thegreenhowards

Tony, That’s a thought provoking comparison. The key question for me is what drives the cost of the ‘O’ gauge RTR loco to £700 compared with £150-£200 for an ‘OO’ version? I would imaging it’s mainly the size of the potential market meaning that the development costs have to be spread over far fewer sales. Clearly the ‘O’ gauge loco will have bigger parts and therefore more raw material, but raw material is cheap, so I would imaging that’s a small factor. There may be more detail on the ‘O’ gauge loco - is that what drives the higher cost of a professional build? But again I can’t believe that makes a huge difference to the cost - perhaps 10-20%. Similarly the cost of assembly can’t be that much different unless there are dramatically more parts. i think what I’m asking is, would there be any more research done for a £700 ‘O’ gauge loco than for an equivalent ‘OO’ gauge loco, or is the cost just being spread over fewer customers? If the latter, then it’s not surprising that there are a similar number of detail issues on the ‘O’ gauge loco. Andy

I have now made them work. The problem was with the decoder. While the decoder works fine, the stayalive made no difference. I tried two decoders with the same result. I then gave up for a bit, but when I came back to it, I tried a different DCC Concepts decoder and it worked fine. Andy

The one that is available is the rebuilt version. He sent me that initially even though I ordered the unrebuilt one, and I’m still waiting... I think they were rebuilt about 1960/1961, but don’t quote me on that.

It’s a bit like a gospel isn’t it. Mine lives near my modelling bench. The wonders of ECML catering c.1958 - almost every train is different! I have had a pair of D.275 sides on order from Bill Bedford for quite a while now for my take on the train.

The 1605 was very much a secondary service with portions and all mark 1s in the carriage workings apart from the RB, although I imagine the odd Gresley or Thonpson carriage would have stood in. The RB is shown as a standard Gresley teak, but I think this was the service which Clive Carter claimed had one if the more exotic buffets in his backtrack article (d.275 or 258 from memory - I’m away at the moment and can’t check).

If it’s the 4:05, I suspect the streak is nameless...

Tony, if if there was ever a layout which proves that you can never have enough storage, then yours is it. You must have over 80 trains ready for service now, including the cassettes! I’ve also been dabbling with cassettes, so far made out of wood with Peco track. They seem to work, but my carpentry is a bit messy on the storage box, so the system will need some fettling. They’re a useful addition, but a bit of a fag compared with having stuff actually on the layout. Andy

Tony, I could have guessed that you would not go for the sound one! Without DCC it wouldn’t work very well anyway. While DCC would clearly be inappropriate for your layout and fantastic collection of kit built locos, I think the reasons you give for not having sound are a case a ‘the best being the enemy of the good’. OK, it won’t recreate every aspect of a Deltic’s presence, but for me, the Deltic sound was their greatest attribute and if I can get (say) 80% of the way to recreating that, then that’s 80% better than nothing. As for the twin plumes of smoke, never say never. I suspect we’ll see a system for recreating that in my lifetime. Here’s hoping! Andy

Archie, I love the Deltic - It sounds superb. I also have a legomanbiffo sound file in mine, but I don’t get that bass, which really does the distinctive sound justice. I’m tempted to upgrade to one of your earthmover speakers, but I think I’ll wait and see how the accurascale one comes out. I already have a sound fitted one on order, and they’re promising plenty of bass. Andy

Hi Clive, The BS+CL sounds great interesting. Can you show or direct me to a picture? Andy

Thanks for all the help on my Thompson kitchen car from people on here a few weeks ago. It’s now finished, so I thought I’d show the final result. I managed to sort out the underframe fairly well. Jonathan’s trick of twisting the dynamos with pliers seemed to work well - thanks! I had some problems with getting it to go round curves without the bogies fouling the underframe which I don’t remember on these conversions before. But some ruthless filing away of plastic seems to have sorted it. Not having to bother with an interior is definitely a time saver. Andy

I never met Roy but his reputation speaks for itself. Very sad news and a great loss to the hobby. RIP Roy.

I hadn’t seen that thread. At a quick glance it looks good, especially as I have Comet triplet in the to do pile. I’m travelling to Scotland by train on Saturday, so will give it a good read then. Thanks. Andy

I’ll try the twisting Jonathan. I agree the rainstrip is the difficult part. The destination brackets are OK on plastic roofs like this where I can use liquid cement, but on MJT metal roofs I still find them a real pain. Are these kitchen car battery/ fridgidaire boxes available commercially? Andy

Tony, The dynamos should be at right angles as you say. They slipped a bit while the araldite was setting. That’s mainly what I meant by the underframe being a bit messy. But they look fine when viewed from the side, so I’m not going to bother, reglueing them. As I know you’ll agree, it’s a shame solder doesn’t work on plastic! The roof profile has been altered, although using my slightly half hearted method rather than your take it all off and start again approach. I find it quite difficult to get the rain strips and destination board brackets back on neatly, so I only smooth the roof profile to the extent that I can without removing these. It’s not perfect, but IMHO gives 80% of the benefit for 20% of the effort. The photo below shows the roof before painting and illustrates my ‘reprofiling method’. The resultant end profile is quite acceptable in my view. Andy

Just measured my RK and it’s spot on. Phew!

Phil, I’m not 100% sure. I put the MJT bogies over the Bachmann mounting holes. Having looked at a few other photos, they seem to all have the same look, but it’s only really apparent when viewed side on. Andy

Tony, Thanks for the photo. I attach some photos of the state of play on mine by way of comparison. The research I’ve done suggests the underframe should be rather different from both yours and Gilberts. The best picture I’ve found is in the blue Harris book on p106 which clearly shows the corridor side on which there are two additional battery boxes on the left of centre. This is consistent with the drawing so I’ve gone with that. I can’t find a good prototype picture of the kitchen side, but the drawings don’t show any additional boxes, so I’ve not added any. I can’t see any vacuum tanks, so I suspect they were between the battery boxes as on the Gresley Kitchen car and therefore invisible from normal viewing angles - therefore I’ve omitted them. The V hangers seem to be on the opposite side from Bachmann’s, so I’ve cut the Bachmann ones off and replaced with MJT. They had heavy duty dynamos, so I’ve replaced the Bachmann ones with MJT BR Mk1 versions which look about right. My underframe looks messy from underneath, but I think it’s fine from the side view which is what counts, This represents my best guess and I wouldn’t claim it’s 100% right. Of course individual vehicles may have varied through time. Gilbert, apologies for invading your thread with this rather esoteric subject. Please say if you’d rather I took it elsewhere. Andy

Andrew, That certainly looks the Bees Knees! I’ll have to track down Master Class Models as I’d never heard of them, although I do remember the article in MRJ a few years ago. I suspect I’ve missed the boat on this one, and anyway, having invested the time and money in getting so far on my model, I’m not going to start again with a new kit. I’ll be interested to see what else they do. I’m particularly interested in building some of the Gresley steel panelled artic twins to d.309/313/322, but I’m not aware of any kits or sides for these. I think I’ve worked out a way forward for the d.309, but the others are in the too difficult box at present. Have you ever heard of kits for these? Regards Andy

Tony, I think theres more to it than just just being the ‘trainspotting generation’. That is the fact that in the ‘transition era’ one can (obviously!) run both steam and diesel models on the same layout. So for those, like me, who like both, we can have the best of both worlds. Personally, I grew up in the blue diesel era, and did once have a layout based around that period. But I found it rather boring and I’ve been gradually drifting back in time ever since. I’m now in the transition era, but have started to put together early ‘50s rakes as well, and you even managed to sell me that silver jubilee set, so I may be tempted back even further. On the other hand I still love a Deltic+8 so who knows! My indecision is likely to be good for Hornby, Bachmann and kit manufacturers...and bad for my wallet! Andy

They do list ends for the non brake coaches separately https://www.dartcastings.co.uk/mjt/2853.php. Isn’t it just the inner ends which are integral to the floorpan? However, I can’t see sides or ends for the brake coach listed. I will try emailing them. Andy.

I’ve not built brass non corridor stock before, so I’m on a learning curve and I had the 247 ends in stock having picked them up cheaply - Maybe a false economy! I’m using Comet ends for the other half of the twin as I need some brake ends and neither 247 nor MJT seem to do them. Andy

Many thanks Gilbert, That gives me a useful layout to work on. It looks like the standard Bachmann underframe, but with extra battery boxes and possibly beefed up dynamos? I also spent some time chatting to Andrew at Isinglass about it yesterday at Railex. Unfortunately his drawing doesn’t really show what those extra battery boxes look like - just a square box. It shows the two extra boxes on one side, but not the one extra on the other side. Anyway, I suspect I’ve got as much data as I’m going to get now, so no excuse not to crack on! Regards Andy

Tony, No hurry at all. Thanks for the ones you put up of NE area usage, but I’m really looking for South end of the ECML. I have a couple in Blood and Custard already picked up cheaply, so I’ll be looking to add to them in due course but, as your photos show, I can mix them up with ex LNER stock and ring the changes. It would be great to have a definitive late ‘50s photo to base it on, so if you come across one please share it with us, but don’t go trawling through 1000s of photos specially! Andy

That’s very useful Robert. I’m afraid that my knowledge of LMS coaches is quite basic and mainly comes from reading the information panels on the lovely LMS rake at the Severn Valley railway. The lack of SKs would explain why one doesn’t see many on the ECML relief rakes. I’m afraid that I don’t find the standard period 3 Staniers very exciting, whereas the Portholes are quite distinctive - a sort of poor man’s Thompson! I can see myself building a relief rake with a couple of Portholes, maybe a period 3 SK and a mix of ex LNER coaches as seen in some of Tony’s photos. Andy