billbedford

Were the tops of Duchess fireboxes ever cleaned? and how did the cleaners reach them?

'Pewter' is a generic term for lead-free white metal. There are a number of different commercially available alloys that fall into that category.

The problem with all this soul searching about RTR is that however much people have pride in their kit built locos they still run them on RTP HO track and toy-train pointwork.

Yes but, pick-up goods would have fitted and unfitted wagons mixed in the train. And a pick-up would be more appropriate for yer bog standard shunting plank.....

Etching is only a medium.

I don't think that art has ever been concerned with visual accuracy.

I don't think that being able to copying a photograph in a different medium has anything to do with being an 'artist' however skill goes into producing the final product.

Yes, but there was always a difference between society artists, who could portray, and even enhance, a person's wealth and status, and a jobbing limner who was at best able to catch a likeness.

Naar Naar... It is only art if it is sold by an Art Dealer..... ... Nope, that is a painting.

Well Tom Harland was an artist by profession, that is he painted water colours as a living.

I suspect there are quite a lot of kits, or at least part kit, being produced, but they are done privately and are never marketed.

Bachman Mk1s are modular, which means less expensive tooling than a coach with a one piece body. It also means that they can add new tools when they are needed, were as with a one piece body they would have to think in terms of at least planning for separate slides for the restaurant cars when they commissioned the series tooling.

My understanding was that since there are relatively few people able to run long trains, the expected sales would not make such a project viable, especially since catering vehicles are in general more complicated, and thus more expensive, than ordinary carriages.

Many of the wagons that Guy Hemingway measured were in use by contractor building the Longdendale reservoirs in the early 1930s, so the wagon in question was likely to have been an old one sold out of service and so had many small differences to the wagon shown in the diagram books.

I don't think that we can assume any such thing. I you look very closely at that four wheeler you will find that one of the doors has be stopped up and replace, suggestion that it was in use as a engineers/stores van. In fact all of the visible train is odd. The second vehicle was a six wheeled composite to diagram 2K1 and arranged T/T/Lav/F/Lugg/T of which only two were built. Next was what appears to be a short bogie saloon. So this does not a appear to be a 'normal' train that would need strengtheners.

The GC diagram numbers were of the form Number Letter Number, where the first number indicated the type of vehicle: 1 - NPCS 2 - Four and Six wheeled passenger coaches 3 - Ordinary bogie coaches 4 - Ordinary bogie coaches with Lavatories 5 - Gangwayed bogie coaches 6 - Railmotors etc. The letter indicated the type of accommodation: A - Van Third B - Third C - Open Third D - Restaurant Third E - Open Van Third F - Saloon Third G - Open Third, also Kitchen Car* H - Van Composite J - Slip Composite K - Baggage Composite L - Composite M - Restaurant Composite N - Saloon Composite P - Van First Q - Ordinary First R - Restaurant First S - Saloon First T - Open Carriage Truck U - Covered Carriage Truck W - Special Cattle Box X - Horse Box Y - Brake Van Z - Miscellaneous Van * The Barnum saloons were 5G1, composite restaurants that were rebuilt as kitchen cars by the LNER became 5G2 etc. The final digits of diagram number was a serial of the initial number and letter, unfortunately these don't align with the various body styles, for instance, the sequence of lavatory composites is: 4L1 - 38' MS&L built 1880 4L2 to 4L6 - clerestories built 1903/4 4L7 & 4L8 - London suburban built 1906 & 1907 4L9 & 4L10 - 60' matchboard built 1911/2 & 1920 I have a number of diagrams, though not a full book, but if you need help identifying carriages let me know and I'll see what I can do.

Newsletter went out yesterday.

See this page, and this one

Fourteen working day plus the Christmas/NewYear holidays adds up to a 'few weeks'.

But was any of this known when 'computer' was a job description and a slide-rule was the instrument of choice for doing calculations? i.e. when steam locos were last commercially designed.

The full story is that G. Dow suggested that the recently ordered locos should be named in the first formal meeting of the BR naming Committee in October 1949, but it was turned down. The suggestion was brought up again when Dow was chairman of a meeting, in April 1954, to discuss arrangements for the opening ceremony of the new Woodhead tunnel. Again the suggestion was rejected by higher authority. Finally after transfer of the MSW electric stock from ER to LMR jurisdiction it was agreed in July 1958 that twelve EM1s with boilers and the EM2s should be named. Dow's original list was received except that substitutes (Archimedes and Stentor) had to be found for Hercules and Jupiter since these names had been use on new Warship class locos. It seems likely that Crewe's list of 'Suitable Names for Locomotives' was more extensive than Doncaster's.

Disagree. It seems to me fairly obvious that names from the original locos used on the line were re-used, once it is understood that the suggestion that the electric locos should be named, in October 1948, came from George Dow, who at the time would have been researching, if not writing, his Great Central trilogy

Have a look at this page. Never mind the squiggly stuff, but at the bottom of the page there is an animation of cranks and pistons, and a graph (top one) which shows the position of the piston with respect to the angle of the crank plots out as a sine wave.

But that's not right either. Apart from Electra they all carried the names of the original SA&M locos used on that line.

I offer etches for the LBSC and SECR bogie stock used on the IOW and well as sides only, Though I don't know of a 54' RTR carcass that wouold be a suitable donor for the sides.