Wheatley

So ? That's free market economics, if that's how the dealer chooses to maximise his profit then good luck to him.

Quite. Some of the language used earlier in this thread is OTT ('unscrupulous.... greedy... shameful ...). If I've got one, whatever it is and I'm disposing of it then with very few exceptions it's entirely up to me whether I sell it as an ongoing project, give it away, break it for spares or landfill it, no matter how rare or unique it is. Annoying possibly, but hardly unscrupulous. There's a Series 2 Landrover sitting on the drive which I'm realistically never going to finish. Its a runner but it needs some welding. I could sell it as it stands for about 2 grand or break it and make double that. Which I eventually do will depend entirely on what I can be bothered to do, not what anyone else thinks I should do with it.

Anyone who doubts the necessity of always using a good dated photo in conjunction with the 'as built/intended' drawing need look no further than any Black 5 which had any involvement with St Rollox at any point in its career. About the only thing guaranteed is that it would come out with the same number of wheels it went in with, anything else was fair game. Currently picking my way through 6 of the wretched things.

Deleted, didnt need saying.

But those (blue/grey) are the Newton Chambers double deckers, the one at Kelso is just a CCT with branding. There were similar unbranded ones in general use. It's stabled in a bay which other photos show to have been used by bog standard parcels stock, so Occam's Razor and all that. I've really no idea though, but neither has anyone else so far.

Dunno. It could be cascaded rather than borrowed, I don't know when the CCT(E)s came off that duty. Its a bit academic without a date for the photo. Edit - there are other John Boyes photos in the same set dated 1963, some show other bogie NPCCS in the bay (GUVs, BGs) and rather a lot of Beetles and other SCVs. Interesting place.

In general parcels traffic ? Apart from the branding it's essentially a CCT, not one of the double deck ones.

Vaccines - what do we do with all the people under 50 who don't have an underlying health condition and who aren't front line health care or first responders - ie the majority of the working age population ? Because they aren't on any deployment list. Do we tattoo them as well as the refusniks ?

The MU jumper cable sockets and plugs under the buffers seem to have started off white or pale grey on most liveries, the last couple of inches of the vac pipes where they meet the headstock should be blue (lh) and red (rh). None of this seems to have lasted long in service before getting covered in track grot and brake dust though.

I joined the navy to see the world. What did I see ? I saw the sea... Back on the subject of compulsorily tattooing people we perceive to be a threat, apparently middle aged men who keep their own company, pursue solitary hobbies and obsess over detail make up a significant proprtion of serial killers. What do we want our tattoos to say ?

Time to put you back on ignore I think.

You are confusing RAIB with HMRI, now part of the ORR. What else are you confusing or half-remembering ?

Portpatrick appears to have been chosen originally as it was the closest point to Ireland, something which appealled mightily to officials in the Post Office who knew nothing about the place other than where it was on a map. No amount of 19th century development would have got away from the fact that it was still a hole in a cliff, and you had to go past a perfectly adequate deep water port to get to it. Tripping the boat train down the 1 in 40 to the harbour four coaches at a time would make intetesting operation on a model though. You don't need to permanently close the Town station, just derail something large on the runround points for the day :-)

We each draw the same amount of hobby money out of the joint disposable income each month. If I was spending mine on tarts and beer I can see how that might be a problem but it's not really about money any more by that point is it ?

13. It's my money, I'll spend it on what I like. At least I've still got most of the stuff I bought, you feel free to carry on spending yours feeding bedding plants to slugs.

The P4 standards dictate the relationship between wheel and track in terms of things like gauge, wheel profile and width, flangeway dimensions etc to ensure consistent and reliable behaviour, especially through pointwork. The rail length is not a function of any of those, it is a function of the prototype and varies with the prototype in the same way as the number of bolts in the chairs or the colour of the locomotives. Therefore it is not set out in the standards (as far as I can see). Many (most ?) P4 modellers will notch rails and add dummy fishplates or lay in prototype length panels with functional fishplates, but then so do a lot of OO modellers.

First proper gf worked on the railway with me so my interest was not really a surprise and I didn't hide it. The current Mrs Wheatley liked trains to start with so I took some of my train photos on our first date and she didn't run away. In between the model aeroplanes have caused more comment than the trains. "Why is there a big aeroplane on top of your wardrobe ?" Because it won't fit on the shelf in the study with the others, obviously. The only time I ever got an adverse reaction was when I persuaded a fellow archaeology student to come out for the day to survey a "hill top defensive structure". She was expecting a hill fort but found herself holding the other end of a tape measure while I recorded the former Q Shed at RAF Binbrook. Not amused. In all cases I've been up front, if they don't get it that's fine, but if they object or take the mick that isn't.

My BR contract includes a clause saying that the patents and rights for anything I develop using the facilities available to me as a consequence of my employment (or words to that effect) belong to BR, which seemed reasonable enough. In return BR operated a staff suggestions scheme (On Winning Lines - OWL) which worked by giving the inventor a cut of whatever savings would accrue from BR using whatever it was you had dreamt up. Two C&W lads apparently invented a gadget which allowed something or other to be changed on site rather than taking the empty wagon somewhere with a lift, BR calculated the empty wagon mileage saved over the next ten years and they allegedly did rather well out of it. After privatisation I ended up administering the follow-on scheme for a TOC, they decided to replace the cash award with a mug. The scheme almost folded itself after that. I've still got one of the mugs, there are 900+ others still in store somewhere.

Not necessarily the case. The Wensleydale branch is owned by Network Rail and leased to the Wensleydale Railway plc.

Did you really get all the way to tooling without wondering what the inside looked like ?

For those touting reservations as the solution to the problem, all EMR services leaving STP are reservable, and they ran a full service apart from the one shortformed set for Leeds which made the news. Even that was rectified at Derby with the 5 car swapped for an 8 car. I love working for the railways, its as easy as football management. Every one and his granny thinks they can do that better as well.

From Rootes at Linwood I think, there is a Derek Cross colour pic of a 40 on a similar working in 1966 in "On G&SW Lines" by David Cross. No evidence of car trains on the Port Road (so far !).

Meanwhile the fourth side of the circuit has taken on a distinctly NER appearance...

All train operators in tier 3 or 4 areas are pushing the 'essential travel only' message. The government (which is now effectively setting service levels) is generally requiring as much of the timetable as possible to operate. Those operators who operate reservations are operating a 'reservations only' policy (certainly LNER are, not been anywhere else recently). Those operators who don't operate a reservation system have no way of controlling ticket sales for a particular train. Rail staff are not there to enforce social distancing or check your reason for travelling, passengers are expected to behave like grown ups and take responsibility for their own actions. We didn't make you all go shopping in the first place. BTP can enforce the restrictions but they can't marshall every train and they've got better things to do.

Not a fan of wiring, it’s right up there with carpentry and wheel quartering in the ‘evil but necessary’ jobs list. Newton Stewart is code 75 Electrofrog so I’ve had to re-learn how to do how to do proper wiring. There will normally only be one operator (me) so there only need be one controller, but I’ll probaby have one for the scenic level and one for the fiddle dungeon if only to have a spare. The fiddle yard is code 100 and the half a dozen points fitted so far in it are insulfrog, but I’ll probably switch that over to electrofrog too (there is only the double loop down there so far). Apart from 200 yards of red and black wire from Peter’s Spares most of the switches, connectors and tag strips used so far were recovered from a couple of EM layouts half built in the 1990s and stored until now. The mahogany frame for the section switches control box was also recovered from a display case, it hinges up out of the way to avoid damage when not in use. The graph paper diagram is temporary. All the pointwork in the main circuit is laid, although most will be replaced as Peco expands its bullhead range. The passing loop is also laid but the rest of the layout will have to wait until Peco’s supply returns to normal. Most of the feeds for the tracks laid so far are in and being soldered up, it might even be working by Christmas although a shortage of accessory switches for frogs means some jury rigging may be required.