Michael Edge

Not Millhouses, not much engine changing in Sheffield. Patriots only Derby - Manchester as I remember.

When you've soldered up anything on a coupler wash it with MEK or something similar afterwards, otherwise the pivots and latch can get sticky. I'm getting a bit suspicious of blackened latches as well, a lot of them seem to get sticky, clean brass ones less so.

That's what I meant, a bit of memory fade there, Leicester shed was probably involved as well.

Mostly Scots and Jubilees until replaced by Peaks in the 1960s. They would mainly be from Holbeck, Derby and Cricklewood sheds.

You should definitely have had the tank wrapper, it's one of the biggest pieces on the etch. You seem to have made a good job of the replacement though.

About P4 then, only a bit wide.

They do an etch primer as well, that does seem a bit different from the Halfords one.

Back to the LSW C14 today. Motion bracket, brakes and crankpins (1mm brass wire) fitted, the slidebars are from .8mm square n/s wire. View from underneath shows the High Level Roadrunner gearbox, pcb pads soldered on for the pickups. Motor is from China but these don't seem to be available now - pity, these were very good. I ordered 5 in December but they only had 4 left. Ready for frame painting now, the splashers are a bit difficult to fit and will cause problems with clearance later. Final assembly under way now, the coupling rods had to be spaced off the wheels to clear the splashers - and this is 00 gauge. The crosshead mostly misses the leading crankpin but the back has had to be cut away quite a bit. Sanding arrangement is a bit unusual - back and front on the same wheel, nothing on the leading one.

No, what I need is another shed to store the layouts not in use......

Here in Barnsley (in normal times) Hycote is sold in The Range - which is next door to Halfords.....

We now have the etches for Caradon available, I've corrected some of the small errors and it will come with a drawing. We have a limited number of these, priority will be given to those who have expressed an interest. Price is £26 + £1.50 postage, payment details as on our website. At the moment we prefer payment by PayPal or bank transfer but cheques must be made out to Judith Edge. The etch for the other two L&L locos, Kilmar and Cheesewring will be available when we get our next order from PhotoEtch. The above etch also includes the long awaited production version of the LNER V4.

We now have the etches for Caradon available, I've corrected some of the small errors and it will come with a drawing, this is what you get: Price is £26 + £1.50 postage, payment details as on our website. At the moment we prefer payment by PayPal or bank transfer but cheques must be made out to Judith Edge. The etch for the other two L&L locos, Kilmar and Cheesewring will be available when we get our next order from PhotoEtch.

Two more photos from the turntable. Some modifications to the baseboard at the Dingle end and then I'll start dismantling it. Once the first board is down I'll be able to get the Wentworth Junction boards out to paint the track. The Liverpool end of the layout will stay up for a while to check the connecting bits on to the fiddle yard.

That looks a good idea but here in Britain setts were not usually laid in this brick bond fashion. I used grey tile grout in this way for the setts on Herculaneum Dock but all I had was a roller made from metal and greased to stop the grout sticking, this is a much better idea.

A couple of photos from Herculaneum Dock, my newish small camera gets into places others won't. The centre of the lens is 26mm above the base so gives more or less scale viewpoint from ground level. The view from the turntable under the coal hole is one you van only get with a camera. No special techniques with these, I'm not the world's best photographer, camera set on the smallest aperture, no extra lighting and hope for the best. The rest of the pictures from this latest photo session on my Herculaneum Dock thread.Tthe layout was put up in the shed to get it ready for the Bristol show, I'll take it dow again soon and get back on with Wentworth Junction.

Hycote paint is just the same as Halfords but cheaper.

It was started some years and several clubrooms ago, I wasn't involved in it myself.

The 70ft one from Dewsbury is now at Carlisle Upperby, still working after some modification and DCC fitting. John Aldrick has the 65ft one from Victoria for the Bournemouth West project.

That reminds me of wThey had the contract to rebuild hat was going on at LH when we went to measure up the MoD Vanguards and Steelman Royales in 2004. They had the contract to rebuild them all and when we got there the yard looked like this. All the locos had been dismantled and there were parts of them all over the place. Talking to the man who had taken them to bits he was bitterly regretting not marking numbers on them all as he did, he was having great difficulty piecing them back together with very few dimensions exactly the same. He had eventually learned the lesson of this though..... They all went back together in the end of course (and then got painted in DLO purple).

I've seen plenty of GA drawings with dimensions incorrectly quoted - including the Fowler one I used last year to produce our 150hp kit. Many have pencil notes on with different dimensions to be used - sometimes you can read these and understand why they were there. Ultimately, if it doesn't look right - it's wrong, no matter what the drawings say.

No, that's symmetrical on each side - this isn't. This is the opposite side to the compensated axles.

It could be my K's 40ft brake van, certainly my scratchbuilt Cravens DMU - aka the growler - and one of my Triang Met Cams creeping into shot (one of these is the infamous unpowered two car set. The K's van still runs, I still have the DMUs here but they have nowhere to run these days.

It doesn't help at all with track twist but it does make the frame flexible in one plane. Many of our track imperfections are simply vertical, particularly at baseboard joints, this does at least stop the loco rocking lengthways on its centre axle. The diesel example I quoted above does seem to defy all logic to me though - I walked round this loco twice to make sure of what I had seen when we measured it - but they do work.

Looking over the shed with an Overhead train passing, Hunslet No.32 with a couple of tank wagons below. This angle and the light behind shows up the lack of interior detail in my LOR trains though, View under Brunswick's coal hole with a 4F on the turntable. There was an electric coal hoist under here but it wouldn't be visible either from the front of the layout or to the operator. Using a small camera gets into some very inaccessible locations. I like this view from ground level with the LOR silhouetted against the sky background. The leaning yard lamp needs some attention. Looking down into the coal hole, the 60ft turntable is a venerable item, originally built in the 1970s for Bradford London Road on our ols club layout Leeds Victoria. View along Herculaneum Bridge towards the station and car shed, the line's original terminus before the southern extension to Dingle. A WD 2-8-0 has managed to get left in the old MR coaling area, this was normally used for the shunting locos but occasionally saw use for main line locos as well. Two other LOR trains in the car shed, this is half the length it should be, it coul;d actually hold four trains. Close up of part of the same shot, the far siding is useful for parking brake vans. The CLC and Dingle tunnel from Herculaneum Dock station. A J10 leaving with some steel empties while an O4 waits to go off shed. The signal showing red is not for the main line but is the shed exit signal, there was a telephone here to contact the signal box as it was out of sight round the curve. This view from the back of the car shed looking over Herculaneum dock as an LOR train leaves the tunnel on the big girder bridge. MDHB small Avonside No.7 pulls full coals across the weighbridge. Some of the casemates were used for storing explosives - this is the explanation for the gunpowder van parked there. Close up of No.7 by the weighbridge hut, fulls at both sides, there is a weighbridge at each side of this building. Just about the view from Herculaneum bridge into what was left of the shed after the Luftwaffe had finished modifying it. Storage space was almost non existent and coal wagons were often left in the shed and that poor bu66er has been halfway up the steps with his bike since 1997. The new Hudswell would have been delivered by rail so here it is paying a quick visit to Brunswick. Way out of time though, the shed had been closed before these last locos were bought by the MDHB. Last one from ground level in Brunswick goods. Steel empties on the departure road and the J69 with the loaded Trestrol.

It isn't intended to be full compensation as I'm sure Nick knows but it is much better than all rigid. With regard to central beams, a quick look at full size practice (always a good idea) reveals that compensating beams are always placed as close to the wheels as practicable, I don't see why we should do something different. In case anyone thinks there are rules about this, have a look at the GEC 6wh diesels built in some numbers for British Steel, NCB and ICI and still in use. These have the first and second axles connected with compensating beams on the LH side and the second and third axles connected on the RH side - I haven't built one of these yet but I'm fascinated to see how it will work. These locos do of course have springing as well but the compensation is intended to help with uneven track. This is quite a bit more complicated than the average model system but it's compensation nonetheless.