Dava

A useful selection of detail accessories. I’ll look out for O scale ones I can use. Dava

I had a brief fantasy about buying an O scale dismantled brass ‘Big Boy’ which came up for offer last month. Logistics & costs of importing from US would have been daunting. Plus the challenges of rebuilding it. My wife asked ‘where would you run it?’, I couldn’t answer that. I found this converted K-Line Plymouth soon after, it’s more my kinda critter.

I was in the LT Museum shop on Tuesday and amazed at how many products they are offering in a selection of bus & tube moquette fabric. Routemaster pyjamas for bus enthusiasts? https://www.ltmuseumshop.co.uk/gifts/collections/everything-moquette Dava

That’s a nicely weathered example, a KTM? I have a K16 as well, a Sunset model with a glossy paint job I couldn’t resist as a mate for the K16a tender loco. It was ‘new old stock’ (about 15 years) from a dealer in the US. It will be dirtied when I convert it to DCC. Here it is with its mate on my Coxheath Sidings microlayout (built in Canada). Nothing to do with economics except as shiny gold metal they may hold their value better than plastic. Dava

Quote from former MD of Games Workshop plc in handbook given to all company managers. ”Some people are toxic. It’s your job to get them out of the organisation.” He was unfashionably right on this and many other principles. Dava

West Clare Railway at Moyasta Junction, you should get a ride. Cavan & Leitrim at Dromod. Both very friendly. Check out the remains of both lines by road. Donegal station museum and the Glenties line might be running. Other closed lines and Bord na Mona (also mainly closed) along the way. Dava

Baltimore & Ohio K16a, Pennsy had quite similar switchers, I don’t know about NYC

Richard Murphy Is an understandable & sensible economist. When I studied economics at Night School, the enjoyment of model railways and other pastimes was described as ‘marginal contentment’, well, I learned something. Having been to a ‘Free MarketsRoadshow’ this evening (sampling the dark side) I need to spend more time in my workshop with the O scale models, not the theoretical ones. These ones are investment grade, until I paint them. Dava

I like the Barclay pug. You could run a Ruston 48 or 88DS (Hornby) as both ran at actual distilleries Dava

Many thanks Gilbert, US O scale SG layouts are quite scarce at shows so I really appreciate these photos. Dava

Anyone take photos or video of 2ndHand Yard, US O scale by Arry Dodd, stand 110 please? I’m unable to get to York. Thanks, Dava

It’s a bit irrelevant as all the LMR wanted to do was run down the GCR and close it so there was no incentive to invest in dieselisation. Thus the use of end of life Royal Scots and Black Fives.. Dava

Fair point and I’d be happy to see 4079 or 2999 visit the GCR to run on a real double track mainline. Dava

I will just add that if the 7027 rebuild had been completed on the GCR, the intention was to run it as much as the other similarly sized locos. The GCR is a good main line to run GWR 4-6-0s on, as the visit by 6023 some years ago and 7029 long before demonstrated. This is rather different from the denizens of Didcot which don’t get out much any more. You could argue 7027s boiler would have been better used on the original loco. But that ship has sailed. Whether the GCR needs all the locos the excellent works team can produce, around two each year, is another matter, with high coal prices and other issues. There are usually one or two away on hire, which points to there being a demand for them. Some railways such as the Battlefield and Ecclesbourne Valley routinely hire in steam locos (not necessarily from the GCR) as they don’t have large ones of their own. Dava

JJP sold because he was fully committed to sorting out the West Somerset Railway, a container of costly to replace parts was stolen, and Michael Gregory, President of the GCR offered to buy and restore it at Loughborough. The rebuild got well under way with a committed team at Loughborough doing what the boss wanted. Then health and family issues changed, Gregory withdrew from the GCR and his trains were offered for sale, including 7027. JJP intervened after the sale was announced, but nothing came of the initiative to acquire and restore the loco. Dava

All you need is your product price list as a pdf file. You can have it downloadable in a 1 page website, or just start a thread on here with the scale & type of your etches. People can email you with orders and pay via PayPal or bank transfer. People used to ask if Roger at Alphagraphix had a website, he does now but not for online purchases https://www.alphagraphixkits.co.uk/ Dava

Enjoyed the show and the narrow gauge railways with so many locos in service, plus the Burton & Ashby tramcar. Superb venue and very well organised. Dava

Preservation is eating itself. So GWR Castles are just commodity parts donors for 1:1 scale kitbash projects. Didcot fills its shed with locos that mostly run for just one boiler ticket. There won’t be the coal to run most of them anyway. Good luck 4709, hard luck 7027. Dava

The reboilered Jubilees & Patriots with the Scot sized 2a boiler remedied that, basically they were the equal of a rebuilt Scot. Dava

There is a link here to a short web feature on the Halifax trams and what followed. https://www.halifaxpubliclibraries.ca/blogs/post/from-the-birney-to-the-bus-a-brief-and-not-at-all-definitive-history-of-halifax-public-transit/ Dava

I’d love to see & ride the Bendigo trams. I lived in Canada for a while, the Halifax cars must have been good hill climbers but no trams there now, in contrast with Toronto which has a busy system. Even Sydney NS where I worked had a tramway system, with bogie cars I think. Dava

My main interest is in O scale North American shortlines, there is some crossover with trolley systems including those which hauled freight. Such as the Claremont & Concord in New Hampshire which absorbed parts of the Claremont Electric Railway, and replaced the electric locos with GE 44 tonner centrecab diesels. Looking for a small trolley car as a static display item on my shortline project, the Birney Safety Cars were used on many smaller town systems and some survive in preservation (not in the UK) see Johan Marsbar’s photo thread. The Corgi diecast model was made in several variants, can be found in both UK and US and could be motorised with a 2” wheelbase truck. Powered versions have been made by Bowser, MTH and Lionel (both 3 rail). It is similar in length to the Bachmann 0n30 trolley, but wider, and being motorised in narrow gauge could be an option. Anyone else interested in these little cars? Dava

I visited Gothenburg in 2016 & enjoyed photographing the trams but didn’t see the vintage ones, sadly. Dava

Is this the best model shop in Nottinghamshire…..?

Light Railway Stores provides an ‘online marketplace’ and order fulfilment service for 18 small producers who don’t need to run their own online shops. It works well. https://www.lightrailwaystores.co.uk/ Dava