big jim

cant really add to that iron horse! Shame it didnt run for you tonight it was booked a pair of 56s! One for you in willaston tomorrow, the coal is running via crewe from portbury!!

Absolutly lashing down in shrewsbury, waiting for my coal train to arrive from portbury, currently 50 mins late but ive got 3 hours in leicester so not a huge problem, i certainly dont envy my work collegue having to drive the van back to south wales in a bit! Least ive got a 70 so the cab will be dry and warm (hopefully)

up early this morning, eldest had to be in school for 05:15 to get a coach to france for the week, wife took him and i stayed home with the youngest whos snoring away!! in work tonight at 22:00 coal, shrewsbury to toton, first time ive worked on my birthday in 15 years!

ive fot a pic of the jarvis sleeper somewhere on photobucket, i'll see if i can find it!

just got to wire up a couple of rails to get power all the way round the layout again then i'll do a few vids with the new stock, might try and sneak in the shed later and do a bit

technologically its like comparing vhs to bluray!! power wise its like comparing herbal tea to a double espresso shot driver comfort is like comparing an ikea futon with a lazy boy recliner asthetically its like comparing madonna in the 80s to madonna today, where did it all go so wrong? im sure you get the idea!

here you go, 22:59 through ludlow, will be a 70 on it http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/R62292/2015/02/23/advanced if thats too late for you then on tuesday evening the baglan logs is running too, if i remember right its about 19:00 off hereford (its not showing on RTT yet), that is now perminantly booked a class 70 too

On the menu this evening, chips, lots and lots of chips!! Been buying up lots if chips over the last few months from the classifieds as well as the local model shop also had a couple of sound chips from old models i want to get reblown to fit into new items of rolling stock I picked out the locos and units i wanted to chip up and began the task of doing just that. however i discovered 3 of the above items i selected were already chipped up, one i must have done ages ago and forgotten about, the metronet 66, and 2 of them 2nd hand from model shops, the 153 and bardon livery 66, i had to rack my brains as to whether i'd chipped up the 66 myself and forgotten about it as i was convinced i bought it new from kernow but i eventually remembered i got it from an exhibition and i'd never got it out of the box until tonight The 153 i only bought this week from c&m in carlisle along with the 170 so upon discovering the 153 was chipped i opened the 170 in the vain hope they were from the same collection and it was chipped too......no such luck! I will however use the sound chip that has previously been hard wired in my 165 and get it reblown as a turbostar and use the small cut off 8 pin decoder in the trailer car for the lights So that left me with an extra 8 pin and 2 x 21 pin chips so i decided to chip up my royal 67, took the body off and found it already chipped, must have done it when it arrived and forgotten about it!! The spare 21 pins found their way into a europorte GBRf 66 and my Bachmann royal 47 The 21 pin sound chip has gone in the Bachmann 150 as it is already blown with those sounds, a swine to do as it has the old style chassis block, chip no problem, getting the speaker in, not too bad, getting the chassis back together afterwards, an absolute swine, so hard to get the driveshafts back in to the motor!! The new Hornby 8 pin has ended up in my wsmr DVT as i have nothing else 8 pin to chip up (although as i write this im thinking that my Bachmann GBRf/medite 66709 is currently unchipped and im sure thats an 8 pin!) Next task is to program them all but my lenz handset has stopped working so i'll have to send that off to be repaired before i can do that, thankfully i can still use the layout with the touchcab app if i want to have a play!! So in all a productive evening, looking through my stockbox i think the only thing not chipped now is a freightliner 70 and my unfinished london midland 172 project

So did i but its back on by the looks of it, and via the marches to boot! Long time since ive driven a coal train between madeley jn and toton (last time was to ironbridge with fastline)

Annual leave this week so no pics Back in on monday night (my 40th birthday!) doing a portbury to ratcliffe coal between shrewsbury and toton, got a week of it!

Not me, dont go that far down the country!!

Definatly friday the 13th!! Got to chirk to work the empty logs as far as hereford only to find a problem with the loco that manifested itself once i took power under load so i ended up failing it Then to top it off the headlight blew en route to shrewsbury so i had to attach my lamp to the front of the loco and run round the triangle when i arrived into shrewsbury so the working light end was facing the right way, in all the time i've signed shrewsbury this morning was the first time ive even been round the 'loop' line behind severn bridge 'box! Instead i took the loco to washwood heath and hoped to collect a replacement loco, as it happened it wasnt ready when i got there and would be some time so i had to leave bringing it back for someone else Just a couple of pics, put inside at oxley to let a couple of passenger trains by

jock, i did have to have some time off with exhaustion last year, just got on top of me, dont let it happen any more! it is a good varied job and i'm lucky where i get to go but i think as more and more trainee drivers come on line i will get less work out of my area and although i will miss the variety its what im ultimatly aiming for, more time at home but while the work is there and i can do it i will do so, i'll be gutted when the east/west link is finished as its my favorite job, hopefully i will still be about and available to be involved in the next stage of bicester to bletchley

The amount of building around bicester is unbelievable at the moment, even in the few years ive passed through there its grown 10 fold Anyway, had a night in frome, now i know you shouldnt have regional stereotypes but this is genuinly the first poster i saw after i parked my car up in the town centre

Interesting couple of days, been back on the bicester job but lack of vans, trains south of leamington spa and hotels meant i've spent the night in frome! Back on the job tonight from bicester to hinksey bringing out the train we worked in last night (top and tail 70 with 15 falcons), go the camera but not had a chance to get any pics so hopefully get a couple tonight Then just for a change on friday ive got a log train from chirk to hereford

well im in yet another premier inn, worked the bicester job last night so am logically in........frome! there is logic, honest, i needed a van, there was one in westbury, my trainee lives near there so he dropped me off for it and into the hotel for a days sleep!

the track on the right was ok as that was the line i used to exit the worksite, a bit of a roller coaster but quite safe! Basically they have laid the brand new track nearest the station building and replaced the old track on the other side, interestingly my train came in on the new line and once on site they severed the track behind it and slewed it back over to the 'new' old line! Couple more pics of the train on the new line, the machines were unloading stone to fill between the sleepers on the relaid line and once done i set right back and crossed back over onto that line to depart I did look out for a man with a massive pencil tapping the rail to get the ballast to settle between the sleepers and the one with a huge dilute pva sprayer but i think they must be on the other shift!

As a continuation to the water eaton pics, where there were no tracks on thursday morning here is my train from tonight sat on some!! next in was a tamper and then finally a rail delivery train, really busy up there tonight! Not long after this pic the tamper went off and did its stuff on the line to the left (the new line) And the new station building at the parkway Once the track was tamped where required i drew forward and stone was dropped from my train

a quick half hour in the shed earlier, making room for the lenz adapter and router, was hoping for a bit longer in there but i've just had a call asking to go and man a train in oxford at 22:00! lenz adapter on the wall router on the controller shelf this is the touchcab app on the iphone one thing bob hasn't done on his layout is motorise the points so he hasn't had a play with the point function on the app, it is so simple to program the points, simply hold down a blank "accessory" space and it brings up a menu allowing you to customise individual points you then add the details you want, type of point, direction, custom labels, you can even change the polarity from the iPhone if they are the wrong way round as well as being able to change pulse length etc once programmed into the phone you get a list of points you simply change by accessing it from the list you do still have to program the accessory decoder in the traditional manner via the handset though but all mine are already set up with base address' back to the loco screen, this is the loco editing screen (colas 70) you can add custom labels to the sounds, here i am adding the Horn symbol to the F4 function, simply click F4 in the previous screen, choose your label (green highlighted horn), you can also add momentary action go back to the previous screen and there it is in the F4 slot now curiosity got the better of me and i pushed the NEM608 button which renamed the functions in relation to NEM standards for diesel locos so i now need to go back and change the labels again!! i think i'm going to have a lot of fun with this i notice it said that loco configurations can be saved and backed up to the computer via iTunes when the phone is connected, something else i'll have to look into heres a quick video of the phone moving a loco