ColinK

I'm looking forward to seeing this develop - been to the real place many times.

Nice to see all these pictures. When I was at school I had many days in the summer holidays travelling up and down the WCML north of Preston behind class 50's, often double headed. Shame I don't have any photos of them. Suprisingly I've never seen any video of double headed 50's over Shap and Beattock - is there any?

More from the rail replacement service today - one of the coach drivers is wearing his 'I'd rather be on British Rail' t-shirt. Caused quite a few smiles, but one passenger was not amused. NB t-shirt was obtained from Rapido trains.

As you may know, the Preston - Chorley line is currently closed for engineering work, with buses replacing the trains. Here is an actual conversation between a passenger and bus driver at Preston yesterday. Passenger, 'is this the Leyland bus?' Bus driver, 'sorry no, it's a Volvo!'

Hi, The railway is quite close to where I live. I did have the open days in my diary, but was gutted that I missed them due to working those days. Are there any more open days this year?

I wish those pictures of the CMC 1015 had not been posted. It looks so nice, I've had to order one. Just as well there is plenty of overtime at work, as I'll need to fit it with DCC sound when it comes.

As well as having ordered the APT-E, I also ordered one of the 'I'd rather be on British Rail' T shirts. The T shirt has arrived, I wonder if I should wear it while driving a rail replacement coach?

Hi, yes the space is small and the decoder needs to be well insulated so it doesn't touch anything metal and go bang. I found it quite difficult to fit a decoder and managed to pull one of the wires out of the chassis. I suspect it was from the pick ups as the loco no longer worked. Then I could not find a way of repairing it. Oops. So you might want to consider getting one from a retailer who will fit the chip for you. I've now got a blue class 14 fitted with DCC sound by Olivia's Trains in Sheffield. They weathered it for me too. It looks good and sounds good.

Hi, I've ordered one. Thanks due to Sandra at Rapido for responding so quickly (via RM web) with my order number (197) which is really encouraging and great customer service.

Hi, Yes it was Mark's layout. Went down very well with the public.

Just found this topic. I'm just home from operating a friends layout at Lymm Transport Day. His layout is also of Chineese Railways and Lymm was its first exhibhition appearance. I was too busy to take any pictures. Suprisingly, there was a model of Japaneese Railways at the same event.

Certainly would.

Had to smile reading the thread on Northwich Oakleigh, post 20 mentions 'soda ash in POO' !

Do you mean like this? Olivia's Trains in Sheffield painted, weathered and put a sound chip in it for me.

Just a 'out of the box thinking' suggestion! Next to the Trafford Centre near Manchester there is a covered dry ski slope. You can see it clearly from Barton Bridge on the M60. That would make an unusual alternative to your sloping road bridge. Should be easy to make too, just corrugated sheet with a big sign 'APA Dry Ski Slope'.

How do you tell if your loco has v3.5 or v4?

Looks a great model, will there be one in BR Provincial Livery?

Thanks for posting this. I've now ordered two.

Does anyone know if there any open days in 2014?

Hi, I bought two Hornby 31's. R2963, 31439 'North Yorkshire Moors Railway' in Regional Railways livery. R2900XX, 31247 in Railfreight grey with yellow ends, with Hornby sound. I don't think either of them has the suspect chassis, but would appreciate confirmation or otherwise? I actually bought 31439 with the intention of fitting DCC sound to it. However, I found a new sound fitted 31247 at pretty much the same price as buying a sound chip and having fitted, so I bought it and swapped the bodies over - not quite a 5 minute job as there are differences in the lighting. So I have the R2963 chassis (only test run) fitted with the 31247 body which I don't need. So if anyone wants the loco please contact me via a PM. I'm happy to split the chassis and body if it helps anyone solve their 31 problem.

Just found this, very enjoyable. I do like the way you have included things that went wrong. It helps us all learn.

On my layout, one road in the goods yard is isolated from the rest of the track using isolating fishplates. It is then fed power from a DPDT switch, one side of the switch is fed from the 'normal' track power, the other side is fed from the programming track output from the controller. So to programme a loco, i shunt it into the siding, move the switch to programme; it works for me. I've made the programming siding long enough for a 2 car DMU s I can programme both cars at once.

Thanks for sharing that with us. I too find ballasting a nightnmare that jams up points, spoils the running qualities and (not sure how) and causes strange electrical problems (mainly current leakage onto tracks which are supposed to be isolated). The layout I am currently building has Peco foam underlay to avoid the pain and so I can reuse the track.

Really like the Jinty.

Thanks Jamie. Spotted the old yard crane too. We continued walking to Morecambe on the cycleway, which presumably was once the railway. Much more interesting than Christmas TV!