60800

An extra + to Locomotion, despite having to get ready for the Glasgow show, my Hamilton is already packed and sent with a delivery estimate of 4pm tomorrow! Cheers, 60800

Afternoon all, Anyone attending Model Rail Scotland who is / was hoping to find a 46229, get yourself in there first thing on the first morning as Locomotion will have a few returns and a failed pre-order for sale on their stand. Although there is one less as I've just managed to bag one last minute before they packed thier van and left for Glasgow. Cheers, 60800

Hi Roy, I've recieved further email correspondence to confirm that the running point is the case of the selected formation and thus will stick Cheers, 60800

Hi Roy, It may not have been mentioned but it is what it is. The initial request for a six / seven car set with black windscreen surround came from myself in an email conversation with Mick, with the preserved set mooted as the base / reason for this and the DTS numbers are those I requested. If these are cars that formed the in-service half sets for the chosen DTS's then fair enough, but I would have liked to see a TRSB included proper. Cheers, 60800

Hi, It's off as the set has been done to (mostly) represent the preserved set at Crewe. The discrepancies are 49003 (NDM), 48606 (TBF) and 48203 (TS) which are not preserved. For the actual formation, the first two are ok as straight renumbers (49002 NDM and 48602 TBF) but there is a TS in place of TRSB 48404. Cheers, 60800

Hi all, First off it's great to have the set numbers and spec sorted, but I am very confused about one thing, that being OO-0003, the 7 car set with black windows. Four of the cars of the formation are great, one surviving power cars and both surviving DTS cars and one of the TBF's, but the rest makes no sense. The set numbers are off for the two remaining coaches and the other power car in the consist and there is no TRSB, a massive disappointment for me. Could either Dave or Mick explain this please and possibly discuss changing it as it kind of scuppers the idea of being able to model the preserved set Cheers, 60800

6 months from the 25th November, but it has been stated that if the required number of orders are reached early then it will close early

What I was asked to do is make a new order for the set you want, email Mick and tell him your new order number and to cancel the old order number Cheers, 60800

I've done the same, just waiting for an email reply Cheers, 60800

Check your inbox Cheers, 60800

It's a rather difficult thing to explain without a working representation to hand - I've found that the force of a sharp curve can be more detrimental than a change in gradient Cheers, 60800

To echo Legend's comments - There are mixed views on the haulage of the 71's - some say slow and sluggish whilst others say it performs admirably with typlical TRAINSET length and weight trains. Let's face it, unless you have a whitemetal bodied - lead crammed chassis, do you really expect anything to haul the full Dover boat train or Golden Arrow set at a scale 80mph? No.... All the APT needs to do realistically is have each powercar able to push / pull six coaches at a scale speed with power to spare, making the dual powered 14 car set a piece of cake on prototypical curves. Regardless of how powerful the motor, the lateral forces involved with 2nd radius curves and a 14 coach train will result in strain and a reduction in speed. In terms of the actual drivetrain, the J94 and 14XX have reportedly (that's the key word) suffered from low quality gearing components. Not being in possession of one myself I can't comment, but with the requirement that the APT-P will need to scale my 2% gradients without cogging, I will happily pay extra to ensure matched sets of brass cogs are fitted to the power car(s). This is not me 'having a go', this is me understanding that there are learning curves in model design and engineering, especially in the chassis department and that it can be a rocky road for a new manufacturer coming to market. The complaints I've seen have been few, but those few are substantial and with the outlay that we'd be committing to our APT-P sets, naturally I'd want the running quality to be top notch and the mechanism to be of proven design, with the only new ground to be broken being the tilt mechanism, which IIRC should work differently to that in the Rapido APT-E as both P and E trains had different mountings for the tilt packs. I can't comment on the coreless motor debate, but I do run DCC so would probably be a benefit to me, but a large portion of the target market will be DC only. Cheers, 60800

Short answer is yes Not 80's, but the long answer is yes, it's still done today. A short while before the two of the three HNRC 20's departed Scunthorpe, one of them (more than likely 20066) had an engine swap - the engine was brought via the M180 all wrapped up on the back of a low loader with HNRC branding everywhere. I've also seen engines / generators for 66's being taken down the same stretch of motorway, presumably to Trent repair sidings (Scunthorpe - DB) or Immingham (FL) Cheers, 60800

The preserved set does though, making it the main draw for the information on the TRSB inclusions. Cheers, 60800

In conversing with Mick, It's been made aware that a black fronted 6 car set could be on the cards - the condition and formation that the preserved set is at Crewe. If anyone else wants this variant please contact Mick, as the more of us there are that want it, the more chance of it becoming an option. What we really need in the description is where the TRSB sits in each set, along with the previously promised coach and full unit numbers. I do feel that to have both the six and seven car sets with yellow fronts is a slight disappointment as it would be nice to have a mix of fronts in those more affordable half length sets. Cheers, 60800

Thanks for the replies all; It seems like when space is at a premium the only choices are forklift / tractor, winches or pinch bar to fulfil the criteria. The two shunter operation is something I have witnessed on a movement in the NRM, but that relied on two things - space for shunter 1 to leave via one of the two exit roads and enough space on the opposite road for the second shunter. With how the NRM is set up, you nominally have a maximum of three or four roads from which it can be done with a two shunter operation. Two with single shunter operation and the rest have to be done with the forklift method. Cheers, 60800

In most instances with the NRM, this would not work as the shunter cannot physically sit on the opposite road due to it being occupied - trying to remove the offending loco from the opposite road results in the problem of then having a shunter stuck on the intended road as, unless one of the two main exit roads is used, you cannot get it out. I have managed to find a snippet of video though that shows D6700, Mallard and Churchill being shunted by a forklift! Which explains that situation. I can only guess therefore that in other places like Barrow Hill, either the forklift or pinch bar method is used. The forklift appears to have a block attached to the forks for pushing and uses a chain arrangement through the rear towing pin for pulling. Cheers, 60800

Thanks for your reply - I had thought of this and consider it to be a very labour intensive way of doing things. The only instance I've used pinch bars in relation to moving locos is in rotating wheels for rod alignment. In today's modern H&S mad world, I very much doubt this practice would be allowed inside the NRM, which forms my query in the main. The other catalyst being the raft of AC Electrics inside Barrow Hill Cheers, 60800

An odd but relevant question - in a roundhouse setting (lets use the NRM and Barrow Hill as the most available examples) where you have relatively short roads and long tender locos, large diesels etc, just how do you shunt a dead loco? I'm asking from both a prototype view and a model railway operation view as I wish to recreate these practices where there is seemingly no room for a shunter on the turntable deck or the road due to said tracks being already occupied by a dead loco. Any help is greatly appreciated with this, especially with examples concerning 50A and 41E Cheers, 60800

Definitely would go for a 'OO' one, but this is fantastic news for N gauge WCML modellers! Cheers, 60800

Thanks for the replies all, 43185 will be done with the wonky red stripe and large numbers as seen at York as that is how I've seen it, simple as Cheers, 60800

Hi all, I've been an amateur modeller since I was about 5, with my layout consisting of an oval of Hornby track with a Caledonian tank and a Virgin trains HST whizzing around, which were both quickly joined by a BR black model of 60800 'Green Arrow' - the loco behind which I had my first railtour, York to Scarborough and back in 2002 Once the traditional track mat layout had been ditched around 2008, I started work on my first proper layout, the Bottesford Valley railway - two ovals on two separate levels with sidings and a shed branching off of the joint GNR / GCR station on the lower loop. That layout ceased to exist in September 2016, which leads us to.... Bahamas Junction, which of course wouldn't be right without a model of Bahamas on it, but that is for another post. A space 6 metres x 3 metres has recently come available to me, and it is here that Bahamas Junction will be built, with all updates posted here - all being well construction should start in July. Which brings me to the 'gap filler' between layout updates. I like building layouts, but I LOVE working on my rolling stock, namely preserved steamers and I have a soft spot for the preserved AC electrics at Barrow Hill, which will be covered in 3D printing updates. That is all for my first blog and there will be revisions to the track plan - there is a cupboard from which I can remove the door and possibly add a terminus station or move one of the sheds. For now, I'll leave you all with some recently completed examples of my work out on a visit. I will also be investing in a proper work bench in due course;

So, over a half a year later than the last post on this topic - physical progress! Main body cad and the result modified with cab floor fresh off of the print bed, with support structure removed. Very pleased with the result so far - unfortunately due to the size of my printer's print bed (only just getting used to all the hardware and software) I have had to split the body in two and add a reinforcing tab structure. The cab is currently just construction lines so I won't show that yet as it won't make any sense; Printing the other half tonight (6 hour print time!) Cheers, 60800

One down, one to go..... 002 seen trundling around Penna Lane TMD about a week after I finished it Something tells me it will take me even longer to finish 185 Cheers, 60800

I knew it was different, but not that different, the shape around the bufferbeam is worse than I thought - thanks for doing the overlay, I don't have the software to do it myself unfortunately Cheers, 60800