manna

G'Day Gents Thank you for your interest, the Northern Heights is a fasinating subject, all the things that were proposed, lines from High Barnet to Potters Bar, to bypass the tunnels at Hadley Wood, great stuff. Her's a few more pics, the O1 (Gresley built) is about 30 years old, and is starting to show her age, she is made out of a bicycle pump and a GEM chassis, I'm not very good with valve gear. The Brass C12, is being updated at the moment, and is usually found on the Edgware-Finchley push-pull, and will share duties with the Sentinel railcar when finished. manna

G'Day Gents Welcome to my main layout, Edgware GN, I, like most people wanted a main line layout, but as usual, space limitations dictated otherwise,, Edgware is 13'x8', and with a bit of compression I've managed to fit almost everything in. Edgware, is/was a single line branch in North London, which is a pretty rare thing in it's self, and survived until1964, although it lost it's passenger service in 1939, at the outbreak of WW2, I've changed history and kept the line open to at least 1970, which allows me to run a few diesels, I've also added a branch off to London Coney, (which gives me a circle, to the fiddle yard). To much talk, here's some pictures. manna

G'Day Gents I've now finished the paneling on the other side of the railcar, and have shortened the chassis to fit the body, (sorry no pics yet) so still lots to go. A while back I started to rebuild a Hornby A1/A3 to Humourist, with the experimental smokebox and chimney, I'm still doing a bit now and then, and have now reached the painting stage, this is how it went. manna

G'day Gents The LIMA, J50 had a plastic chassis. manna

G'Day Gents Like this layout, (anything GN) the footbridge looks a lot like the old Hornby model, bit of cut and shut !! manna

G'Day Gents Ah, Kings Cross, in pre light in the tunnel days, crews used to hang a shovel out of the cab,and scrape it along the sides of the tunnel to find out which way they were travelling, even in diesel days I've been sent to the back cab on a Deltic to see if the signal was off, and more than once, we couldn't see the enterance of Gasworks tunnel as the fumes were so thick, the worst bit was if you were shunted into the tunnel and had to wait for an express to depart, before you could back into the milk yard. The only spot in KX, that would really make a loco slip was, when you came up from Moorgate, if it was raining or frosty, you could take so long getting going, the signalman could (and did) put the road back in your face, and that was with a Class 31. manna

G'Day Gents Is all that 'stuff' ex NASA, I'm sure I saw all that 'stuff' in the background whilst watching the Moon landings...............or was it an old valve radio, sorry totally lost. manna

G'day Gents A point to remember, A fair sized lump of Kings Cross goods yard was taken up by the potato market, in busy periods, Littleworth, between P'bro and Spalding, could send 200-400 wagons a DAY to KX, all bagged in open wagons manna

G'Day Gents There was a big 4-6-0 'Cardean' or something like that, (Sorry the Caly's not my strong point) Gem used to make the body to fit on a B12 chassis. manna Just Googled Caly engines, interesting, I did'nt know they bought 50 ROD's after the Great War...........and the LMS sold most of them to China, so there's a another RTR loco for you.

G'Day Gents Thank you for your interest, right, GN cabs, I find the best way that suits me, is to make the sides and roof square (pics lower down the page) where the roof and sides meet you need to fill in, on the inside of the cab with a triangle of plastic (4 or 5mm, sides) glue well, and let dry, next day, you can start filing away the outside of the cab, curving it as you go, you MAY have to add a bit more to the inside of the cab, (flat plastic) until you get the curve you want. You may also have to use some car body filler to get it real smooth, the GN cab can be time consuming to get right. I would try this method out on scrap first. Good luck. manna

G'Day Gents More happening on the Railcar, but slowly, as Mill Hill is off to a show on Monday. I've been working on the paneling along one side, now I have to turn it around and do the other side, the chassis frame is from an old Trix, trans pennine DMU, just needs to be shortened. manna

G'Day Gents Enjoying this build and may give a plastic chassis a go, but can you let us know what size pipe you used to make the flairs on the tender. Thanks, manna

G'Day Gents Going back to the pannier tank, iirc, did'nt the GWR have a engine shed at Peterborough, once upon a time !!! manna

G'Day Gents I had a talk with one of Bill Hooles firemen, ( by then a driver) who told me that he used to carry a 'dust pan and brush' as they quite often ran out of coal by Hitchin, then Bill had to slow down a bit,,,,,,,,,,,they always made it to the 'Cross' manna

G'Day Gents Wonderful thread this, although, with all these lovely terraced house's, not one of them is owned by one of the 50/60's emigrant, who liked bright colors, I recall some of the house's in North London, being painted in 'lime green' and 'lavender' brickwork as well, which made them rather destinctive ........ manna

G'Day Gents Quite a lot is original, 90% of the roof, under the windows, and between the doors, I've even saved the cut out guards doors and reused them as the drivers door at the other (non powered) end. manna

G'Day Gents I think most footplate staff would have retired at 65, but quite a few Ex drivers came back as guards, I have heard of guards being well into there 70's (ex footplate) and that was at Kings Cross in the 1970's manna (ex footplate, Kings Cross)

G'day Gents What a model best looking loco ever. manna

G'Day Gents Still working on the railcar, sinve my last gripping installment, I made up the doors and fitted the window frames along one side of the railcar, I start the otherside shortly, see what you think, but it is starting to look like a Sentinel. manna

G'Day Gents Aren't C12's a great looking loco, I must get on and get mine running. manna

G'Day Gents Work on the Sentinel is going forward, I've started to cut out the doors on one side, looks a bit messy at the moment, but it is coming together. manna

G'Day Gents Reading through a railay book about a year ago, I read that Sentinel railcars were used in the early 30's on the Edgware branch, which is my main modelling project, well I had to have one, tried E-Bay, way over the top, so I'll just have to build one, looking at a old Gresley Brake 3rd, I thought it's got the right shape body and roof, so I started to strip all the detail off of the body sides, then putting it next to some plans, it certainly looked right, so far I've removed all the body detail and built two cabs, the engine room end has had it's chimney fitted, today I've been down to Adelaide and bought the clear plastic for the windows. I have a Lima, HST motor bogie, and a short wheelbase bogie for the other end, the runningplate is from a Trix, Trans Pennine unit, that I picked up cheap from E-Bay, piccy time. manna

G'Day Gents Glad you like the style of modelling, not a lot of model shops in the almost outback, so I have to make almost everything. Here's a quicky 0-6-0 build, but this one use's a old Hornby Dublo/Wrenn chassis, I built a K's J3, it's not a very good runner, so I built another out of the Dublo chassis, which is a good runner, I cut the runningplate out of plastic card again, and used a bicycle pump for a boiler ( the boiler is a bit over scale ), the secret is to get the boiler down as low as you can (see pics) you can see how much I cut out of the Dublo/Wrenn chasss, I used the K's J3 as a template, so it's close ! I'm using a B12 tender for the moment, but one day I'll have to batch build half a dozen GN tenders. manna

G'Day Gents After filling around the smokebox and fixing the cab, it was time to give her a try, even in white it looked good, the body fitted but when I turned the power on the coupling rods hit the underside of the coupling rod splashers, it didn't matter how much I filed out it was never going to fit, using the old Tri-Ang wheels it had pushed the coupling rods out to far, so I had to order some Romfords, with those fitted and a pair of scratchbuilt coupling rods, I had a working chassis again, and one that fitted the body, the chimney came off of a Lima J50 and the dome from Thomas, never waste anything Ther's not left to do, I want to adjust the spashers as there a bit narrow and finish the lining, bit she's working for a living already. manna

G'Day Gents Fantastic pictures, I never realized how big the forecourt of the the station is, it's huge ! In the early 70's (sorry) when we arrived from the 'Cross' with a stopping train, we normally arrived at platform 6 (where your GE stoppers arrive), from there we would propel our train back into the carrage sidings, down by the Nene river, (sorry can't remember there name) do you do the same! always thought it was such a wonderful conflicting move. manna