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According to the results of the wind tunnel tests, an A4 travelling at 100mph, running into a headwind of 50mph, saved approximately 640 hp by being streamlined. OK, that scenario didn't happen much and at slower speeds the saving was less, until at about 60mph it was very little indeed but hardly just a publicity stunt. The Gresley design was thoroughly tested before production commenced, including in wind tunnels. I am sure that if there was no benefit in performance, he wouldn't have gone ahead with the class just for publicity purposes. Having said that, design and marketing must have played a part in the choice of livery and the decision to introduce a fast, streamlined service in the first place. What we tend to forget after all these years and with all the advances in design is just how much impact the A4s had when they were introduced. Not just in railway circles either. My father in law is nearly 90 and doesn't know what day it is but he has vivid memories of being taken to the local station in 1935 to watch this silver and grey train tear through, accelerating off the speed restricted viaduct and going faster than anything they had ever seen before. It must have seemed like something from another planet to them, compared to the Ivatt Atlantics and A1/A3s they were used to.

That works fine until you are building an accurate model of a real place and it doesn't have a suitable bridge/feature. Which is one of the reasons why I prefer models either based on real places but with a bit of artistic licence or entirely fictional, where the picture can be composed as an artist would compose a picture. In my view, there are very few real places which have the right mix of interesting appearance, interesting mix of locos and stock, interesting operationally and able to fit into the spaces that most of us have. I work on the principle that you can build a superb model of a dull real place and it will often end up a dull model. Bringing interesting features from several real places together can result in a believable and interesting layout, which can also be great fun to operate. I can understand why people want to build accurate models of real places but I have never yet seen a real place that I could have the space or the inspiration to build.

And a grand job you do! Cheers, Tony Gee

The discussion seems to be to be more about whether a show is clearly in support of a club, clearly in support of a commercial organisation or is set up to look as if it is in support of a club but is actually in support of a commercial organisation. It is rather like all the bags we get through the door asking us to donate clothes to support charities. Some are really to support charities but many are from firms who deal in old clothes and give a tiny percentage of what they earn to the charity. This is usually shown in tiny print on the back. Each of us can make an informed decision if we know which it is. In effect, exhibitors give up their time to attend shows. Now they may just enjoy exhibiting and may not care who is making money out of their efforts. That is fine. But each layout and each exhibitor can only do so many shows and for each one that they do to earn money for a commercial venture, that is one less that they can do at a club show. I, for one, am quite happy if an individual wants to put on a show to put money in their own pocket. All I want is for them to be honest about it and not pretend that they are a club, so that exhibitors and punters can decide if they want to support such a venture. The lines can be a bit blurred sometimes. I note that the Easter show at York is now run by a limited company. The people behind the limited company are the same people who have been involved with previous shows and I would guess that the change has been made to offer financial protection to individuals, as the EMGS did a while ago. So does that make York one of those dreaded "commercial shows"?. Not in my eyes.

Time was when 00 meant steam roller wheels, dreadful track and if you wanted to make a RTR model look half decent, you had to do a major rebuild, including new wheels. So it was just as easy, in most cases, to re-wheel to EM. Nowadays, 00 track looks so much better, as Little Bytham proves. To me it looks even better than the EM on Kingstorre because it has little things like chairs. Modern RTR stuff has improved beyond all recognition and also has so much below footplate detail that might be in the way of EM wheels. the improvement in appearance from going EM 35 years ago to going EM now has narrowed considerably. I say that as a confirmed EM man! If my modelling was based around RTR items, I would be seriously considering saving all the time and effort converting stock and putting more effort into track and scenery. It is not the first time that I have heard those sorts of views expressed, so he is not alone. I actually use virtually no RTR so my 4mm modelling will continue in EM but as a set of standards it seems to be under a bit of pressure as kit and scratchbuilding falls by the wayside in favour of more RTR, (as seems to be the case). It takes a deal of courage to start dismantling your latest £160 purchase to find out that it has a non standard axle size! The supply of easy to use self quartering wheels at sensible prices isn't fantastic either, which can put some people off.

Giving Cowbit a quick look at on Google streetview it all looks to be intact and in good nick. What a lovely place. Full of old style railway character.

I have seen high speed long trains running in P4, on a layout based closely on Grantham as it happens (although not a scale model in the way that Little Bytham and Retford are). There is no doubt that it is possible. There is also no doubt (in my mind) that it takes more time, a certain mindset and the willingness to rise to meet challenges to accomplish such things. Every good P4 modeller that I know (and that means quite a few) has a level of dedication and commitment that is a step or several above most other modellers that I know. I will make an exception for one or two 2mm finescalers, who can show the P4 people one or two things in the dedication and commitment department. The people who try to tell us that P4 is easy and that we should all be doing it are doing a great dis-service to those who slave away to get their baseboards, track, locos and stock to the standard they need to be if they are going to work and then apply the same high standards to the rest of their modelling. All model railway projects have a degree of trade off between the time spent on them and the quality of the workmanship. A tiny number of people can work to the highest standards and do it at a great rate of knots, without compromising the quality of the results. I have no doubt that I could work in P4 and get layouts to run well. I also know that I wouldn't have built (or helped to build) upwards of 10 layouts in the last 25 years. I would still be on the first one. We each make our choices to suit what we want from the hobby and the only people who get it wrong are those who try to tell us that their way is the only correct way to proceed.

Didn't the GWR used to run rabbit trains to Dawlish Warren?

There is nothing wrong with a bit of humour. I sometimes say funny things myself. But going back to Tony W's post about his school meeting, saying something like that once is funny. maybe in a slightly warped, un "PC" kind of way ( a bit like my sense of humour) but it is funny. Now, if Tony W had said exactly the same thing at each and every meeting, it would become tiresome, irritating and boring. An MRJ thread for No 252 was started, got stupid and was locked. Somebody started a fresh one, it got stupid and then was locked. No doubt the next MRJ thread will start, become stupid and get locked. There is a forum thread for jokes. Hopefully we can have a thread that is titled MRJ that is actually about MRJ one day. When people talk about life being too short to taken things seriously, I agree 100%. It is also too short to waste time looking at a thread to read what people think of a magazine and just finding several pages of nonsense. It shows a total lack of respect for those who are actually interested. It also contravenes one of the rules of RMWeb "9. Please do not post pointless, irrelevant or inflammatory content." Mind you, if we all stuck to that RMWeb would be half the size that it is!

I am not at all sure that cassette type fiddle yards had been invented when Minories was first drawn. When I built my version, I used points in the fiddle yard. They were all as short as possible to save space, so they were either Y points or in one case a 3 way. The trick was to make the first one join the two running lines together into a single track and start your fan of sidings there. I also incorporated a dummy line each side of the fan of the sidings, one on the up side and one on the down. This wasn't used for storing trains but allowed one to be shunted in or out at the same time as another train was arriving or departing. This was done by utilising the curve in to the Y point that joins the lines together to insert a further Y with the blades at the station end of the fiddle yard, Mine was quite a long Minories, with trains of up to 7 carriages (admittedly shorter pre-grouping ones) but with platforms around 7ft long. The station was in total 12' long and the fiddle yard 8' It would be possible to do the same fiddle yard for 4' long trains in around 6' for the fiddle yard length. A fiddle yard with points is always going to need to be longer than a traverser or cassettes but I find it much more pleasurable operating, being able to set 5 trains up, run them in and out, without having to do any more in the fiddle yard than change a point or two. When all 5 trains are facing the end of the fiddle yard, I go and change them all round at the same time. With a cassette or a traverser the fiddle yard needs almost as much attention as the station.

When a thread gets locked, it means that one of the people who police the forum (one of the moderators or possibly Andy York himself), has decided that it has got to the stage were they want to close it down. It remains visible to anybody who wants to look at it but people cannot add further comments. MRJ threads have become increasing silly over recent times, with people thinking that they are being hilarious by typing "sausage" or listing branches of W H Smiths. Any protest at such postings is met with accusations of a lack of a sense of humour. It is sad really. They only do it on MRJ threads. They seem to see it as some sort of game, to see how far they can push the boundaries of childishness in their efforts to get the threads locked.

One was shedded at Retford (the former GCR Thrumpton shed) in the 1950s for around 3 years. Whatever it was doing there, it certainly ran on former LNER lines. http://www.brdatabase.info/locoqry.php?action=locodata&id=404455102&type=S&loco=2019

I did have a look at that one but thought that the USA one with a 10,000 ton train (yes, those are 100 ton wagons and there are 100 of them), just pipped it! A friend of mine was there that day at the quarry watching the 9F (and there was an S160 there as well with a superb hooter) and said that it was very impressive. I recall reading in the press at the time that the fireman suffered burns to his arms though his overalls due to the heat from the firebox door. I am not a huge fan of American railways, much preferring the more subtle and stylish looks of the works of J G Robinson but even I was impressed with those two. Cheers, Tony

Not a 9F but quite impressive. That second loco produces 6,300hp and has a great whistle/hooter! Loading gauge and the need to run trains that could fit loops and siding were the two biggest limiting factors in this country. There are only so many places you can put a boiler and big cylinders on a steam loco. Mind you, there would be something a bit wrong if a modern Class 66 couldn't do a bit better than a steam design from 60 plus years ago.

The "million" has gone! Many congratulations to Tony W and to all the others who have contributed to what is, in my view, the best and most interesting thread on RMWeb. So we start the countdown to the second million... Tony Gee

When my cutting broaches lose their plastic handles, I use them in a suitable pin chuck. They are easier to grip and turn (especially the smaller ones) in a pin chuck than they ever were original handles. How sad is it to get excited over a thread bearing the magic million views? I find myself looking at the number each time I have a look. I think that I just added another to the number. Tony Gee

I don't purchase much RTR but a Midland 0-4-4T might be one to get my wallet open.

Cheers Alan and all the best to you too. There is a nice drawing in the back of a two part series of books on GCR locos by EM Johnson, as well as some photos. If you don't have the books but are up for doing some, I will scan and email it to you, (pretty please!), Tony Edit: Just had a look at the drawings and they have no dimensions. I hate it when that happens! Still better than none at all though.

Lovely work Alan, as usual! If the 7mm range ever gets to GCR lamps, put me down for a handful! Probably not high on the list of priorities but I can hope. Tony Gee

Way back when, some 40 years ago, when I were a lad, I remember having an art teacher who was rather good and showed us how colours worked with each other. If I recall, red and green are complementary colours but don't work well together if there are equal amounts of each. So red trousers and a green top don't look so good together as they represent roughly equal amounts of colour. But a green loco on a red train looks better as the proportions of red to green are quite different. I may be talking utter bull**** as I often do but that lesson has stuck with me all these years.

Even more like Great Central Railway colours (but lacking the crimson or brown frames, depending on period, plus much fancy lining). Unlike the GWR, the GCR really did use Brunswick Green with Brown and Cream carriages. And yes, they look fantastic!

As a mere youngster of 56, I don't remember "blood and custard" and have only the slightest memories of BR Maroon. My interest in real railways really spanned the BR Corporate blue period. It is not what I model but I remember it with some affection. At least most things matched and looked as though they belonged on the same railway system as all the other trains. I think the rot set in with privatisation. There must be a good number of people whose jobs depend on coming up with updated liveries, new initiatives and whose career progression depends upon them making some sort of impact. I just can't imagine a "brainstorming" meeting with ideas being thrown about for the latest livery, with some highly educated design graduate daring to say "They looked better some time ago, why don't we use one of the really nice old liveries". It just isn't "dynamic" "go-ahead" or any of those other dreadful management speak terms. The people hiring in these design consultants can't possibly justify the expenditure if all they come up with is something that has been used before, so they have to come up with something new. So the liveries get more outlandish and garish because all the attractive, dignified liveries have been used already and are therefore off the table as possibilities. The odd time something does get painted up in an older livery, it usually looks very nice indeed.

Hello Tim, I use a chemical blackening (Superblue) and have found that phosphoric acid flux eats it away and limits its effectiveness. With a paste flux (I use Templars Telux from Geo W Neale & Co) I can get 100% results with chemical blackening as it doesn't attack it at all. It also works with mild steel and wipes/washes off really easily without leaving nasty residues, like some paste fluxes do. I haven't tried black marker pen so must give it a try. Have you found a particular brand best or do they all work? Like you, I have never got on with paper and fibre washers. Even the thinnest paper leaves too much slop for my liking and getting all the bits out after soldering has always been a struggle. Tony

If your coupling rods are double thickness etch (it is hard to tell from the photo but they look as thought they could be) one trick is to take the boss of the outer layer off, just leaving a single thickness next to the wheel. The crankpin washer, which could still be thinned down until it is the thickness of a layer of etch, can then be soldered into what becomes a recess. You can end up with a dead flush surface on the front crankpin. A washer between the coupling rod and connecting rod on the centre crankpin is a good idea too. Apart from anything else, it will stop things catching when there is a small amount of sideplay in the wheels.

I would just like to take the opportunity to wish Tony W and all the other contributors to this thread a happy and productive 2017. It has been a lovely place to show some great model making, to exchange thoughts and opinions, all with hardly a cross word spoken (or should that be written). It just goes to show that we modellers can have sensible discussions about things. Long may it continue. All the very best, Tony Gee