JSpencer

They did a separate thread for those. And agree they are certainly welcome....

Just what the doctor ordered. More SECR and LBSCR opens to balance out my rather van heavy fleet.

For the livery, only a stamp and some artists images of the time. No hint that the underframe was yellow though. But the body seems to fit well within the theme. The trunk is glued on but people can obvious add and sheet up more if they don't mind them not going back in the boxes anymore.

The mail arrived yesterday with a mail coach. I don't think this was ever done as a modern replica but I feel it adds something nice on the end of the train.

Whoa! Those differences must be really subtle. I could spot differences in rivets and buffers, there might be a slight dimension difference too..... You guy's really go to extremes LOL

@RapidoCorbs Do we know if W2 Yarmouth model will be like Medina or W4 (IOW style) please? Or if it is the later boiler/chimney versions?

It should be possible to design the plunger pickups so that current goes from the wheel to the plunger part and then directly onto the sleeve without going through the springs. (From memory Rapido use a split chassis). My guess is that dirt/oil block contact between the plunger part and sleeve leaving just the spring which is not only thin but acts like an inductor (worse on AC). In chassis I have made that used plunger pickups, the sliding cylinder isolated the pick up from the chassis, but a thing rod would go through the entire spring to be attached to a wire.

Could you not just set both chips to the same address.... ah oops... I guess under DCC you could and reverse direction of one chip via the CV (I did that for TTS). But not the app itself which would see 2 distinct blue tooth addresses.

nope - the closest is currently the class 73

It used the Britannia chassis for the tender.

Nah, save your money and wait for the Accurascale class 33 to be announced instead.... (my hopes).

Indeed, my adventure was similar. I brought the NSE version upon release, that was about £130 at the time. And found it was not as good as the CEP which I had brought for £120 at the time of it's release. About a year later I picked up a bargain all blue VEP for £80. The blue/grey dragged it's heals for a few years and the second run of CEPs were not selling fast either. So I got a second CEP cheaper than the first. When the Blue/grey VEP finally appeared, I decided against it, as I now had two VEPs (all blue and NSE) and two CEPs (both blue grey + an MLV). When the blue/grey VEPs went for £99, I brought one of those too. I have not brought the latest VEPs as the liveries are beyond my era. Anyway, the years dragged on and finally Bachmann released the 4-BEP, more expensive than the price I paid for the two CEPs and MLV. But - after allowing some time to pass - I picked one up at a slightly higher discount (I now had a full boat train!). As for prices of older VEPs, a certain auction site is showing all blue ones between £200 and £300 right now, but one was sold earlier today at £137 (normal bidding conditions). So I am always careful of what people ask for these things on that site and what they are actually worth. Heck, even old Dapol open wagons with big coupling hooks are on there asking for £30 to £40!

I cannot comment for the latest units, but the originals are a handful of clips on both sides (and maybe one in the nose). I merely slide stiff card down the sides and pull from the inner end. A lot easier than Bachmann's CEP.

Maybe compare photos of the tender online. Mind you at least you know which loco it might be off (I received a spare drive shaft with a new Bachmann EMU once, clearly if it had been one that fallen off, then the model would not move). FWIW I have a collection of spare bits found on the layout over the years with absolutely no idea where they came from.

Brake tender maybe????

That should make a great April fools advert. "We are proud to present our all new class 31, complete with ring field motor, traction tyres and tender drive..."

I think they referred to World War One wartime liveries in this case. Mind you I cannot think of many Rapido RTR locos in WWI colours. And they would have hanged around until grouping I guess (or at least can go with those SECR wagons...). In anycase I have a trainload of WWI wagons so...

Perfect news - I just stuck my order in for a sound fitted one and I'm not a member of Brighton Circle. This was a no brainer for me as I can use in pre-grouping days - or with a little stretch - in preserved days (I know she has not carried this livery yet, but never say never).

I have some Bananas vans on pre-order via your IRM website. Will they still be going from the UK to Ireland and then to me?

Mine arrived yesterday and is the sound fitted version. I tested it under DCC yesterday evening and there were no issues. She is quite fast even on 1/4 speed settings. I never cranked her up to full speed. The manual shows this to be a very impressive set up. Some sounds have random settings leaving you to concentrate on the main ones. Other sounds have several choices to choose from which can be changed by the CVs. For example two types of station announcements (Liskeard and Looe) are set by default but there are about a dozen to choose from by changing the CVs. The lights were fine (interior & exterior), about the right brightness under DCC. In fact I was surprised to find interior lighting so passengers and crew will be a nice addition eventually. The first thing to strike me taking her out of the box is her length. Nearly as long as a Mk 3 shown below. The box is the same length as Accurascale's Detlic, though half the width and height. I've been giving some thought recently to a shunting plank micro layout (to be mixed with OO-9) and this model has me thinking about maybe a small terminal.

I always use Roco style couplings whenever I get this issue. It locks the mechanism and forces it to operate. (Equally graphene can help).

Forgive me for asking the question, but I am curious as to why someone would want to put a new 47 body on the previous 47 chassis. Is someone selling the bodies alone?

Seeing the model like this in actual daylight makes it feel more real to me. Well done.

When it was with Howe's you brought the entire sprew! Which was very handy and something I was very happy with.

When these vans were first announced, most were sold out on pre-order in about 24 hours, leaving me only able to order the SR pair. I really wanted the 5 SECR versions. This was at the start of Covid and they appeared about a year later still during Covid. Prior to this, I had the later 1424 from their first run with later break gear. This was repainted in SECR though clearly with the wrong roof and brakes - but better than nothing. I scanned Rails website relentlessly looking for spare ones of the new batches to buy. At first there were only special door ones available. I brought 2 of them figuring I could renumber one or convert it. Then - as others were not appearing - about a month later I got another 2 figuring I could try to convert the doors. So 4 special door versions + 1 from the original batch repainted. Then the SR ones appeared, I had 2 on order and they arrived. About a month later, additional ones were released on sale, so I brought another pair figuring I could repaint them. The second pair really showed how tough the models are as they had been crushed between the rollers of the letter handling machines. The parcel arrived well and truly squashed! So much so that the vans had imprinted themselves onto the plastic and card of the boxes! Remarkably the vans themselves were fine. Tough beasts! So I now had 4 SR ones, 4 special box ones and 1 from the original batch repainted. 9 or 4 more than the initial batch of 5 I wanted. A few months later the remaining SECR did appear (though not all at once) and I managed to get the remainder. Now I had 13. What to do? The original run repainted one, swapped chassis and roof with an SR one and I left another in SR. Even if I my SR collection is small, these would be wellcome. And finally recently, I managed to get round to repainting 2 SR versions into the earlier wainwright liveries when 1 special door version was repainted into the later SECR livery. The roofs on most had degraded over time (deforming and paint cracking), so this was addressed as well. I still have three 9944 special door versions in Wainwright, Obviously one will remain as is, but not sure about the other two and being in France, it's not easy for me to sell off excess stock. I mixed up my own paint colours, matching Rapido for the latter SECR colour and doing something lighter (but not as light as Rails) for the Wainwright livery. Transfers are Fox. Below pictures of most of the fleet: nine 1424s together Left 2 repainted SR vans into SECR, vs Rails originals Left the van from an original batch (SR), repainted in SECR and given proper roof and brake gear Right a special door van repainted into later SECR and renumbered Two differents sets of repaints. Obviously 9934 (from the original batch) has too dark paint but it will serve) The 3 vans in Later SECR livery. The two on the left being rails original, and the right a 9944 special door repainted to later livery