Michael Edge

Nothing to do with Jamieson although they were produced by the same methods - marketed by Charles Covey I think. I've built a few of them years ago and they were quite good, mostly accurate but of course needed a lot of detail work adding. Jamieson did do a Duchess kit as well as the streamlined version, in fact I think I've got one somewhere and my son has nearly finished building one.

Our Fowler 150hp kit is in stock, price is £64 + £3.50 postage, it does cover the one shown in your post. Judith and Michael Edge

9mm scale is used quite widely in New Zealand for 3'6" on O gauge track, I have designed several kits in this scale. The most common scale used in NZ is S (on 18mm track) but there are others, more recent kit design has been in 1:48 scale (O scale in USA), strangely the only commercial scale which doesn't seem to be used there is HOm - which is slightly over 1m and nearer to 3'6".

This is the 14" type, Mersey Docks had two of them but there were plenty more (one - Brookes No.1 - iis preserved at Middleton) MD&HB No 14 was built from the test etch.

You're not wrong - it's not there! The website is long overdue for updating anyway but it might explain rather poor sales for the 14" so far. It's the same price as the other two HE saddle tanks. All three types were fairly popular with collieries but the 16" might have been preferred for heavier work. The 15" type was often built for stock when work was slack between the wars.

I wouldn't start with something like this for a first attempt at building a boiler from sheet - I certainly didn't (although that was a long time ago).

We do the Hunslet 14" 0-6-0ST as well - all three in stock at the moment. No difference in build difficulty between them but i think the 14" is the prettiest.

The resin moulded boiler in that kit was particularly bad, I think I replaced all of it in brass.

Don't forget that it cracks more easily one way (along the direction the sheet was rolled in) than the other way (across) and that brass sheet varies in hardness.

Parts like this (and the boiler cladding itself) might well have been replaced in preservation and may not be exactly the same as the Swindon original.

The strap isn't on the boiler, it holds the tanks together and just passes over the boiler cladding. There was usually only a small gap under it but sometimes it could be bigger - this model does look excessive though.

TH built some twin engined 0-6-0s later, these were based on the 0-6-0 Sentinel layout, weighing about 60T or so.

I was referring to the two axle idea above - not the 0-8-0.

That's it, it's really easy to do and works very well. In my triangle installation there is two way changeover switch in the relevant track on the panel to allow movements in both directions. This is the track diagram, the reversing section is shown in red between the signals. This is what the control panel looks like, switches mounted sideways connect the separate sections to controllers at each side of the panel, the changeover dorection switch is mounted in line with the track. Black sections are switched automatically by the point settings.

Two engines and transmissions on four wheels would be pushing the axle load a bit! (and I'm not sure where the fuel would go either). There were a lot more 0-8-0s than that, apart from the one-off MoD loco they were built for Ebbw Vale and Normanby Park (Scunthorpe) steelworks and Moor Green colliery. The Normanby Park locos were a longer wheelbase and eventually had the centre sections of the coupling rods removed to run as 0-4-4-0s but the others remained 0-8-0.

Nearly all of the MDHB system was laid in grooved rail, it's a heavier version of tramway rail. Most of it was inset with granite setts although some areas were concreted,

I've done this with a triangle on a continuous run layout - one leg of the triangle has the power fed through diodes, while the train is on this section you simply reverse the controller's direction switch. The train continues to move in the same direction since the diodes don't allow the current to be reversed but the controller is now set the right way when it moves off the triangle. I've got a diagram for this somewhere but I can't find it at the moment.

Is there no combination of rail that you can use in 7mm? In 4mm I use flat bottom rail on its side in the web of the bullhead, the edge of the bottom flange looks a lot more like the groove rail actually used. Two rails won't look right, especially as you can see down to the sleepers in what should be a groove.

It's difficult to work out what's gone wrong but I suggest you take the cab roof off again and file the cab ends (it might just be the back in fact) down a bit until the gap disappears.

That doesn't look like the Merlin that was running on the layout - that one has my frames and motion and the correct tender.

I find Slater's (with Canon motors now) just as good and normally readily available.

Have you ever actually tried it? Your posts are full of theory but I've seen no evidence of any practical experience.

Yes, I made the patterns for the DC kits 84 and 83, that's why we sometimes have etched grilles for these - but we don't have any in stock at the moment.

It's not just what it looks like, the "instant reverse" crossover doesn't work very well either.

DGs were designed to be used double ended, the loops do sometimes interfere and prevent coupling but not very often. The thin p/b wires easily slide over each other but the etched Dingham loop won't readily do this.