roythebus

I hate the Leyland Nationals and all derivatives of them. Horrible nasty things, made of corrugated iron, like those French vans that look like an Anderson shelter on wheels, designed to replace the wife to take goods to market. An interesting vehicle otherwise, and probably worthy of preservation if it doesn't rust away in the meantime! Modelling conversion using EFE buses and a Mk1 underframe anyone?

Looks good but the route number box doesn't look right. I don't remember them with an external frame; this may have been a later mod, but then driving them, I only usually saw the inside of the route number box! Also, not enough dead flies on the front...

According to the bus press (RouteOne) the busway is already open. I suspect towing a dead bus off there will probably take about an hour unless they have the recovery truck on standby at all the junctions. the hitching up is the easy bit. What happens if the bus has no air, is unable to build up air from an external source and therefore the parking brake won't release? Being a bus engineer these days I could carry on with a lot of other ifsanbuts. Flat tyre? wheel bearing failure? Suspension failure? Fire?

Peter Parascandalo worked in SW control (emphasis on CONtrol). He's a signalman on the KESR. One of his sons was sadly killed in a motorbike accident in Hitchin a couple of years ago. He used to run the Croydon Tramlink website. I suspect we are talking about the same family here. Also, congrats on the superb layout. sorry to p in your fire, but we done it in 1980 with New Annington. With working 4 aspect colour lights which changed in sequence, were interlocked with the points; a working half barrier crossing with sound; overhead using mainly Sommerfeld and a load of home-made stuff,and hand-built track. Oh, and an entry/exit push button panel for the hidden loops. I just found the article on the original New Annington in a railway book from about 1988, pre-electrification. Things have progresses since then, even the stock, and the electrics. But seriously, well done.

I'd rather switch switches than keep pressing buttons to work something, it's far quicker. But that's going a bit off topice and was subject of another thread!!

I can vouch for the management of the L&B, a number of them have been in the preservation movement a long time at the Isle of Wight Steam Railway. They seem to have migrated via the WHR, helping to lay track there as well! Glad you had a good day out.

There's usually an update of the Cambridge (mis)guided busway in RouteOne magazine, available online. I don't have a link to hand, but your search engine will find it. How about the Millenium Doom guided busway? Designed to pass the buses so close they knocked the mirrors off as they passed..more millions wasted on THAT project!

ISTR the DB hold the steam record for this century, being the first to break the 100mph/160km/h barrier quite a while ago.

I used to have a number of these sort of wagons back in the mid 1960's with the same underframe. I never did find out what make they were! i suppose for their time they were super detailed!

Remember steam hauled station stops were longer because the loco needed to take water. As for average speeds, wot Stationmaster says; my Range Rover has an average speed gizmo on the computer. I drive from Calais to Liege on cruise control at 90odd mph. Computer says average is 42mph. On the K&ESR, times are extended because the guard sometimes has to open and close crossing gates as well as a loco stop for water in each direction. The maximum a small tank loco can go without a water stop is about 15 miles.

Perhaps THE most unusual was reported by a pal who was a driver at Koeln Deutz. He was working an international train from Koeln to Hanover. just outside Hanover on the home signal the train engine failed, class 103 IIRC, and was dragged into the station by one of those tiny 4 wheeled KoF shunters! He was also a test driver at Bw Opladen for a few years testing the first series ICE. They were usually dragged in by a variety of locos when they failed on test runs.

Geoff Packham was the other chap who worked there building locos. The directors at the time were AG "Tommy" Thomas, he of private Owner wagon books fame, who used to run a model shop in Exeter and used to regale stories "when I was in Iceland" in WW2 and "you can't get anything out of K's, they're making plastic bingo cards"; Alan Beeston, an accountant, AMS Pickering who used to do the etched nameplates, and Viscount Garnock, then owner of Green Arrow. Loco painting was contracted out to Alan Brackenborough in Gloucestershire. There was never enough money to buy stock or pay the wages when I was there. It was only when EAMES bought the business that things looked up again. Sadly the business closed when Ted Morris died. Tony Dyer of Kemilway worked there with Ted for a while. The only product I have left of theirs is a 6 wheel LNER parcels van which I built using plasticard sides with their roof!

I worked at Kings Cross models in 1968-69 and the shop was still producing wooden bodied coach kits when I left. some were designed and hand built by a chap called Simon Kelly. his products usually carry a cast SMK plate underneath. The sides were stamped out on a fly press in the basement of the shop. the same fly press was used to produce the Kingsway scale track system chairs and fishplates, claimed to be the first scale track system produced. The rail was the forerunner of today's SMP etc bullhead rail. Other full time model makers there were Mike Shepard and a chap named Geoff whose surname I forget, both of whom produced some superb models. mike made the first patters for my GS Models bus range, and went on to work with Sutherland Models. The shop at the time was run by the late A.G.Thomas, of PO Wagon books fame, and formerly of Exeter Models. The shop was founded by Keith Dann who was tragically killed in a road accident near his home at Biggleswade in about 1967. The management of the shop when I was there left a lot to be desired and it was underfunded. It was taken over by Ted Morris of Eames of Reading in about 1971.

Being in the bus industry, the bus operators are even more sceptical of guided busways. The capital cost of the additional equipment is horrendous, and lowers the resale value of the vehicles once they're past their first sell-by date. It also lowers even further the fuel economy of such vehicles as all the equipment uses more electricity which it turn has to be generated by the bus' diesel engine.

Ah yes, the wonderful dome guided busway, another complete waste of taxpayers money. I worked, eventually, but it was designed that when the buses passed each other, they would knock their wing mirrors off, a very useful aid to driving buses! You can read a lot more about the Cambridge guided busway in RouteOne bus trade magazine available online too. Even the bus industry is sceptical about the idea and concept of them.

Maybe a few of us from here can go along with some Woodland Scenics amd Floquil weathering paint to make it all look a bit more used??

With all that bonking going on, it sounds more like a smutty video!

Not being a narrow gauge enthusiast, and having only visited south Wales twice, I feel rather saddened that there is this rift between the 2 railways. I've not followed all the thread either, but see parallels in their differences that I see in other railways i belong to, and of the Cobham Bus Museum when I was on the committee of that many years ago. I agree, the WHR is a new railway on an old trackbed, but then many railways are. The Isle of Wight with its Smallbrook extension is one example. I also belong to the TTA in Belgium, a short metre gauge diesel tramway with the possibility of extending the line a few more km round a horseshoe bend and up 150m in 3km. what a sight that will be for steam. BUT, the condition of the track dictates a very slow journey, and after half and hour of being bumped through a foresr at 10km/h, you've had enough. I know that's not much to do with the current argument, but just putting across some points of view from members of other lines and the travelling public, who, after all, pay for the things to run in the first place. The KESR experimented with running their Victorian set as the A set for a season, and it was not popular with the punters because the seats weren't that comfy, and no toilets! It's very nice having this lovingly restored heritage stock, but is it really what people want to ride in for a lengthy journey? As for modern engineering, nothing wrong with that if it brings improvements to what is left of the ORIGINAL loco, which sometimes might be just the wheels or the coupling hook. I hope the warring factions can have a cup of tea and make up sometime sooner rather than later. So much hot air.

One unmentioned danger of the quick attach/detach is that of putting up the loco's eth jumpers before the REP's eth jumpers had been dropped. This could cause serious electrical problems with line voltage being applied to the loco! I don't recall any instances of it happening, but it's a possibility that sprang to mind.

Interesting days indeed. Especially after the changeover from steam to electric. Waterloo-Alton-Basingstoke services in the up direction, when the Alton portion was a 2BIL and the Basing bit was a 4VEP. Deffo NOT compatible. Yes folks, it happened.

The other DD motor coach is still at Sellinge so I believe. I saw it there about 2 years ago along with a collection of steam and diesel locos in varying states of disrepair and restoration. Double deck trains COULD be made to work in the UK IF we had lines built to the Berne loading gauge. HS1, Great Central, new bridges on the WLL to name a few...

I travelled on it once, in about 1972 with the first mrs, from St P to Carlisle. Don't know what the loco was, probably a 45. Mk1 maroon stock, with restaurant car. A superb cooked breakfast served somewhere near Luton, and Lunch beyond Leeds was excellent; the fewer passengers, the bigger the helpings, all cooked fresh on board with excellent service. At Carlisle, I bumped into some of the guards from PG who'd been there to watch the Carlisle-Fulham match! We returned by the "quick" way to Euston! I suppose the TCE could be likened to some of the traditional international European trains of the era, stoping at every major city and a few others besides; not too fast, and the traditional superb railway service on board.

Don't forget there was a SO working 8VEP/CEP+4TC to Bomo. The 4TC trailing had to have an oil tail lamp, the reason being that the roller blind tail light could fail if the 4TC batteries went flat. There was no power jumper from the VEP/CEP to the TC unit; there was also no heating in the TC, hence it was a summer only working! It was also the reason the TC was trailing; flat battery=no control power=no go!! We had some weird and wonderful workings on the Southern.

The info above regarding REPs working in multiple is correct; however, the REPs could physically work in multiple with any of the BR era EMU stock, PROVIDING traction motors somewhere in the consist were isolated to prevent exceeding the "16" rating. There was an evening peak working from Waterloo which was usually 4VEP or CEP+4TC+33/1, split at Basing for Salisbury, from 4 to Bomo. Sometimes the loco would be in the middle just to add to the confusion. During the Plastic Pig conversion era, there was all sorts of odd formations, including top and tail 73s with REP and TC...no motors in the REP. I was learning the Bomo line at the time. My railway career was cut short during that era by management. I knew the Mad Monk, Frank Matthews. He and I didn't see eye to eye over union matters. He sadly was killed in an accident at West Brompton after I left railway service. He was indeed a fast driver. Was Roy Porter any relation of Gordon Porter? The odd REP workings on the Portsmouth direct line were fun. And fast.

Well, just by chance I saw the CoT at the Bachmann stand at the Ally Pally show. I didn't even realise they'd made one, since I don't usually get the model press or scan these pages for hours. I'd been trying for about 40 years to motorise the Airfix one and had done some work on it about a year ago (started in 1974), so managed to get the last one from the NRM stock. What a superb model. The only criticism is the front coupling fitting means the coupling sticks out miles. I managed to modify the spare bogie so it's now a more realistic length. mine will happily pull 10 Mk1s on my layout. Well done Bachmann. The £140-odd was a price worth paying for such a lovely model.