Robin Brasher

The station building looks similar to a mirror image of the original station at Swanage which was rebuilt in 1938. The original Swanage station was built in1885 so perhaps Bude station dates from the same time.

Hornby Trains Tank Goods Set number 40 in front of a Quality Backscenes No 2 Country Halt. The locomotive is not a very accurate representation of a BR 3MT 2-6-2T but the lining, handrails, lights and weight of the model capture the feel of the prototype more than new plastic models. I used 3M Photo Mount to glue the backscene on to the MDF and it has dried without wrinkles that would have appeared if I had used wallpaper paste or PVA.

There were three Black 5s at WH Smiths in Swanage today. A prototype Black 5 did visit Swanage in preservation days but I decided not to buy a model as my flat is getting cluttered.

The Bachmann pill-box brake van seems like good value for money compared with the Hornby-Dublo D1 SR goods brake van and is a better model. According to the seventh edition of Ramsay's British Model Trains Catalogue a mint boxed Hornby-Dublo SR goods brake van is worth £150.

I think that the best way to get a paint match for BR crimson would be to look up 540 'crimson' in Technical Paints British Standard 381C paints website. This is http://www.technicalpaintservices.co.uk/381php. A problem with this is that colours seem lighter when applied to a large area than they do on a model or a colour chart. You may find that you need to add a little red to get the right colour.

The picture shows a Hornby-Dublo D12 BR brake third (LMR) Stanier corridor coach in crimson and cream livery. I think it is the best ever representation of BR crimson and cream livery. Taking a model to a paint shop for colour matching is one way to get the correct colour and I have seen Hornby-Dublo coaches selling for £7.50. You can always resell it after you have finished matching the colours.

Thank you. It looks like I misread the paragraph in Keith Parkin's book. Under the heading 1949 Crimson and Cream it says "The later change which was intended to match the LMS 'lake' was known as 'maroon' again by reference to the BS specification." It now looks like he was referring to when maroon livery was applied to the whole coach from 1956. I have had a look at the colour 'crimson' in the BS specification 381C colour chart which shows the colour used by British Railways. It looks like Bachmann and Graham Farish have got the colour wrong for their Bulleid coaches and Hornby's colour for the Maunsell coaches is a bit dark whereas the Hornby-Dublo colour looks correct.

I have still got some Hornby-Dublo D11 ex LNER and D12 ex LMS coaches and the colour is an excellent representation of BR crimson. The first Tri-ang coaches were strawberry red and cream but later models were maroon and cream. Similarly Bachmann's Bulleid coaches are maroon and cream.

According to page 48 of Locomotive Hauled Mk1 Coaching Stock of British Railways by Keith Parkin MA the red chosen for 1949 crimson and cream was a match of 540 'crimson' in the BS specification of 381c. The picture shows a crimson and cream Mk1 coach on the Swanage Railway. The shade looks like the 'crimson' colour. I hope that this helps.

W. H. Smiths at Swanage had sold out of Deltics by Friday and the manager said he would order some more. Today he said that his suppliers have run out as well. This is probably a blessing in disguise as the cost of my collection of Great British Locomotives is mounting up to the extent that it will soon equal to the cost of a ready to run locomotive. I have also run out of storage space

There is 1/3 page about the attempt to preserve the Westerham Valley Light railway on page 8 of Southern Steam Revival by Brian Sharpe published by Mortons for Heritage Railway. My parents had a beige Ford Popular and I think Ford made it in other colours than black. We lived in Orpington and my parents used to take my brother to Toys Hill via Westerham as a treat. I remember that there was a Spitfire and a Hurricane outside Biggin Hill Airport.

My local W H Smiths at Swanage has sold out of Deltics and has ordered some more. They may be popular here because we have just had the diesel gala.

I don't think that we have got the equivalent of Classic Toy Trains in the U.K. The Hornby Railway Collectors' Association produce an excellent monthly magazine called The Hornby Railway Collector which is devoted to Hornby 0 Gauge and Hornby-Dublo. It includes advertisements for Ace Trains and Darstaed.

Billy Johnson firing up the M7 at Swanage motive power depot at 07:06 on Friday 25 April. Adjacent to the M7 is Eddystone. A cool, wet day here with heavy rain forecast until 14:00. Now the Easter holiday is over the Swanage Railway is operating four trains a day with an interval of at least 1 hour 20 minutes between trains.

I assume that this is a new Corgi Bassett-Lowke Royal Scot that is designed to run on 2 or 3 rail track. I do not know what you mean by regular 0 gauge track but it would probably go on Peco 0 gauge track but not through their points. You could buy a small length of regular 0 gauge track and see if the deep flanges foul the sleepers. On our club layouts at the Isle of Purbeck Model Railway Group and the Wessex Branch of the Hornby Railway Collectors Association we use coarse scale 3-rail track made by Middleton in Australia which is compatible with Hornby 0 gauge 3-rail. Alan Levy, who makes ACE Trains, advises against buying any model railways as an investment on page 125 of his book Brilliantly Old Fashioned, The Story of Ace 0 Gauge Trains. They are not stocks and shares and they are there to run. Ace Trains are not produced as limited editions but some of the production runs are very small, they are made of metal which has a long term appeal and they are high quality items. I have seen some Corgi Bassett-Lowke items and I think the same applies to them. They seem to hold their value on EBay. I don't think an 00 gauge controller would provide enough power to run 0 gauge engines for a prolonged period. I have two Gaugemaster controllers designed for 0 gauge models and they are guaranteed for life. At a three day exhibition at the Brighton Centre the club's Gaugemaster controllers overheated and we had to borrow G Gauge controllers which worked well. I hope that this information helps.

I am just wondering if you put a Great British Locomotive in a display case with some ready to run 00 gauge locomotives whether anyone would be able to identify the ready to run locomotives. The Great British Locomotive Schools class probably looks better than the Hornby tender drive version. For collectors who never run their locomotives but just keep them in their boxes or in a display case they may be better off with some of the Great British Locomotives. Certainly the Great British Locomotives Schools class looks a lot better than my attempt at building the Airfix kit and is probably cheaper taking inflation into account. When I lived in Orpington the estate I lived in had roads named after schools so I have a special fondness for the Schools class. At the primary school was an illustrated book of locomotives and I knew the names of the Schools class locomotives before I learnt my tables. I lived at 45 Malvern Road but other nearby roads included Charterhouse Road, Eton Road, Repton Road and Winchester Road. There was a secondary modern school at Charterhouse Road and every parent did their utmost to prevent their children from ending up there. I was repeatedly warned by my parents, grandparents and teachers that if I continued to get distracted by railways I would go to Charterhouse School and end up doing some menial job.

Some of the Golden Age representatives are polite. One comes to the Isle of Purbeck Model Railway Group as the company is based in Swanage. He said that some of his best sales are to the least likely looking people who come to shows in shabby clothes so he is always polite to everyone.

Schools class Stowe together with its little brother Repton. I bought my Stowe from W.H. Smiths at Swanage this morning using the self service till. The assistant told me that they had sold very well although there are about four left. She told me to press the "I have brought my own bag" button as they did not have a bag big enough. Although the Schools class did not run on the Swanage Railway that I am modelling I have already got an Airfix kit built Schools and several Hornby ones. I used to live at Orpington where I often saw Schools locomotives. I used to record their numbers in a notebook. Before the Hornby model came out members of the Orpington and District Model Railway Club used to motorise Airfix kits using a Kemilway chassis kit or build Wills kits. It was a pity that the Airfix ready to run Schools never came out. Airfix had problems with production delays like Hornby have now. The decision not to produce the Schools had nothing to do with the introduction of the Hornby model because the Airfix model was going to be much more accurate than the Hornby model and would have appealed to a different market.

I went to Bournemouth College of Technology for three years and I am very interested in your layout. I am modelling the Swanage Railway and many of the engines were looked after at Bournemouth Shed. Will you please let me know where I can see the layout?

The pictures show a couple of my Hornby 0 Gauge Milk Traffic Vans at the Hornby Railway Collector meeting last Tuesday. The vans had sliding doors and milk churns made for them. Hornby made the blue van with a black underframe from around 1935. I use it for my Somerset and Dorset Railway trains. The Southern green van with the lettering on a panel on the lower left side was made after the war. These matched the Southern green coaches. I am surprised that no-one has made them in 00 gauge as they were a common sight on the railways before insulated milk vans and later milk tank wagons were used. For further information please see pages 186 and 187 of The Hornby Gauge 0 System by Chris and Julie Graebe.

Perhaps Hattons are trying to recoup the money they lost when they were selling new Hornby Dublo emus, including sets with track, for £2 each in the late 1960s. That was about half the recommended retail price.

O gauge tinplate trains simulate the weight of the real trains but Hornby O gauge also had more play value than Hornby-Dublo. The cattle, milk vans and goods brake vans had opening doors so you could put cattle, milk churns or guards in them. There was also a side tipping wagon. The locomotives, goods and passenger brake vans had brackets to put lights on. You could load Dinky Toy lorries from Hornby open wagons using either Dinky Toy or Hornby cranes. The goods depot and engine shed had opening doors. My first venture into 0 gauge since my childhood was when I bought a Hornby LMS goods set at an auction for about £40. The spring had broken but someone repaired it for about £20. The engine would only do about three circuits at a speed that would do credit to Mallard but you can buy electric mechanisms for about £150.

From a dream to reality in 40 years. T9 30120 crosses Corfe Viaduct with a passenger train at 11:52 on Saturday 5 April 2014.

My funds are limited as well. I pre-ordered an Ace Trains BR SR Q class 0-6-0 goods locomotive for about £250 which seemed very expensive. While I was waiting for it to arrive for about a year I occasionally bought a Hornby goods wagon for it to pull. I ended up with about 20 goods wagons and found that I had spent more money on the goods wagons than the locomotive without realising it. I have never regretted buying them. I have taken the Q class to exhibitions and run it with heavy loads for three days. The public like to see 0 gauge trains running and I think more people watch our layout than anything else. At Blandford the lady Mayor came back to our layout after she had been round the exhibition and spent the whole afternoon watching the trains going by.

For further information about Ace Trains please see http://www.acetrainslondon.com then click "Enter Site" and then an item like "New Coaches". You will see that Ace are planning to produce coaches like Southern Railway Bulleid coaches complete with a restaurant car, a nine car Coronation blue set and a Bulleid Tavern car that 00 gauge ready to run enthusiasts can only dream about. Similarly if you see http://www.darstaed.com and click on "Download Coaches" you will see that they are producing pre-grouping coaches from CR, SECR, LSWR and GER.