LNER4479

Meanwhile, back at the layout ... Track being taken up, wire, switches, hammer, pliers, saw ... just another normal day in the Grantham fiddle yard. Danger! Man with hot soldering iron at work. All in the name of incremental improvements, designed to reduce head-scratching time at exhibitions. Stay tuned ...

The internet, as ever, is your friend:

It works almost as well just by cropping the original, Gilbert? I agree with it being a favourite viewpoint ... but there again I might just be a tiny bit biased (!)

With Central all back up and running, had a shunt around to set up 3 more trains for departure. First away is the rebuilt Rebuilt Royal Scot (scratch built over 40 years ago, now with DJH GB1 motor/gearbox). Train may look modest but there's some old 'draggy' coaches in this formation; let's hope the banker isn't needed up Shap. Struggled a bit but here she is at Shap Wells. Seems to be the case that early stages of the climb are worst. Once out on the open fell, it appears to ease slightly. As she tops the banks, a northbound goods train pulls out of Dentonholme. Next away is a parcels train. It'll be taking a different route at Grand Junction. Black 5 moment (there'll be plenty of these!). 2 of the 842 workhorses of the fleet pass at Caldew junctions. Finally (for now), a lengthy mixed goods pulls out of Central goods yard, bound for the Settle & Carlisle route. The Clan and the WD are off previous arrivals and have made their way back along the plat 4/5 centre road to await access to the loco sidings. It's now configured such that the MPD operator can get hold of these, which improves the flexibility of the operating arrangements - a valuable piece of feedback from the recent operating session. And is held in section as there's a little congestion ahead. The two boxes spoiling the pic are recent RTR wagon purchases (either 'bargains' or pre-loved' in the main - what a wonderful woke expression the latter is!), awaiting coupling conversion, weathering, etc. Must find somewhere better to store them. To be continued

So ... it's up! For a couple of weeks at least. For improvements, testing, photography etc. All in preparation for forthcoming season, starting with Newcastle in November. Inevitably, with the rough and tumble of exhibition life takes its toll. So it's repairs first of all. More soon

Given that the FO sleeper is running through at the moment, then surely the next day will be Saturday? My Dad does a similar thing to you - runs a 24 hour timetable. His approach to the same conundrum is to run Mon-Weds-Fri-Sat (and repeat ad nauseam). Mondays and Fridays had some variations (eg as above) whereas Tues-Thurs were more the same. So running the 4 days of the week he does makes it interesting in that no four of those days are exactly the same. Saturday is of course the biggest variation.

In truth, it'll be a 'couple of years' yet before I can play trains in the way I really want to. There was a need to test the reinstated wiring last night so I chose to make it fun - somewhere in between testing and playing trains. Whilst the layout is set up in 'summer mode' I can run trains; once we get to the first show of the season (Shap at GETS, Milton Keynes, Oct 14th/15th) then it will have to be part dismantled for the winter. This is likely to be the pattern for the next few years. Plenty I can be getting on with during winter time, mind - subject to temperature in the chapel(!)

And now, having waited patiently on Shap Bank for over two weeks (!) Reinstated wiring for plats 3/4 allows the Perth express to arrive! Hmm ... Station getting a bit full now. Let's have a departure. Yet another out-of-the-box loco - a Bachmann Patriot - departs plat.1 And the 'classic' Shap scene. Loco well within itself on such a train. It's not all 10-12 coach expresses.

Not quite; you're sort of on the right lines. It's actually to do with the Maryport & Carlisle route. Including the ability to run those services was a bit problematical on the plan. If we take a quick look: The M&C route away from Citadel (right-to-left) crosses the top of the three bridges shown and then I just need to lose those lines (via the relatively simple expedient of them descending quite steeply (short trains) and straight into Central as shown. However, as with all the lines in and around Carlisle, the goods traffic does different things! So the red line indicates where these will run. My current thinking is that this can possibly double up as a relief goods line between Bog Junc and Central which might come in useful. It ends up as what appears to be a separate stretch of double track heading away from the station but in fact it is two single tracks. Shown by the red arrow on the picture below. Passenger trains will only be able to use Plat.1 at Central (but that's OK, as it's just local passenger trains) but the goods trains will need to be able to access the goods yard fully; the change from single to double slip facilitates this. The picture shows that this all needs to be installed before I can fix the baseboard above in place for keeps.

Well, didn't take long to reinstate the station throat: Just as well, 'cos: A northbound goods train sets off from Dentonholme. Crossing over to Caledonian metals at Caldew junctions. This is another out-of-the-box loco that runs beautifully; should see plenty of use. Slightly unusual viewpoint as the train approaches Bog Junc. Gives you an idea of how it's set out. Meanwhile a southbound goods sets off from Central over the reinstated pointwork. You just knew I was going to do that? Taking the Caley metals at Grand Junc And thus arrives into Dentonholme. It's all still working 😉

Well, it's certainly the closest one of those is ever going to get to the layout 🙄

And now possibly the most boring photo that will ever be posted on this thread: The main board for Upperby is making used on a 4 x 3 piece of 24mm ply. Yes you did read that right. The far corner (where the furthest roundhouse roads will be) will not be reachable in a conventional manner so this board will have to take my weight for installation purposes at least. It's sitting on battens securely affixed to the wall panelling plus these stout (4 x 2) timber legs. The one in the middle being illuminated (do you like the spot lamp?) was installed yesterday and packed to get the board dead level. I'm told that the walls need painting (white) so this solid construction is also coming in useful to achieve that aim. Won't be so easy once the shed is set out.

Well, I got good news and I got bad news ... Firstly the good news - the tracks are back down at Central plats 3 & 4. And now the bad news: The station throat is now in a state of partial dismantlement! The single slip I installed when Central was first rebuilt really needs to be a double slip so here they are - single slip removed and replacement double slip alongside. The exact rationale for this will become apparent in due course. All part of trying to get things right now to avoid more painful alterations later on😉

Thanks. Here are some pix of mine: We boarded at York, affording this photo opportunity. One of my Edinburgh arrival pictures - looks like you could be on my photo? 01:15 not the best time of day for photography but ... for the record! I think we touched 100mph (or very close) in the Cramlington area. And was fortunate enough to be on Tornado's 2017 100mph test run so can therefore claim the 'ton' behind both these very different machines in the preservation era. That'll do me.

Now where was I approx 2pm on Monday? Ah - here ... Highly recommended this being retired lark 🤩

Yep - that's the one. David Elliott from the Trust was there to 'supervise' those boarding at Durham and instead he and the passengers were treated to what must have been a rather splendid run past!! As you say, quickly resolved. Never a dull moment!

All I can say is that the day I had a ride behind 'Deltic 9', it had an exhaust fire down your end of the ECML. It somehow seemed to survive the experience and duly pitched up at York (where I was due to board) some 45mins late. The scenes of rejoicing on Waverley platform amongst the support crew when we eventually arrived was like they'd made it to the moon. Tornado took over for the run back south (the real reason I was there), which it accomplished all the way back to 'The Cross' without the slightest fuss or bother. All that being said, I know how much goes into these things so, for the sake of all the unsung lads and lassies involved, I sincerely hope it shows up on time and everyone is having a grand day out.

I hope that's not tempting fate, Tony?

Hi Richard, My apologies, as your post above is from nearly a week ago. The depot concerned was Longsight depot (Manchester). Despite what you might think, by far the biggest concentration of vehicles there was coaching stock (mainly Mk2DEF), rather than locomotives. I distinctly recall trying to grapple with setting up the parent-child links within RAVERS for the major components; in the case of a coach, this was wheelsets / bogies and (I think?) the MA set. Problem was, Mk2 bogies (BT42) had no unique identifiers on them so we were instructed to affix ID plates with a unique number stamped on. Such a list was duly supplied from Derby. Problem was, in the continuous cycle of coaches going off to works and having other unscheduled bogie swaps, you were running to stand still trying to keep track of all the newly applied bogie numbers within RAVERS. My recollection is that we never really got on top of it. Wheelset numbers in the system were important for keeping track of UAT details. I arrived not long after the Longsight wheel lathe was commissioned (across the tracks on the site of the old Freightliner depot) and the guys there did the UAT on anything that went through the lathe so there was an ongoing battle to keep on top of that info. That was something of a priority for obvious reasons. I seem to recall going to a couple of RAVERS user group meetings at Derby and heard of other depots wrestling with the challenge of keeping the HST oil sampling records up to date in RAVERS ... but that was something I never got involved in. I may have had the odd call or two with the RAVERS helpdesk but can't say as I recall any names (sorry!) I remember hearing about the GUI thingy and saw a demonstration of picking up a component and attaching it to a vehicle (with something called a 'mouse'). Looked great ... but I don't think the computers we had at the depot were that advanced - we were still using the old (Apollo?) mainframe computers at the time! Overall (as you can perhaps tell?), I was a little underwhelmed with the system although I could see its potential (sorry again!)

Modesty should forbid ... but I like the second one! Thanks, Gilbert

adb968008 was specifically referring to Locomotion No.1 which is referred to in the Durham County Council news item (albeit the replica version).

Keep watching this space … https://www.durham.gov.uk/article/26823/Plans-unveiled-for-Stockton-and-Darlington-Railway-200th-anniversary-celebrations-

One of my ‘go to’ colours, together with M67 Dark Grey and M70 Brick Red. I use M29 for painting rail sides.

FWIW, Jacobite stops at Glenfinnan outwards for 20 mins to allow pax to detrain and visit museum, signalbox etc. Total journey time for morning train is 1hr 50mins - it passes morning ScR train from Mallaig at Glenfinnan.

Number 9 - I assemble (solder) with pin head at the rear wherever possible. Much neater appearance when cleaned up and reduces out-of-scale-ness, especially union link