TomE

Livery samples for the Dapol Class 59 revealed: More images here Tom.

Think the Line was named before the shopping centre opened. Seems to be around 1988 for the line name and 1992 for the shopping centre. Could be the centre was actually named after the line! Tom.

I believe the name was the result of a competition to decide one, and it was derived from stations served along the route, ''Har''-lequin for ''Har''-row Har-''le''-quin for Wil-''le''-sden Harle-''quin'' for ''Queen''s Park Once named the logo was designed using the Harlequin pattern Tom.

New livery samples for some 313s were on display at the NGS York show: More photos viewable here Tom.

On display at the NGS York show were the first engineering samples for the 1938 stock: There are more photos of the samples here Tom.

It's great to see the 9 car sets coming, especially as their large production runs will make the pricing attractive for a full length unit. Like Steven I really hope they follow up with the 802 in TransPennine/GWR/Hull Trains and 803 in Lumo and in time the 805 and maybe even the 810, although the later would effectively have to be a new model given the new nose and shorter coach length. There is potentially a lot of milage in this for KATO. Tom.

Back home and reflecting on the show, and overall I enjoyed the event despite some of the issues. I’m sure the NGS will learn from this and use the experience gained for future events. The choice of the NRM as a venue was not fundamentally flawed, holding a model railway event at a venue like that is a solid choice, but the space available and layout probably wasn’t adequate in truth. It might have worked better if some of the layouts had been dotted around the main hall in a similar style to the Swindon show held at STEAM, if that were possible. I don’t know what sort of numbers were expected, but the positive take away is that British N Gauge appears to be in rude Health if the length of the queue on Saturday is anything to go by! So well done to the volunteers who organised and ran the event on the day, especially in the face of some of the challenges faced. Hopefully this doesn’t put the NGS off organising future events as they’re a great way to promote the scale. Tom.

Much better today, seems to be a bit less footfall. No queue at present. Tom.

Just a heads up, there seems to be some sort of issue with the NRM limiting the number of people entering the show, so the queue is currently pretty lengthy and slow moving. Suspect this is outside the control of the NGS but people should be aware there is likely to be a long wait to get in. Tom.

The prototypes were tall things, and did stand taller than Mk.1 stock: Tom.

No real need, it's already in controlled airspace. The biggest disruption will come from the flypast (the details of which are all publicly available via NATS: https://www.aurora.nats.co.uk/htmlAIP/Publications/2023-04-06/html/eAIC/EG-eAIC-2023-024-M-en-GB.html) Tom.

The Freightliner Powerhaul 90s have arrived/are arriving. Tom.

It’s nice to see they’ve done the WCRC coaches too. Ideal if you want to recreate a modern day charter rake! Tom.

Not specifically for what I have in mind, which is the Wherry Lines loco hauled formations of loco/BSO/TSO/TSO/loco. That said, I wouldn't say no to a flush front DBSO, as a DRS one did make appearances on those services (On that note, add DRS livery to future Mk.2f releases please Bachmann! Tom.

It looks very at home there! Stands up well next to the 2FS stock. Tom.

If I had to admit to one minor disappointment from today's announcements, it's that there were no Anglia Mk.2s. It's such a wide travelled livery now spanning quite a long period and goes with all manner of motive power that I'm sure they'd be popular with modern scene modellers. Can we expect some Steadfast Virgin blanking transfers coming in the future?😉 It's unlikely there'll be another list as long as this quarter's, but I suspect Bachmann are not completely done with N Gauge for this year. Tom.

Good to see coaching stock announced, hopefully all those clamouring for it in the past few years will put their money where their mouths are! A few of those Virgin Mk.2fs will certainly be heading in my direction. Excellent set of announcements for N Gauge I reckon. The NGN summary is now up here Tom.

Good that a solution is available, I’ll be interested to see how people get on with the suggested modification. Will those versions yet to arrive be modified by the factory prior to delivery? It also means those with printing that is currently level like those shown here will now be out of alignment, which is a bit unfortunate! Tom.

Comment from Dapol on their digest: Tom.

I popped down to the local shop to have a look at one in the flesh and all models they had received had a very noticeable nose down attitude, even when placed on the track, so not it’s not the the flanges on the pony. It’s almost as if the new chassis has been designed around drivers of the correct diameter but then they’ve fitted smaller diameter ones like the previous version. They were in the process of returning the entire delivery. Disappointing, as they seem to run reasonably well but no point having one if it looks like it’s about to dive, dive, dive! Tom.

Not the camera angle, and these are photos of model rails have received in to stock. I’d like to pick one up for Ropley, but curious if this is just an oddity or if it’s a wider issue. Tom.

Has anyone picked up one of the updated M7's yet? Curious to know if the nose down slope affects all models or it's just unfortunate Rails photographed two models with the same issue. Cheers, Tom.

Didn't realise there was a thread running here too! News here: https://bit.ly/43jK6VV Tom.

News! latest samples have arrived. ETA now Q3 2023. https://bit.ly/414oVp9 Tom.

The one thing I noticed was the rain strip is a continuous curve, whereas there are subtle changes in angle on the real thing. My suspicion is that the windows are flat across the front where the outer windows should rake back very very slightly. The photo below shows this quite well - notice the slight change in angle between the drivers window and the centre pane: The areas in question highlighted: Subtle, but noticeable in the right light. I appreciate these are 3D prints and it's difficult to tell sometimes if features are there or not on these at such small size but looking back at the CAD I don't think it's on there either, and it's the one area that struck me as perhaps needing a little attention. Edit to add, this photo shows the changes in angle of the rain strip quite nicely: Tom.