Wheatley

Gilbert Harding, when presented with the question "Is it your intention to overthrow the government of the United States by force?" allegedly answered "Sole purpose of visit".

They dont like Brit tourists pointing at them and trying to take a photo :-) Even more of a head shaking moment than filling in the green form on the way over with the invitation on the back to write to the National Office of Paperwork Reduction if you though it was too long.

By far the easiest way to operate this would be using push buttons and diode matrices, I can just about get my head around them and if I get stuck I know a man to ask. But I never worked an NX panel, only lever frames, so my layout must have levers and they must stand normal or reversed otherwise I'll be twitching all day. One day they might even get interlocking (ironically the PL26s were a stop gap until I could build my own interlocked frame but that was ten years ago when they were 3 quid each and I'm not getting any younger) but I can just about cope without it. Thank you to everyone who's replied :-)

A static brake test on anythingbin the UK more than a few years old only tells you you have brake continuity. The running brake test tells you whether they actually slow the train down. You can get brake continuity with the disc brake calipers frozen solid, or with half the brake blocks missing. Granted on a modern unit the train might actually know half the brake blocks are missing without you looking.

One if those (Damask Red ?) is discontinued I think (possibly because so is Rover !). If you see it buy a couple of tins. Failing that, this lot will sell you a 400ml aerosol can of anything you can find a code for. I used then for RAF Light Aircraft Grey, Hemp and Dark Sea Grey - https://www.riolettcustomaerosols.co.uk/

So that's how they're doing it ! Reopening the London Extention ! I take back everything I said about First, clearly they are visionaries !!

Restoring Your Railway. Sorry, laziness.

Now that is an idea, thank you !

Thank you. Yes that warning is on Brian Lambert's page and the same would apply if I made my own levers with a home made sliding finger switch on a bit of PCB. The workaround (according to Mr Lambert) is to pause at the midpoint to allow thd CDU to recharge, if necessary I can live with that I think. The design of the PL26 is actually really cool, I took one to bits once :-) (when they weren't a tenner each !)

Thank you both, that seems fairly conclusive and confirms that I wasn't just typing the wrong terms into the RS and Farnells catalogues ! I shall probably concentrate the existing PL26s on the largest lever frame (it's a bit limited for space so needs small levers and the PL26 is ideal) while I investigate Brian's One Wire system and round up second hand R044s.

I'm slowly wiring up Newton Stewart and have a steady requirement for passing contact switches. Up to now I've been using Peco PL26s because they were relatively cheap (compared to anything from DCC Concepts), they were smaller and slightly cheaper than the Hornby equivalent and they looked like a lever frame (as an ex-signalman a row of levers which can be set normal or reverse is almost as important as what's going on on the rest of the layout). But they're now pushing a tenner each RRP and I'm only halfway through, I still need about 4 dozen. I'm wiring up one lever frame at time (there are 8 in total) and whilst consistency within each frame is important, consistency between different frames isn't so I don't mind different levers in different frames. So my question is, is there a toggle switch type alternative which behaves like the Peco and Hornby versions ? I'm aware of centre-off 'burst' type switches but that's not what I'm looking for - I don't want a row of levers standing half cocked with no indication which way anything is lying - they must stand normal or reversed. Likewise diode matrices and probe and stud are out - it has to behave like a lever frame even if it doesn't look exactly like one. If all else fails I can make levers and sliding contact switches from bar and copperclad sheet but that's not a production line I want to start if I can help it. I'm aware I may be looking for something which doesn't exist !

Turn left at Woodhouse Junction. Waverley will be between Darnall and Woodhouse.

How convenient then that that is more or less what's planned under the RYR project to reopen the Old Road via Barrow Hill. How lucky for First that they don't have to get involved in all the tedious legwork involved in getting that off the ground.

That would suggest a degree of joined up thinking and actual policy making in the DfT which reality elsewhere suggests is largely imaginary. You might well be right though. Personally I suspect it represents a change in focus by First to operations where they can set their own objectives and cherry pick rather than having to deal with all that tedious franchise commitment nonsense. I still think 'ORCATS Raider' would look good on one of their nameplates. "The latest ORR figures, published in December 2023, show more people are now travelling with Hull Trains than they did before the pandemic." Not difficult when 2/3 of their pre-covid fleet was on fire. And there is no way in hell I would park my car anywhere near Woodhouse. I did bus co-odinating there once.

The issue with the boiler joint is not so much that it's there, but that it's out by about 0.5mm. That isn't much but it's enough to create a stepped joint and catch the light. Zoom in on Mike's photo above and you'll see. Personally I'm ignoring it (thejoin not the loco) - it knocks the DJH kit into a cocked hat. The other perceived faults I can fix with a paintbrush.

Engineers' trains in South Yorks in the late 80s were usually published as 7Txx, but frequently ran as 8Txx depending on how many brakes were actually working. I doubt things were much different ten years earlier.

Hi Nigel, I usually do the same in vans but the partition and veranda on this prevented that. There was just enough room to get two stacks of 4p in but all the weight would have been one end. There is minimal movement on the rocking MJT axleguard so it won't need any extra help at falling off, although I suspect it will be spending most of its working life dumped in the same siding that Mr Shuttleworth photographed it in !

Well this year's Christmas holiday project was going to be bringing a couple of Newton Stewart's boards indoors to wire them up, but there's now a pile of IKEA boxes temporarily in the space they would normally occupy. So I did this instead: This is a North British Railway 20T brake to Dia 36B, built at Cowlairs in 1919 and photographed by none other than FW Shuttleworth at Newton Stewart in 1958, at which time it was presumably in use as a ballast brake. (I will be doing the Toad B as well). The kit is by NBR 4mm Developments and it's gorgeous if a bit fiddly in places. Everything fits just so with minimal clean up and it includes variations in handrail and footboard. All castings are included but the outer W irons are not, an MJT 3 axle set (2299T) being required to complete. Early buffers are included but of course Newton Stewart's had Spencer reserve stroke buffers, on order from Wizard/51L. It looks a bit rough in bare brass, I hadn't even cleaned the flux off when I took these and my soldering isnt the neatest, but it will get a good scrub and scrape tomorrow before I tackle the several miles of handrails. The advantage with brass kits is that you can solder the weights in, these are eight penn'orth of posh minted ones.

Thank you ! I feel his pain ! ERTMS (or whatever replaces it, maybe something which actually works) will come eventually, more likely in the shortish term is replacement of Low House and Culgaith boxes by CCTV crossings, and possibly some of the others with more IBHs and axle counters. Fortunately Network Rail has much more important things to spend its money on for the next couple of Control Periods. You might be safe from wires for a bit, apart from the odd short section to charge up the 195-replacement BEMUs ;-)

Even then the conflict doesn't end and not everybody is happy. I arrived on the S&C as Ops Supervisor shortly after Mr Portillo reprieved it, there was an ongoing conflict between those who recognised that it was part of a national network and was very expensive to operate on a day to day basis (7 signal boxes staffed on 2 shifts 7 days a week, plus reliefs, 6? P.Way gangs, 2 station staff, 2 supervisors and a small Works gang, not including maintenance teams shared with other routes like the S&T) and those who wanted it preserved in aspic almost as a sort of long extension of the K&WVR. We had a project manager appointed by BRB to oversee improvements (Geoff Bounds, absolutely top bloke but we were only a part of his portfolio and if course there was no budget) but indifferent management at Regional Railways HQ although the local RRNE team were generally supportive. So along with some rejoicing at the modern rolling stock (156s), the general painting and tidying up which was starting to take place and some fairly serious attempts to drum up business by both RRNE and the FoSCL, I was also dealing with complaints that the loco-hauled Nottingham - Glasgows had not been reintroduced, the new footbridge at Settle wasn't a MR one, the new signalbox at Kirby Thore for the desulfo gypsum traffic (actual brand new revenue earning freight) was a portacabin and not one of the ex-Leeds northwest MR boxes re-purposed, and that the platform lighting at Settle and Appleby (the only stations with more than one lamp post each) had not immediately been ripped out and replaced with heritage gas lamps. We did our best to stave off the whinging where we could, the reason that the signalboxes are still maroon and cream to this day is because Paul Holden took one look at the RRNE painting schedule (blue white and grey) and quietly asked the Works Supervisor if he could accidentally order maroon and cream instead, and we diverted an offer of surplus bright red Macemain seats to stations which still had wooden benches, and swapped for their benches. We couldnt do anything about the gash timber platform extentions to accommodate the 156s, although they were at least lit ! I also managed to generate 3 formal complaints because I a) cancelled the Appleby stop on Terence Cuneo's birthday special (which broke my heart but was at ICSTU's request because it was over an hour late and was in danger of losing its path back to Southall if it was too late rejoining the WCML) b) had Bahamas piloted back from Carlisle in light steam behind a 47 after it started 23 separate fires, and then got a b*****ing for not cancelling it outright because of the fire risk and c) recessed a steam hauled charter at Appleby because the Sprinter was a block behind it, which meant they couldn't do any run pasts. As late as Serco/Abellio days there was so much whining about digital platform information screens "spoiling the look" that the Northern retail team gave up and diverted them to other stations. The franchise commitment was to deliver 'X' number of them, it didn't really matter where so the S&C went without.

With regard to relevance, several friends and I have teenage children, some of whom are into trains. None of them expect to see modern(ish) rolling stock on a preserved railway, that's what they see every day and go to school/work on. They expect to see steam trains and old stuff. This is of course a completely different argument to what should be preserved at a national level where stuffed and mounted isn't a problem.

My mum and dad were National Trust members for years, dad used to record his 'marks out of ten' for everywhere they went in the handbook. Took my mum years to realise that the score was largely based on how good the cafe was. As for the charity vs business angle, a large multi-national famine relief charity based in GWR territory regularly attracts criticism for paying its executives six figure salaries. But it has a turnover equivalent to the GDP of a not so small country - do people really expect that all this is managed by little old ladies in its high street shops in between selling second hand coats and table mats ? As was pointed out to me when I raised it with one of them, the people on six figure salaries are mostly more than capable of earning seven figure incomes in private business but choose not to because they want to do something useful.

The tanks don't need to be next to the fuelling point. At Neville Hill the fuelling point is the 3 road shed at the west end, the tank farm is at the east end against the main buildings. Likewise at Newton Heath they're at diagonally opposite ends of the site.

If you fix the details of the charitable aims too precisely then you run the risk of a future change of circumstances (eg a ban on coal fired locomotives) rendering the organisation unable to legally function or become financially unviable leaving it to be wound up and its assets disposed of. All defunct local authorities will have a nominated residuary body (which may be its successor local authority) which takes on its outstanding legal obligations, set out in the legislation abolishing it. See West Yorkshire Combined Authority, South Yorks Mayoral Combined Authority etc. Same as BRB Residuary.

Loss of key infrastructure, in this case a single point of failure (i.e. lose this bit = lose the lot) will be factored into to the operators' emergency plans but likely as a 'high consequence / low probability' item. If it was the sort of catastrophic failure which could kill large numbers of people (eg fire on a train in a tunnel) then you take precautions anyway as a single event, however unlikely, will finish your business. You could, for example put a b****y great fire main in there to mitigate the risk. It doesn't alter the fact that closing the tunnel while you deal with the fire and its consequences is going to be hugely disruptive but that is offset against the fact that it hopefully won't happen very often if af all. If it was a high/medium consequence / high probability event which could cause regular disruption to your business then you might well have stations staffed which otherwise wouldn't be if you know you're going to need them regularly. A better example is breakdown cranes and tool vans - they were needed often enough in the steam era that it was worth paying for very expensive pieces of capital equipment to sit around at every large shed just in case. Today not so much. But this is slow flooding of a tunnel with no risk to life because of a fairly boring infrastructure fault, and is possibly so unlikely that "Stop the job until its fixed" is the most sensible (and certainly the most cost effective) contingency plan. At any other time of year apart from the few days between Christmas and new year, Easter weekend or the first weekend of the summer holidays, this woukd hardly have been worth reporting. Apart from the opportunity to be able to write "Channel Tunnel" and "flood" in the same headline obviously. A few hundred people have been inconvenienced, most reasonably large airports can do that routinely without half the coverage this has generated.