adrianbs

Hi All, Sorry to hear that Chris, Just hope you need a fair few for your layout. You can always get rid of the rest as Freebies with the magazine !! Just joking, they will of course sell like hot cakes since nobody knows what's wrong with them, apart from the select few who read these posts. If you get the picture sufficiently out of focus they won't be able to see the rivets anyway. The trouble is these days with these new fangled digit cameras you just point your digit and shoot and the picture is perfect. I'm guessing that if we did not have these new cameras, model standards would not have improved over the last 10 years. Trouble is some manufacturers must still be using box brownies for research. For goodness sake "The Nth degree" don't give them ideas, I think I would have an unfortunate accident within days, you know how the Triads work. Regards and apologies to all who have bought SR brake vans on the strengh of the published reviews adrianbs

Hi Autocoach, Isn't it annoying when a manufacturer throws in a few extra free "Rivets" !! If only the Torpedo vents had been 10% larger they would have been spot-on for the Dapol O gauge model !! Do you know my friend Scott Maze in Walnut Creek by the way. He and I use fingers for counting rivets, this was fine in the good old tinplate days but has literally got out of hands these days. Like you, I should have left the model in the box instead of trying to use it. These days it seems as if one model after another is a "Best left in the box" . I nearly had a go at altering the old K's Kits Brake van when I finished up with the patterns. I thought rather better of it when I realised that the only usable bits on my built model were the buffers and the coupling hooks and they were from my own range anyway. A set of buffers is hardly a good start for a new set of patterns even if they are a rather fiddly item. Thanks for the award, thats the 40th year in succession now and the award did not exist before that anyway, since it had not occurred to anybody to count rivets, apart from a certain Mr J S Beeson.who was rather good at it and explained his methods to me. No idea what he was talking about though, seemed to be something to do with relativity and the distance between hemispherical bodies. Best of luck with the Cambrian Kit, I read the article on one of the forums and decided either to scratchbuild or wait for a decent RTR, looks like it's scratchbuilding again.!! Regards adrianbs

Hi All, And it won the wagon of the year award !! I I presume this was because the rivets were so small the reviewers could not see them, which may mean the Dapol model is not so lucky being in "O Scale" in spite of being "more accurate" ??? Regards all adrianbs

Some of the more obvious FAULTS on Bachmann 4mm SR BRAKE VANS 1 Roof on LH van is mirrored to the correct design i.e. it is the same as 2+2 van so roof end is also incorrect. 2 Rivets on body planking uprights incorrect, one extra pair throwing out alignment very badly in places. 3 Some rivets missing on solebars of LH van ( As per Chorley drawing which is wrong ) 4 Unnecessary rivets alongside duckets on cabin corners (As per Chorley ) 5 4 very large bolts on platform ends missing 6 Buffer beams have reinforcing plates which vere not used until later years and some rivets are missing 7 Axleboxes are BR variant on all versions including SR and rather crude. 8 Springs are very low relief outboard of “ W” irons which are very thick and rather crude. 9 Steps supports on LH van are not tapered in at the top. 10 Plank grooves are far too wide and deep and spoil the appearance. 11 Sandboxe lids are incorrect slope on 2+2 vans but OK on LH vans. Odd, as they are different mouldings. 12 There are no bolts on the cabin end corners ( Technically may be rather difficult but not impossible) 13 The torpedo vents are too large for oval type or the wrong shape if meant to be the rarer round type. 14 The screw heads on the Ducket are about 3 times the correct size and would have been better omitted. 15 The SR lettering is one plank too high on the large lettering versions. Looks rather odd. 16 Rivetting on verandah end pillars is incorrect on the end face. 17 Hook plate is 2+2 type for both versions, LH vans have 6 rivets. 18 Lower footsteps are far too high on all variants. 19 Solebars of all SR livery variants should be brown, the same colour as the body 20 The brake rigging is correct for the LH ducket type but the handbrake crank is wrong for the 2+2 Other points to note. The “air cylinders” people keep referring to are NOT air cylinders but are fairly standard vacuum brake cylinders which were fitted ONLY to MOD/WD vans but are quite common on preserved vans as most were bought cheap when the MOD sold them off. Only 2 vans in BR days had them and both were ex MOD. There are two different chassis mouldings, one for LH vans with “W” irons and one with “Plate” axleguards for the 2+2 vans. The first batch of EVEN PLANK RH ducket vans also had the “W” type whilst the majority had the later plate version I believe that, apart from ex MOD vans, no vans were ever air or vacuum braked but in later years were piped. Valves in the cabin which enabled the brakes to be applied were fitted, hence the pipework on the bodyside of those vans and the bauxite livery. Regards all adrianbs

Hi The reference "GWR Freight Wagons and Loads in service on the Great Western Railway and British Rail Western Region" by J H Russell Pub. OPC shows exactly what these wagons look like as they are unloading and clearly shows the floor position. If only Flangeway had done some proper research they would have raised the floor of the body to the CORRECT position and put the ballast weight in the recess underneath. This would have allowed the chassis members to have been made full depth,and the top of the vacuum cylinder to have been moulded on. Modifying the position of the floor may have prevented the unfortunate sag of the body. The axleguards, brakegear, buffers and guide mechanism would still need total replacedment or major reworking to produce a reasonably accurate model of either the early BR unfitted version or the GWR version and even more work would be required to produce the later vacuum fitted variants. It is pity they mistakenly assumed the vacuum fitted versions have the Vee hanger in the same position as the unfitted wagons. They have finished up making a true chimera which is very difficult to convert into any of the 3 possible variants with many components which cannot be used at all for a reasonably accurate model.!! A

Hi All One of my friends showed me a couple of the latest Dapol "7 Plank" releases and apart from the brake lever they have also altered the left hand push rod which, as I had already noted earlier, was directly in line with the pivot on the vee hanger instead of below it. As such it would not have actually moved the brakeshoe. It is now well below the vee but actually looks rather worse the way they have done it than it did previously. The tumbler has been over emphasised and and looks very odd especially as they have not changed the right hand pushrod which still ends only slightly above the Vee pivot . I would have thought that if they were going to do any rectification to the tool they mght just as well have done the whole of the brakegear not just one bit which aesthetically has actually made it look worse ( in my opinion ! ) Still, perhaps these Dapol wagons are not long for this world if they really do intend to work in conjunction with RW and not try to compete with his business. Regards all adrianbs

Hi all, Who has received or bought a Dapol 2014/5 catalogue and have they disclosed anything of interest regarding new O gauge items ??. The N gauge section of the catalogue has been fully copied on the Internet but the OO and O sections have been omitted. The list of N gauge new items looks like it will take them well past 2015 unless they are able to double or treble the rate of production compared with the last couple of years. RW and any other designers are certainly going to be busy bees to keep all those items on time let alone the new 4 and 7mm items which have already been promissed or hinted at. .I wonder if there will be any further prepro images of upgraded SR brake vans and milk tanks or if they will be produced without any significant changes to satisfy delivery commitments. It has been observed elsewhere that Andy Y usually has all the latest information and keeps us posted about what will be coming but so far there has not been any info on this forum. Regards All adrianbs

Hi All I have had a chance to see the pictures of the prepro/EP brake tender in the Hornby Magazine and as Clive says in post 183 the model does appear to be the same as the last CADs with all the ghastly mistakes still present apart from what looks like a 3D printed brakeshoe unit quite different to the originals. The pictures are not that fantastic but all the body and bogie errors seem to have been incorporated and the model seems to sit very high on the bogies as well. The only improvement may be the body length is now a 555 assuming the dimensions have been corrected but I can't tell that from photos anyway. I had no time whilst talking to RW at the Kettering GOG show about progress on the DBT. I was more concerned about the errors on the Dapol 7mm SR brakevan. As It appears that all the EP bogie tooling will have to be scrapped I would still think a 556 might be the cheap way out. I am not sure if the EP tooling is proper dies or if it is perhaps just 3D prints which are relatively cheap. It still seems to me to be a very expensive process to produce a complete model prototype with so many obvious errors. I sometimes bin bits of patterns when something goes wrong or I find I am up against a brick wall to proceed and need a rethink. I have never had to start again on a completed model apart from some where patterns were supplied by someone else or I have bought them in. I am beginning to see where the high price of this model may even have to go higher or the profit margin will disappear. Keep your fingers crossed the tooling money has not run out yet !! regards adrianbs

Hi All, Very busy Kettering show as usual and I had no time to look around for the Dapol stand. Did they have anything new on show ?? RW only had samples of his 8 plank POWs as far as I could see. I supplied RW with a few notes about errors on the SR brakevan, a photo of which is visible on the Tower site, but there were others I discovered on closer inspection after the show, when I had more time to spare. I was hoping it might be worth buying to replace my SR Brakevan showcase model which was stolen at Telford. At the moment it still looks like I will have to build myself another unless Dapol have done a lot of extra work on it. I would have expected Dapol to have EPs or samples of the 3 modern image wagons and perhaps a list of these 8 new wagons on their stand although there is nothing at all on their internet site and the SR B/van is not even mentioned. We still don't know which version of the SR B/van will be made apart from the colour schemes listed by Tower nor indeed which prototypes the milk tanker is supposed to be based upon. The photo of the latter on the Tower site is still a composite of GWR and LMS designs with some components not suitable for any milk tank at all. With Tower's announcement of new "Specials" based on RW's wagons I have s feeling the days of the Dapol POWs may be numbered apart from the short run freelance specials which may still be produced for individul shops and societies. Regards to all adrianbs

Hi All and epecially Coachman et al Quite a coincidence that having been discussing Britrail and Samhongsa brass OO models our local auctioneers, Cottees of Wareham, have a number of both coming up for sale in March. They rarely turn up these days and certainly not in multiple. They are more of interest now as curios rather than models for use but no doubt they will sell Regards All adrianbs

Hi All, Just been having a quick look at my old MRN back numbers around '50 -'53 and the Korean war certainly caused shortages, indeed one advert said the Government had made it illegal to use brass but I think this simply caused serious shortages rather than a change to Ali. This afternoon was spent with the local EM group and one of the more senior members knew Rob Kennedy ( of the bogies) as he was in the same local club. Apparently his castings were made by a Jim Hewitt, whose name is new to me, in his garden shed. He also remembers Bob Wills as being the local model shop and to my surprise said Bob was still with us, at least last year, so most likely is still around as I have heard nothing to the contrary. I am making an inspired guess that Mr Jackson probaly made the turned parts for Nucro/Acro and also supplied W & H who at that time were still Walkers and Holtzapffel Ltd. Many of the turned brass parts seem similar in both the W & H and Nucro ranges. Bradshaw Model Products seem to have taken over the Acro range in the late '50s. About the only Trade name that has survived intact since the early '50s is PECO although certain products have survived under new ownership. In that period there are no adverts for Jackson products although Kennedy bogies are advertised quite separately to Wills and perhaps Wills took over the production from Jim Hewitt at some point. Maybe others can add to the story.?? adrianbs

Hi All, I think you will have to contact Markits for availability of these couplings. Romford models are now sold through the Markits range and many parts are now made by them. adrianbs

Hi All I decided to try and get some of the story on Jackson's wheels from the horse's mouth or to be more accurate the mouth of the venerable Frank Harris of Romford, still doing a full days work every day at 82 with the able assistance of his young lady of 85 !!!!! He has no knowledge of Nucro/Acro but did take over the Jackson's wheels range when the latter retired in 1958. Until 1972 production continued for W & H who basically owned the Romford name and they wanted to continue the Jackson name as it had a very good reputation In 1972 Frank bought out the Romford name and continued supplying to this day. W & H crashed and burned in the '80s I think and Frank was seriously affected as they were his major customer. More later adrianbs

Hi All, Can anybody add the pictures in the Feb. H/M to this site, I am not going to buy it but, if it is not copyright, it would be useful to see the pictures. Otherwise I will have to ask a little bird to email them to me. adrianbs

Hi All Also interesting as it appears to show the side panels to be more or less straight with a bend at the bottom rather than a curve tightening over the solebars. Also has a full set of steps which only seems to have been seen on those 3 DBTs perhaps and maybe some were removed later. adrianbs

Hi All Aluminium has problems in that it is certainly a very good conductor, they now use it in power transmission cables I believe and it is much lighter and cheaper than copper and about the same strength. It has one awful drawback though if used for things like wheels, it is very reactive and oxidises in a few seconds when exposed to air. The oxide is a very good insulator and that is why they don't collect current well and spark as the aluminium turns to oxide. If you can manage to remove the oxide fast enough it will burn in an oxygen rich atmosphere. Nickel silver on the other hand does not oxidise very easily and I believe the oxide is somewhat conductive. Brass is nowhere near as good as N/S which is why Hamblings wheels never performed well. It took a lot of persuading to get Frank at Romford to produce batches of N/S small wheels for my tram kits but the extra cost was worth it as the wheels pick up far better. On a 4 wheel tram with only 10.5mm wheels this makes a lot of difference !! I could never get Hamblings wheels properly quartered even with their wheel press and they always seemed to wobble but I could set up Romfords in my Unimat and get them running square with a dodge I learnt at BAC You get them spinning fast on an axle and lightly tap the rim with a pin hammer, after a couple of taps they run true if you are lucky. You then returned them to get them concentric but made sure by marking the wheel and axle you could always get them on again in the same position. The difference in running could be dramatic but the quality seems better these days anyway. Bye for now adrianbs

Hi All The Ali wheels must have come much later than '53 as I was buying them to put in my kits, very reluctantly, no earlier than about 1973. I had never seen any ali wheels by Romford etc before that and the only others were the Stephen Poole kits that I can remember using it I will have to give Frank at Romford a ring to get the story on Jackson etc etc. My first car was a sit-up-and-beg Ford Pop which had an 1172cc engine but refused to exceed 55mph down a steep hill with following wind. At that point the steering became unstable and frightened the life out of me. It only did about 30MPG driven at 40MPH and burnt out the valves at 5000 mile intervals !!! The following "Woody" Cortina estate was luixury by comparison. Ernest Rankine Gray of ERG used to call round for years after selling the business, he built W/M kits for people and would bring the scrap bits round when he wanted to buy things to get a discount. ! His "partner in crime" Hugh Wild was a member of our GOG group in Wimborne and scratch built O gauge locos to supplement his pension until he passed away. The two of them built the huge OO model railway in Boscombe which I first saw when on holiday from London in the late '40s early '50s. They built everything from baseboards to auto control electrics to locos and rolling stock and scenery themselves.!! Although already a Hornby O gauge Tinplate owner that layout probably was a major influence on my later activities. With reference to my wheels, which also appeared in O gauge for the same reason, they would have been done with metal tyres as the mould and the design was already sorted but I could just not afford the investment for the quantities required and still live. A pity really but I was not prepared to gamble with Bank loans with so little assets behind me. Soon after that the brass wheels returned followed by MGW etc etc so I might not have been able to recoup my money. Regards Alll adrianbs

Hi All My white Granada !! ah yes, happy days, I really knew I had arrived when I bought that, brand new for cash !!. A little aside, when I went to buy it my first port of call was the Ford agent, English's jointly owned by none other than Ronnie Hoare, of RJH fame later, but also the owner of the Bromford and High Peak 7mm layout with all the lovely Beeson, Vic Green and other tasty locos, not to mention the Ferrari concession.The Layout was in a shed behind the filling station fence next to the showrooms at that time. I breezed in with my work clothes on and asked if they had a white Granada estate and the saleman said no, there were none there and suggested there were none in the area so it left me the choice of a blue one or another colour which I did not like. I asked if I could have a test drive and was told that unless I wished to buy the blue car that was not going to happen. I said I could not make my mind up but would like a drive and was refused. I walked out, drove a mile to the Hendy-Lennox Ford agent and was most courteously received, shown 2 white Granadas and offered a drive before I had a chance to ask. They then offered me way more than expected for my Cortina Mk 2 estate which was full of rust so I drove home in a new car for the first time in my life. I mentioned this to Hugh Joslin in passing as he was the Poole and District Model Railway Society secretary and also looked after the Layout for Col. Hoare. He must have passed this on to the Colonel who apparently dealt severely with the salesman. Brian should have been glad the bogies were in pairs, a major encouragment for the modellers to come back for a second twin set !! By the way the Granada didn't do a lot of "chugging", not with it's 2.6 V4 engine it did'nt but it did get through a lot of petrol. Driving all round London on a delivery day when I might well drop off 7 or 8 orders from Mill Hill to KX to Hobbytime and various points between and then back home it only averaged about 18MPG in town and maxed at 25 on a long trip.!!! That's all for now adrianbs

Hi All again. I have just checked my Nucro ICI tanker and the wheels are definitely not steel but brass and appear original, being the same as the other wagons I have. Whether or not they were made by Frank at Romford or elsewhere I don't know. The change over to Aluminium wheels must have been in the early '70s as my kits started with brass Romfords. The ali wheels were a disaster and so I set up to make our own all plastic wheels with pinpoint axles at 26mm. The Romfords still had the longer axles without points.until they reverted to brass. I must admit that I called the wheels "Jacksons" for years and still do occasionally, perhaps Romford were always the source or perhaps took the production over when Nucro disappeared. So where did Jackson come in ?? The Coachcraft models intrigued me but I have never even seen one. I was told that they were press formed plastic sheet. If anyone knows more it would be nice to hear. LMC's 2 Bakelite coaches plus their Box van and "POW" mineral appeared just before the war but as far as I know were never reissued. They were very fragile and although they were of a similar standard to the recent MTH LMS coaches were alas far too short and very very difficult to kitbash by making 4 into 3. It was so very easy to finish up with bits breaking off and even modern adhesives don't seem to like Bakelite as I found when trying to make 2 damaged vans into an LMS 6 wheel fish van !!. Fortunately I had recourse to some industrial grade Epoxy at BAC and it is still in one piece. Looks like there is still a lot of history to be unearthed, regards all adrianbs

Hi 5050, Thanks for that contribution on Acro/Nucro/Wills, Those are the adds I used to come across in old issues of magazines I found in places like Lens of Sutton. I still cannot fathom out the connections however, nor those involved, apart from Bob Wills himself. Nucro seems to have still been operating alongside Wills although I assume Acro became Nucro somehow. The wheels on the Nucro bogies were in brass on the examples I have but not quite the same profile as Romfords. I have one of the ICI tankers and two or three each of the NER Quad bogie bolsters and GWR Crocodile H bogie well wagons. The latter are nearly as good as the Mainline one. They also made wagon solebats and other components besides those listed. The Wills wagon kits came along in about the early 50s but by 1961 when I was in London they seem to have disappeared apart from odd ones in shops. The early Wills catalogue I have, shows all the coach and wagon parts which I think may have been derived from the wood body coach kits by Ratio and CCW plus all the Kennedy bogies. The suspension on the latter of which I had a few is quite different to the Nucro version. It comprised 3 Nickel silver plates. 2 fitted into slots at the rear of the side. either glued or solder giving a compensating box and the third bent down at the ends to act as springing. I have never seen any other version but since I have seen so few the design may have changed or people may have fitted Nucro units to Wills bogie sides. Regards adrianbs .

Hi Baby Deltic, That's what I have been doing for 40 years but I don't wish to upset Cambrian who I know well and make a nice kit already. I may make a conversion kit though to convert the Flangeway one to the GW or 573 version for those who need them but it may be that so much work is involved I may just sell on my Flangeway ones to some modeller with much lower standards and make do with something different,. adrianbs

Hi All Bit off subject but nobody seems to mind, NUCRO / ACRO. Does anyone have the history of these two names. They came and went before most of the other kit makers appeared. I could never find out what happened to them and who was involved. There can't be many left now who are old enough to have know them first hand whilst they were still in business but they may have been involved in other activities afterwards. Their products inspired me rather more than K's or some of the other ranges of wagon kits. When I arrived back in London in the early 60s I used to occasionally come across, and usually snapped up, their bogie wagon kits. They made wagon parts and coach bogies well before Kenline and Ks but although a few parts went into the Wills range they seem to have been recasts of the originals. I am not sure if Rex Kennedy was involved in the patten making but later the Wills/Kennedy bogies appeared which were also to a high standard but also were only around for a fairly short period. I very clearly remember building a set of commonwealth bogies whist in Digs opposite the Star and Garter in Putney and curing the Aradite over the Paraffin stove I had for heating. The smell of paraffin plus hot araldite was not very pleasant !! I later became well acquainted with these adhesives when working at BAC. and even made a plastic injection mould from it for moulding a 7mm SR 3500 gallon tender axleguard. The mould disintegrated after about a dozen shots but the mouldings were quite good, for their time !! That was my first attempt at low cost tooling for moulded plastic parts, I had more success later but used other methods. later. Better get to bed now adrianbs

Hi All A little bird told me that perhaps all is not lost and more work is being done on the design by someone new, so although the model will probably be delayed further it may be worth the wait. Alas I don't think it will revert to being a dia 556 unless it is found to be a way of reducing the costs incurred by yet another redesign if available LMS bogies are used . Regards all adrianbs

Hi Brian et al. I think I have a pretty good idea who the HRH might be. Many years ago I was involved with the originator of the Wrightlines Narrow Gauge range. Russell Wright was a bass player in the Bournemouth Synphony Orchestra and very much into NG. At the time I was trying my damndest not to add any more personal interests to my already wide range but I did some castings for him. Then I got more involved when he acquired various Roy Link kits and a certain WD 4-6-0 WW1 Baldwin tank loco pattern set from Roger Chivers. I heavily modified about half this kit to make it easier to cast and more accurate and decided to make one up to check if it was OK. Fatal mistake! Shortly afterward 2 real locos arrived from India for preserrvation and a Royal Patron was to inspect one, on a low loader, outside a Hotel in London. A few days before the event Russell was asked to provide a Display fully finished model for presentation to their patron by the society which had brought the loco back. My model was Russell's display model and quite clearly the timescale to make and paint another model was quite impossible so my model was press ganged with the promise that the society involved would pay to have my model replaced . They may have already approached a builder but he had also said the time available was insufficient. Eventually I received a very nice replacement,which I still have. It is actually rather nicer than the original !! With regards my casting shed the sequence of events was like this, In 1970 I bought a casting machine which took me quite a long time to save up for. Before that I had made some Tram Patterns for Bec Models but in those days if you wanted your own kits produced you GAVE the caster ( Ks, Wills Bec or Gem were the main ones ) your patterns in return for a few sets of castings. Having been "Out the back" at Tooting Bec I knew what was involved and decided that to become A FAMOUS MODEL RAILWAY MANUFACTURER I would need to buy a machine for myself. This was installed in my parents very large somewhat derelict garden shed which was built in WW2 as the Radio Shack for D Day preparations around Poole harbour. Originally it had a reinforced 7' high blast wall all round but one end was already missing when the plot was bought in about 1952 to build a new house. This gave access for cars etc to the wooden shed inside. Unfortunately the blast wall next to the new house was completely removed when that was built in 1959/60. The shed was later improved at one end to make a more draught proof casting area and eventually housed 2 employees. This came to an end when the local vigilantes of the Residents Association informed the council about certain local people using premises for commercial puruposes and the inspector came round asking if I was using the shed for making Kitchen units. Actually there was another resident doing this but I got caught in his place and had to arrange to move out,. initially to Geoff Barlow's back room, as above, the shop being about 50 yards from the up end of Poole station and we continued there for a few years until the whole of the area was redeveloped. At that point it looked as though real problems were ahead as small workshops were almost non existent and the few available were very expensive. By great good fortune. I was able to kill 2 birds with one stone because BR had just realised that the precast concrete building at the other end of the station belonged to them but the rent was only a peppercorn one. The buiding was 40' x 25' and occupied by the Poole and District Model Railway Society of which I was, of course, a leading light ( not !) BR increased their demands overnight from £90 per year to £1000, totally beyond the means of the members. After much negotiation with BR, the Council and the PDMRS the demand was reduced to £500 and I had a small section of the building to move into, with various restrictions imposed by all parties. This is still the situation although having partly retired I have no employees and do much less casting. There have been a number of scares that BR were going to use this area, initially it had been earmarked as the Sub station for the Weymouth Electification so the club, having moved from Branksome station had a very short notice of eviction and the low rent to compensate. BR never built the sub-stations which is why there is a limit on the number of trains on the Poole- Weymouth section. Recently the new signalling contrlol boxes have been assembled on the adjacent land but have not needed the Clubroom and some year ago there was a plan to install a siding which came to nothing. So that's it for the moment Regards all adrianbs

Hi Ian Am,amazed you still have the moulds for the Sentinel. I missed out when it was first around with Bill and when I needed one I had quite a job tracking Autocom down and was surprised to find he had some sets of mouldings etc but no motor or wheels. It is still in a tin awaiting one of my own chassis to make it go,. although I had better hurry up or it will finish up on an executors bring and buy stand. I knew Bill was into something fairly religious but had forgotten which Diagram Number it was. You are right about the fostering, he had a houseful when I stayed over one time and I could not work out which were his. There is already a book on w/m model car makers as I had to divulge some of my less reputable activities for it !! Fortunately some of the others had already passed on to the great motorway in the sky so they did not suffer the embarassment of some of the disclosures.. The Brackenborough bus brings back memories, I built the GWR version shortly after it came out and now it is in my range but it was through that I got to know Alan B. around the same time, although he was not into O gauge then, apart from painting the odd loco for friends as far as I know. One of the best modellers in the country not to mention his painting and more especially his lettering and lining. I met Beeson a few times but although his models are works of art I would go for less "showy" locos built by others for myself, not that I can afford the prices very often.. I built a turnout using KX chairs and Copper clad and although I found it much easier and quicker than I expected I could never disguise the insulating gap in the sleepers to my satisfaction. When I went back to buy some more chairs later on, the tool had either broken or worn out and they were never produced again. Like the Stationmaster I wanted them for my Brunel fan timber viaduct which still has no track or piers, I blame Pendon for that. The abs coach looks pretty good even today but had I had enough money I would have had injection mouldings done for the side and roof. This was done for the N gauge versions and was a far better job but they were small enough to mould " in house " on a handraulic machine. Peter Chatham of PC models and Maj Models had similar ideas and Maj actually did get mouldings made. but the fixing of the printed sides was always a problem in the long term. I tried to find a screen printer who would print directly onto moulded sides but none wanted to try it and Tampo printing was unknown at the time, at least to me anyway. The potential was there but not the finance or the technique, today almos everything is finished that way. Keep the stories coming, we may be able to get a book out of yet !! adrianbs .