Joseph_Pestell

26 minutes ago, Michael Hodgson said:

I always thought the tavern car was an eccentric idea that some marketing type must have dreamed up, a;though I can see there would have been a market for it.  I had a colleague who always aimed to catch one particular train home from Liverpool Street as he was one of regulars in the bar. 

 

From what I've read of this vehicle,  it seems the brickwork was a fairly robust wallpaper.  How long woud this have lasted in practice, especially if they put it through a carraige washing plant using the nasty cleaning chemicals of the period like Exmover which even painted surfaces didn't like?  I don't think the quality of vinyls used for modern liveries would have been available back then.

Certainly strange to our eyes in an era of very standardised fixed set trains. But in reality only a continuation of many trains around the network for regular well-heeled commuters such as the "Club Trains" from Manchester to Southport and Blackpool. I think that the first of these dated from late Victorian times.

I lived and worked for a while in Moffat. When the branch there was still open, it had one through train to Glasgow each day (reversal at Beattock Jct) with special rolling stock.

1 hour ago, russell price said:

Got to have cider in Herefordshire. Maybe a harvest scene is too narrow a timescale  to have .

I used to grow various cider varieties. They ripen over quite a long period, late July through to October.

20 hours ago, ph64 said:

This was a huge show, but personally I found the crush in the main hall too much and somewhat unsafe, so left after about 30 minutes.

 

T

Plenty of space by comparison with some shows. Are you old enough to have experienced Central Hall? I also liked that there were several seating areas.

22 hours ago, Respite said:

I and I wonder how many people didn't see the exhibits upstairs.

Doncaster is a really good venue with its motorway, rail links and the car park being opposite the stadium.

Guilty as charged. And I had even seen in the Exhibition Guide that there was a second set of exhibits.

Put it down to extreme exhaustion which the quacks can still not  explain. Quite surprised that I even made it there, much the longest trip for several months even if it is only about 55 miles each way.

Signage in the hall is not great. Having got up to the food court, I could not find a way down again (I don't do down escalators).

I don't think that I have come across any RM webbers who dislike SK, or even doubt his enthusiasm. But that does not exempt him (or Hornby) from criticism.

38 minutes ago, Chris M said:

Bottom line is that Bachmann, Hornby, Dapol et al  know considerably more about the model railway market than any of us here on the forum. They will know what has been successful and what has not in terms of return on investment. For all businesses survival is all about maximising return on investment and their product strategy will be very much focused on what projects are expected to provide the most profit per £1 invested. There isn't much point in saying manufacturers should try this or that as they will be discussing the very same things but they will be armed with the knowledge of what has worked and not worked for them in the past. Our manufacturers will, quite rightly, do everything they can to run a profitable business. Whatever their strategy regarding price/detail they choose to follow I very much hope they succeed. It has to be said that while there appear to be quite a few successful model railway businesses in the UK at the moment I don't think any of them are making exceptional profits from current high prices.

Well, you would like to think so. But the record suggests that they don't. There have been several projects where the numbers sold would not have covered the development costs of the model and stocks remain. Many of us here could have warned them off.

And the bigger strategic decisions such as taking over ranges from other producers have been farcical.

I have been a long-term advocate of 1:120 TT but I never expected to see it happen. I agree with another contributor that it could be the right move to use 1:120 for a "Railroad" range. Just hope that they have learned from their 1:76 Railroad range how to differentiate the range properly for marketing purposes.

We had a Kia Soul 1.6 diesel, bought secondhand from a local dealer at 15k mileage. Great little car which was still going well at 110k. Only problem with it was the aircon.

37 minutes ago, luke_stevens said:

Bikes - Artitec

 

https://www.artitecshop.com/en/sport-bikes-23494130.html

 

https://www.langleymodels.co.uk/awd1/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=8015&search=bike

Branchlines has some suitable etched pushbikes. I have a few packs somewhere in store.

2 minutes ago, roythebus1 said:

Someone was mentioning on one of the AL1 threads about the lack of pulling power on the Trix motors. I've neot had a problem on any of my AL1s over the years. My locos done some very active service on the MRC's New Annington layout in the 1980s and ran faultlessly with 10 car trains. It's only now the traction tyres have disintegrated!

I have never had a problem with a Trix motor either. But given their age, it could well be that they need a remag.

Hope to be there. About 20 years since my last MMRS show.

But still in hospital which is how I missed Warley.

To answer your other point, whether or not there would be distant signals on the same doll as the starters would depend on how close the next signalling block (and box) is. This is probably not on scene on your layout but you still need to think about it as if it is. It could be a junction to a goods yard, a lead to a locomotive depot, a diverging route, etc.

This is case where it is easier to model a real location than a freelance model.

Well worth looking up the Signalling Record Society website. You can find diagrams showing various LMS termini which you get inspiration from.

I had a weekend in Paris last year travelling there and back on this line.

Issoudun does seem like an odd place as first stop on the return journey but stops at Les Aubrais and Vierzon might lead to some overcrowding. Perhaps they should stop there but to pick up only.

Can't remember which year, but I did do Paris-Toulouse once on the Capitole. Comfortable, but a long day.

2 hours ago, ScaleModelScenery said:

There are a couple of demo videos up on our YouTube channel. And if we get a minute I'll try and stream a bit live from Warley over the weekend.

https://www.youtube.com/c/ScaleModelScenerycouk/streams

There seem to be sound problems. Very low volume and someone else talking in the background.

1 minute ago, Jol Wilkinson said:

I think that the opposite may be the case, in that some people build "exhibition" layouts but don't base them on any particular prototype location, track layout and design, running/operating practises, signalling, etc. When much of what many modellers use are RTR/RTP products, they are restricted by what is available off the shelf/online or they have collected over the years.

 

My own layout wasn't of a prototypical location but used trackwork based upon the designs of the prototype railway in the period modelled, as were the signalling (planned by the author of the book on that specific subject), buildings, and stock. The only thing I couldn't accurately replicate were the Edwardian operation practises. However, we found that at most exhibitions, the viewers didn't know either and were mainly interested in just seeing trains run.

 

That was probably the reason why layouts such as Stoke Summit always attracted a good crowd.

I have enjoyed your layouts a lot.

Modelling a non-prototypical location but "getting it right" involves a lot of knowledge and research. As you say, many of the public won't care that much and yet I think some of them may go away with a niggling feeling that what they have seen is unrealistic and could be so much better.

8 minutes ago, Barry O said:

So to get the slope correct you need to alter how the tracks are positioned so irs no longer like the prototype?

 

It does actually work better that way.. you could always have asked the owner about it...

 

Seems like we need big roundsy round high speed main lines with shunting yards which don't get in the way of main line trains... should have brought my Battlespace turbocar along at the weekend. 

I didn't like Borchester in rhe flesh. The quarter  of an hour non operation every hour was a pain. Especially  when the first train of the next session fell off!

 

Baz

No, but perhaps consider whether that is the best prototype to choose for an exhibition layout. Or accept that there are compromises involved. After all, getting it into the shed at all involves curves that weren't there in the real world. No easy answers.

Perhaps not enough layouts shown at exhibitions have been designed with exhibition in mind. Entirely understandable as many have been designed for home use by the builder. I overheard one well-known layout builder say (this weekend) that he had never previously seen the "public side" of his layout as it had been built in his shed where it takes up all the space. The landscape on that layout, a prototype location, is fairly flat but is sloping down from the viewer towards the operator so not ideal for exhibition.

With luxury of space, surely the ideal exhibition layout is a four-track mainline with a goods yard (or similar) which can be shunted while traffic continues on three of the mainline tracks. Perhaps not too many such locations out there on the "real" railway.

But simpler layouts can also be entertaining if operated prototypically. How often have I seen a freight train reversed through a crossover onto the other running line and held to allow another train to pass? Not often if at all, yet it was very much a feature of the steam railway.

On 10/10/2022 at 13:13, farren said:

There’s a thing called the internet, you may have hard of it. All the youngsters bang on about it. You want young blood in the hobby you go where they are. 
 

 

The problem is that you can't actually deliver anything over the internet.

As high as needed. The landscape was there before the railway.

If the wall becomes too tall, either the railway would take another route, or there would be a tunnel.

I would suggest that you do a 3D drawing of that part of the layout. Or a 1:10 scale cardboard model so that you can see what looks right to you.. 

Only quite low walls can be built perpendicular. Most will need to be angled back into the hill (in reality thicker at the base.

23 minutes ago, Stephen Freeman said:

The French don't really do Marmalade at all, certainly not that brand, as far as I know. Now an interesting fact is that a certain DIY store in Sauze Vaussais used to cater for the home jam making and they sold jars of the same design as Bonne Mamman (of course on sale in UK as well even now, though I don't really rate them and nor do the French I think, as they are probably the least expensive brand there) now whether they were brand new or recycled I couldn't say...

You are behind the times. The French definitely do Marmalade these days. I think that "Orange Amere" has been in the Bonne Maman range for about 20 years.

Agreed that it was not well known 30+ years ago when my parents moved to France. Several orange trees' fruits were going to waste. But she taught several locals to make marmalade and it is now available in the village shop.

22 hours ago, Michael Hodgson said:

I think those who take layouts to exhibitions and achieve less obvious board joints just take along some spare ballast and flock to sprinkle loose over the joint when they erect the layout and accept that it will be lost when they take it down again.  And strategically placed hoardings, road vehicles or huts etc can be used to conceal or at least distract the eye from any joins like the breaks in the fences shown above.

An exhibition anecdote from a long time ago.

A club offered to exhibit at our exhibition (one of the best 4mm exhibition layouts of its time) with the prime selling point that one could not see the joins (as Eric would have said to Ernie).

The downside was that they needed access to the exhibition hall 24 hours in advance which we could not arrange (or afford).

I am still having difficulties getting into the site at all, including being directed to a page that says the site does not exist.

I have got here by fairly random methods but many others may not be so lucky.

Can't remember the name but there was a guy in the Bournemouth area who used to stock them.

Like JZ, I have a few which I don't think that I will get round to using (ex-shop stock. I used to sell quite a lot of them.)

You are no doubt familiar with the trick of "converting" to 4mm scale by raising onto a dwarf wall of brick.

12 minutes ago, KeithMacdonald said:

Has P&O Ferries had a "Ratner moment"?

 

 

 

 

 

Reputational damage

 

 

 

https://www.personneltoday.com/hr/po-ferries-boss-questioned-by-mps-shameless-criminal/

 

Much the same in an account of his meeting with Scottish MPs

 

https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/politics/po-5-shocking-moments-peter-26582714

I can't defend P&O's actions - not least because I have family in Dover, some of whom have worked for them.

But I found the conduct of the MPs on the Select Committee rather poor.

Since then I have learned that, as I already suspected, the roots of P&O's action is the arrival of Irish Ferries on Dover-Calais, with, you guessed it, an agency crew paid at lower rates.

Grant Shapps seems to have rather a lot of responsibility in all of this. With, if I recall correctly, 40% of EU/UK goods coming via Calais, this is an important issue that UK Govt really does need to get a grip on. Not to mention the 6 hour delays for cars this weekend..

On 11/03/2022 at 14:04, woodenhead said:

I guess because in many cases the Oligarchs purchased companies like Chelsea at an arms length and in some cases using shell companies to make it harder to trace where the money came from.  Then there are the strangely rich ladies spending large amounts on credit cards with no apparent source of income, one lady from Russia went from being a cleaner to owning a bank.

 

What upsets me is that the Government quite happily allowed all this to happen, for large swathes of cities to be bought up by faceless shell companies to launder foreign money.  Looking at the backgrounds of these people, they should never have been welcomed into the UK and now it is coming home to roost.

I don't disagree at all with what you have said. But you have not answered the question. (Have you considered a career as a politician?)

A company (in this case a PLC which is little unusual when there is a sole owner) has its own legal "personality". So it should be treated separately from Abramovitch.  Seems to me that Govt , and the Chelski lawyers, have made a basic error here.