john new

Sorry but I totally disagree. I would rather be late home because my train back from London is running slowly through the New Forest in gale conditions (and able to stop if the driver sees a downed tree) than have it crash at line speed and derail. It is the same reason as the need when driving the car to go more slowly in bad/wet weather; sadly something many motorists don’t seem to do.

Had this idea come from UEFA with a proper pan-European structure and promotion/relegation it would be what football needs. Unfortunately, international politics (national governmental and sporting) would get in the way just as previous suggestions of a pan-UK league have. Sadly, like the Kerry Packer cricket situation, money then takes over and you get what we have got. Common sense is not always considered or adopted - our English League/Nationwide structure, as an example in my opinion splits too far down hence the absurdity of Nationwide North having south Midlands/East Anglian clubs like Boston, Kings Lynn (since promoted) Hereford and Gloucester in Nationwide North. There isn't a Nationwide Midlands option because of the low down split. Looking at cricket, Packer did start a step-change, is it better or worse than it would have been without his intervention who knows.

With ironing boards you need a double tubed one in the leg supports. Our big one (for actual ironing) is fairly stable; I bought a smaller one that would fit into our then car (a Corsa) but it is single tube and has proved a bit too wobbly. Used with a second one under the 4ft square board I use with my test/running in oval it is ok, not as good when used as below.

This assumes your accountancy regime, whether micro or macro/national sized, lets you spend it now. When computerising new services/replacing older gear back in the 90s we were forced to lease kit (more expensive overall) because if we bought outright it was less kit on the ground in year one. We all knew at local level it was not the most cost-effective way of doing it but it was the best way to utilise the £n we had available within the rules then applicable. At national level now someone has made the decision to spend a % of their £ megabucks budget on HS2, without reopening the debate on whether HS2 is good or bad, that same % of the rail budget is therefore not available for other projects like the electric spine, GWR mainline, trans-Pennine wiring, cross-rail2 etc.

Thank you and done - link to pdf = https://pure.aber.ac.uk/portal/files/9884787/MacKinnon_R_J.pdf

Will there be a link to a new BRM TV edition or is this one not having one associated with it?

First time I have come across this thread is today. Was the thesis ever published, is it ongoing or abandoned? If online would like to read it.

Yes.

This memory may be false as it is now about 30 years since I was working in the Engineers support office but I have a vague recollection of coming across them before. If they are what I remember they are an early form of pressure relief chamber in the drainage system to give a bit of expansion room when surface water flows get high. The bit of wood is a logical extra pressure relief a bit like a fusible plug in a boiler. Too high off the ground to be just a seat and not suitable for viewing the sea. Not the same thing as a gas relief column (aka stench pipes) in the foul sewer system.

Complexity of the graph, electric would follow the same timeline, though flatter though to start with; then how do you split IC between oil, diesel, and petrol (and more latterly hydrogen) in a graph, which in context, was aimed at showing the curve for the horse's history as a prime mover. With electric, also would you further break it down into battery, OH (Also by voltage?), rail pick up (Several formats). As Pacific251G stated the sheer scale of horse usage by rail companies was phenomenal - circa 28,000 in 1915 but still only down to around 9,000 after WW2. Somewhere I have more accurate figures but my notes from the work I did pre the 2016 Conference are not currently to hand. Pre-COVID there were still at least six, possibly more, horse worked tourist railed trams systems worlwide.

Agreed, I did say I was being flippant. In my article on Why displace the horse (in the Early Railways 6 Conference papers) I did give a much fairer overview. Although the graph is an approximation it is an assessment of how horse, steam and modern traction evolved/are evolving as %s of their peak use. Clearly steam was extremely important in transport development during the nineteenth century but you can see why I was making a flippant case regarding steam being the short-term interloper. 400+ years of horse traction (250 as the dominant power) 200+ years for steam (circa 100 years as the dominant power) 180+ years for modern electric/IC (circa 50 years and ongoing as the dominant power) Hydrogen etc, wasn't included but clearly now needs adding into the mix as the desirability of diesel is being challenged.

The very big Dorset Steam Fair is now held north of Blandford off the A354, Tarrent Hinton?. The smaller Portland Steam Fair was held at the former AUWE Southwell site but relocated to a site at Chickerell a few years back. Both off in 2021 AFAIK due to COVID.

It is some time since I read the articles about the GWR plan for the SW electrification but none are currently to hand. If anyone does have copies to hand it might give some clues.

Quite possible. I know from my management years that reports can be commissioned for several reasons. Options could have been - The coal prices issue you have mentioned Or similar issue, perhaps loco footplate men stirring so suggest a major single manning proposal to shut them up The most likely, serious logistics costs with steam in the far-west were costing the GWR £n,000s pa in just carting loco coal around, so chose to make a genuine assessment of how much it would cost to go electric and will the mega £ capital investment generate sufficient savings each year over the payback period to justify the repayments on the capital investment. It didn’t so they didn’t proceed. I think I have read that (3) was the reason but don’t know enough about the GWR’s internal Director level politics to know whether it was the operating sections and the loco engineers trying to progress the technology and the Board blocked it (insufficient cash savings) or a Board proposal to modernise ultimately proved to be a bad investment if proceeded with as more expensive overall than the status-quo.

And prove to be a right PITA when you forget that your couplings of choice don't like the curves you've gone and installed due to the fact that the subsequent track alignments look better scenically than a straight line of track parallel to the board edge! The downside is they then cause the coupling problems.

Counter-factual history is an interesting topic. If the NER had been able to do what Raven had clearly wanted/expected when he arranged for No.13 to be built, given that the specification anticipated the subsequently intended class working over the NBR inclines on the route beyond Newcastle into Edinburgh, also probably fewer Gresley/Thompson/Peppercorn A* class steam pacifics too. The early Gresley A1s in the 1920s would only have been needed working the ECML Ex-GNR section KIngs Cross - Leeds/York, Leeds-York &/or Ripon-Darlington, north of Edinburgh, the ex-GCR main line etc. Had the NER passenger electrics been successful how much further south would the ECML have been wired? Sadly real world events over took the conceptual plan; Gresley examined high speed diesels and determined steam could do it with more comfort, the GWR investigated electrifying into the West Country but again without implementation.

When Hawksworth(?), Ivatt and Bullied were CMEs I get the idea the usual 5 point process was the idea:- idea and check it’s’ feasibility and likely cost-effectiveness develop prototypes test refine roll out a series of standards Then the subsequent plans went a bit awry due to various issues. The BR steam standards were built in a rush and market forces overtook them, as for the rush to dieselise it seemed to be an idea introduced (without the other checks), skipping steps 2-4, and the roll out a notch-potch of good and bad. Hindsight gives 20:20 vision, the conceptual ideas (1) were broadly correct when made but then failed in the execution. Whatever you think of Thompson’s actual designs like Riddles his step (1) idea of looking at reducing the sheer variety of LNER loco types was sound. Even before the grouping options to swap out steam were being experimented with/installed; we must not overlook that the pioneer electric loco was nineteenth century. 1840 Davidson. If anything, and I appreciate this is being flippant, steam was the interloper that eradicated canal, horse and cable traction (arguably also far too rapidly with experimental items just like the modernisation plan diesels) and then by being so widespread and embedded seriously delayed a much earlier transition to electrification and internal combustion

Where? Just curious.

I was trying earlier to fit a DCC chip into the OO Dapol B4. Not going well in the putting back together phase, giving up until tomorrow in hope I have better patience and less clumsy fingers. I appreciate they have learnt (as per the smokebox fit for the new Manor) but who ever thought up the arrangement for the B4 either forgot about post-sales non-factory fitting of DCC chips by the end users until too late down the line to change things (my guess) or was born a masochist!

The glow in the dark feature would save building lighthouses.

It is also about defining carer/the care profession. My elderly mother (97) does not need a carer in the medical sense but does need some domestic assistance. Her private sector maid/cleaner hasn't been recently, as I doubt she could afford child care on the low hourly rate paid whilst the schools were shut. Her job is exactly as @Hobby describes, small employer, low wages and is part of the care support industry but not how a carer would be described within the government descriptions.

The dilemma with the reporting of deaths as COVID related if within 28 days of diagnosis isn't new as @hayfield mentions with his mother. With my father similar circumstances back in 1972; he was always weak with lung problems due to having had TB as a teenager, got the flu and ended up going into hospital. Seriously weakened by the flu he ended up having a heart attack (which was final cause of death), the attack brought on by the incessant coughing. I can't remember what went on his death certificate but even if it wasn't recorded as flu back in the 1970s the true cause was long-term weakening due to TB, exacerbated by flu. Long-TB is not a modern thing due to medical advances (Long COVID appears to be) but having seen the impact at first hand of it on an individual's health, and the knock-on family impact, I can fully see why the medical profession are currently using 28 days.

Similar issue a few years back, described as good condition copy of the HMC Wollaton papers (rare). Arrived with cover detached. Expected to send back to USA at my cost and no refund unless they got it. Cut my losses and had it rebound in the UK. Might have been customs or postal damage but I have rarely used e-bay for second-hand since.

The BBC reporting the ship has been arrested - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-56743556 and not going anywhere until what is effectively the release ransom fee is paid.

As posted elsewhere a little bit more testing today appears to establish 2ft/610mm as an acceptable radius for working with the modern tiny spike style t/l couplings.