checkrail

Can't recall seeing LM from that angle before. A wonderful view - just stunning.

These lovely little models were delivered this afternoon. Even better, Rails of S. had offset the price with a gift voucher I'd had at Christmas and forgotten all about! The glaring white roofs will soon go, as will the yawning gap between the vehicles. And after a bit of weathering or toning down I might get around to replacing the wheels with Gibson's. If I allocate them to the pool of 'shuntable' wagons to appear in Stoke C. yard they'll need further work. They're so free-running that otherwise there'd be no chance of operating them with sub-track uncoupling magnets. They'd just run back to the magnet every time you thought you'd just uncoupled them. John C.

5557 is on freight duty today, shunting the yard at Stoke C. while 6305 drifts past on a down class J freight. John C.

I do love a nice 'get out' clause!

I suppose, if one could be bothered, one might buy 20 quid's worth and sell on those surplus to requirements on eBay to cover costs? I might soon be reduced to this. Here are my last two sets, already primed and painted before removal from the fret. They carry Martin Finney's name. Note one thing that Hornby missed with their printed versions: the double spacing between vertical bars in the bottom right quarter of the left hand door. When building my first brake coach I puzzled over this for a while until the penny dropped: it's so the guard can get his hand through to turn the door handle from the inside. I nearly put the first one in back to front, if not upside down! John C.

I use Slaters plastic rod, bought in 'assorted sizes' packs. Handily it also comes in assorted colours, including red/brown!

Always a treat to see pics of your layout Mike.

Had a look at mine and, yes, they are more noticeable than I thought so worth doing, especially when there's light behind them. Here are the Brassmasters items (forgive the dirty windows!): And here the Hornby ones: Going back to internal corridor handrails one of the weirdest things I found with Slaters toplight kits was that there were little notches or pegs for these handrails but you had to remove them to fit the glazing in, unless you cut glazing to the exact dimensions of the window aperture and glued them in flush (a la Laserglaze). But there's nothing on the instructions which suggests or advises that approach - which would have been beyond me in any case. John C.

I use the Brassmasters ones, usually bought at exhibitions as I believe they have a £10 minimum order for sales by post. I paint them black, which I think is prototypical, though TBH this means that at NVD it's quite hard to see them. That's probably why Hornby et al do them in white or silver, so you know they're there. (And I never bother replacing those.)

Nor do you need to - looks great.

AFAIK they had them from new, replaced from late 1940s (?) onward by 4,000g types. I've certainly seen post-nationalisation pics of them with 3.5000g tenders as late as 1959, though most had the 4k job by then..

Here's the other half of today's snaps. Have always liked my Hornby Grange (truth to tell, even more than my Accurascale Manor). John C.

A stopper pulls into Stoke Courtenay as a Grange-hauled parcels train passes through on the up line. John C.

Good news for prospective Dapol corridor toplight purchasers. Below is a reply to my email (above) from Richard at Dapol. Good morning John, The original samples did not have the bolection mouldings decorated in mahogany colour, we upgraded the livery sheets to include this, but unfortunately this was not copied for the production models. Yes, we shall have these mouldings correctly painted for the upcoming corridor coaches. Thank you for your comment and interest in these carriages. Kind Regards Richard Director of Product Development I guess those buying brown & cream M & C coaches will just have to get out the paintbrush. Anyway, my thanks to Dapol. John C.

Thanks Bill @heraldcoupe - and thanks for your reply to my earlier eBay message. I also note that there's been a flurry of RMwebbers signing up to the Facebook GWR Modellers group in recent days - I wonder why! As I said, there's quite a bit of interest building up. Certainly, I for one would love to have a 'Bird' series Bulldog to play with. Best wishes and keep us posted. Cheers, John C.

Thanks Robin. Have emailed Dapol (text below) but not holding my breath for a reply. Hi From the pictures I've seen you've done a great job with these toplight coaches, apart from one significant detail of the GWR brown and cream versions: the bolections on all the side windows should be painted the same colour as the droplights in the door windows (venetian red, mahogany or whatever you want to call it). This is an important element of the 'look' of all GWR toplight coaches in all brown and cream livery variants between 1928 and 1948. I do hope this will be rectified when the promised corridor toplights go into production. Painting bolections is tricky at the best of times as I know from kit building, but even more difficult when the glazing is already fitted. Yours in hope,

Yes. Thanks Miss P. Knew there was something amiss as soon as I saw them but just needed confirmation in case there was something I didn't know peculiar to these Mainline & City coaches. Are the pics we've seen of pre-production samples or of what's actually been delivered to stockists? If the latter it's a serious omission and I'd want to know it was corrected before I ordered any of the forthcoming corridor toplights. Painting bolections can be tricky at the best of times but twice as difficult when the glazing is already in.

Oh yes - dead right. And of course nobody has to buy thrm.

Just been online to order one of those nice ex-Caledonian Railway vans. <Groan> Seems to be something new to order every other day. Are these people at Rapido and Accurascale trying to bankrupt me?

Small world and all that ...

If the flurry of interest after Rich's @The Fatadder recent posts is anything to go by it could be a case of. "Form an orderly queue", if we could only find out how to contact the splendid fellow who's produced them. (I've been a "sleeper" on Facebook for years, but remain unsure how to navigate it.)

Yeah - positively droopy. Trouble with the first generation Dapol plug 'n' play signals is that they tend to droopiness after a few years even when in the 'on' position. Bit like many of us maybe.

As the Hall and train wait in the platform 6027 'King Richard I' roars through on the down line with a Penzance express. John C.

Modelu indeed - haven't they been a godsend to the hobby? I'm glad Broome Hall's crew pass muster. I think it's 63 years since I was on the footplate of a loco in steam, a Hall as it happens. While waiting at Kingswear for its departure time back home to Taunton the driver invited me into the cab and asked me whether his engine was "one of Mr Churchward's" or one of Mr Collett's. Happy days.

They do look gorgeous - it bodes well for the corridor ones (which I think more people will be after). I see they've done them in the short-lived 1930 livery with double lining, as Hornby first did with their bow-enders. Just a couple of points: 1) Shouldn't the bolections be the same colour as the droplights? 2) Did the GWR really outshop coaches with the door hinges in unpainted brass?