still people around who had known the locos in GCR days. When Malcolm Crawley and I visited the preserved line at Loughborough many years ago, to see the D11 running during the brief spell it ran in BR black livery, the tender back was painted red oxide. Malcolm said "That is a nice touch. Somebody from Gorton paintshop told me they used to do that all through GCR, LNER and BR days". Most people around today don't have those memories and have to rely on saying what they think might have been the case. It may even be that locos painted at Gorton were one colour and those built by contractors the other, as the livery specifications are pretty vague and don't specifically say which colour they should be. As there seems to be little hard evidence one way or the other, I think we sometimes just have to pick an option that pleases us. The sky won't fall on our heads if we are wrong.

I started one of these as an N4 with round top firebox a few years ago and for some reason, as happens with many of my projects, it got put on the back burner and was never finished. I did find the rivetting quite tricky as there are so many that are really close together, which gave no room for an anvil or support for a rivetting tool. So I cheated and only did every second rivet. I am not saying that everybody should do it but it might be a useful tip if anybody struggles like I did. The round top firebox version lasted quite a long time and is quite appropriate for a GCR period layout.

My mum used to do exactly the same! She was from Sunderland. Of course he wouldn't have had to travel very far to see the ships on the Tyne so perhaps he got away with it.

My understanding is that black locos had a red oxide tender interior and that green locos had the same crimson lake colour that was applied to the outside frames, splashers etc. I attach a photo of the preserved Butler Henderson, which was painted many years ago and although not 100% authentic in the lettering, was based on colours found under the BR Black livery she eventually received. The actual coal space is black but the front and the rear area with the filler covers are crimson lake.

It is very good of you Mike to share your techniques in such a detailed, easy to follow way. I still have a stash of Kirk kits and although my current modelling is pre-grouping GCR there is always a chance I may do some more in the future and I will certainly be referring to your photos and description if and when I do. You have taken things quite a bit further than Malcolm and I did and with worthwhile results. I adopted a different method for the window vents. I cut the Kirk ones out and put a single pane of glazing in then made new ones fixed directly to glazing. You don't get the inset glazing for the sliding vents but I think it may be a bit quicker and easier to do.

I recall showing these before but as this thread is specifically about Kirk kits I will show them again. Fairly poor snaps taken using the camera on my tablet but there is an LNER version, which was done by the late Malcolm Crawley, plus a BR liveried one I did for the late Roy Jackson's Retford. It has fooled one or two into thinking it was an etched kit, so the work involved to fill in the panelling and flush glaze it has certainly made a difference.

I remember him singing about the "Good old EAR & H" celebrating the railways of Kenya. He was a favourite of my parents in law and they often had a CD of his songs on in their car. I grew to enjoy his gentle songs and his melodic and smooth voice. R.I.P.

Having attended the recent GOG show at the venue and been pleasantly surprised at how easy the journey was from near Doncaster, a few of us are going to make our first trip to this show at the weekend. It looks to be a good line up and I am really looking forward to it.

I purchased one of those GCR carriages at a second hand stall at a very reasonable price a long time ago but I have never plucked up the courage to try to sort out its biggest problem, which is that the sides are mirror images and one side has the door handles at the LH side of the doors. I haven't looked at it in years so my memory could be faulty but I recall that one side is correct. I thought that if I ever see another one for sale at a good price, I could make one correct carriage from the two kits. Then one of the "Retford Mob" started drawing some in CAD with a view to producing some etches, so I even stopped looking for the cheap second kit. Such a detail may not bother many people and your build (or builds as I will include the others) look really nice but once I knew it was wrong, I couldn't bring myself to "unsee" it. I have built a few Jidenco models, including the GN Fish Van and the GCR 6 wheel brake van. They are not 100% accurate but they are, to quote the late Roy Jackson, better than the ones we haven't got. I have told the tale of the Jidenco Claughton before and won't repeat it but we do have, between us (the builders of Narrow Road), the Claughton, a Coal Tank and a MR 800 Class 2-4-0 as completed locos from Jidenco kits.

What a lovely model.

Hello Stew. You could do a lot worse than a 9F (N5 to more modern folk!). There is an etched scratch builders aid from Judith Edge or a complete cast kit from SE Finecast. Until SE Finecast was taken over by Squires, you used to be able to purchase the fittings like chimneys domes etc separately but I don't know if you still can. As the GCR used them for shunting plus local goods and passenger trains, they are a really useful thing to have. There are two on Buckingham, the original Denny one from 1947 and a much more recent one built by me from a Millholme kit that hauls the Director's saloon. Cheers Tony

I don't see how you have reached that conclusion based on what I wrote but I have seen the same sort of approach from several manufacturers.

I may be totally wrong about this but I have this personal opinion that much of modern life is made more complicated than it needs to be because we have lots of designers and product developers who don't look as though they are doing anything useful if they just copy what their predecessors did. If they want to be seen as innovative and clever, they feel the need to reinvent the wheel. So a simple loco tender coupling, which worked perfectly well for many decades, is no longer seen as a suitable option. It is almost as if they think "That way of doing things that has worked perfectly for years...... we don't want to do that". There comes a time when an optimum design, which is simple to make and which works well, has been achieved but in order to justify their existence, they don't stop there. Maybe it is just me being a bit cynical about the modern world and there are many who will say that if we don't experiment and tinker with things we will stagnate and never improve. But we do sometimes need to realise that making things more complicated and more delicate and easy to break is not really progress, no matter what the marketing people tell us to believe.

I have a little question about the decision to change from radio control to DCC. I have been visiting a friend today and running his fairly large O gauge garden railway, with worked quite nicely on radio control, to the point where I am considering trying it. So I am interested in your decision to move away from it. Did you encounter problems that you can share to guide my choice?

I do recall mentioning it as a possible prototype idea for a small layout. Another reason I am glad to see it again. I haven't achieved very much on any of my own projects in the 4 years since you started Tewkesbury so I won't be saying anything about your lack of progress in that time!

I am so pleased to see this project up and running again. It is a delightful little scene. Perhaps an entry into the small layout competition at Stafford next year might encourage you to stick with it?