Marshall5

It might be worth checking that date as I'm pretty sure the last one was withdrawn in 1967. Ray.

The March issue of Backtrack has a photo of 44709 climbing away from Windermere on a short empty wagon train on 2nd August 1968. Ray.

I dug out my old copy of Rowledge's "Heavy Goods Engines of the War Dept. Vol.1" on P54 "Modifications made for service in Australia ....... 15 - 20 being retubed with 221 2" tubes." "The boilers seem to have been altered before leaving the U.K." "12 - 14 started work in 1926 and after a while were also fitted with saturated boilers". " The quality of the water used was atrocious and led to early boiler troubles so that in 1934 a programme of rebuilding boilers with superheaters and copper fireboxes was put in hand ...... Nos. 12, 14 , & 18 were not altered". Rowledge states that No.18 was withdrawn before 1932 and its boiler removed in 1937 - presumably as a pool spare. He also states that no new boilers were ever purchased but 17 & 20 had steel fireboxes at the very end. Presumably these locos had received boilers off 2 of the unaltered locos. Hopefully this answers the OP's question. Ray.

As most industrial locos were moved 'on their own wheels' either dead in a freight with rods removed or light engine with a B.R. pilotman it wasn't unknown for them to run hot and be taken to the nearest B.R. shed with a wheel drop for attention. Ray.

Going back to the first 2 posts regarding the conversion from superheated to non-superheated it's not quite as simple as either of the references seems to imply. Post #1 suggests that the superheater elements and flues were removed and small tubes fitted instead. AFAIK this could only be done by replacing both tubeplates. On p140 of 'Locomotives of Australia' shown in post #2 it says the elements were simply removed and the locos ran, presumably successfully, in this state. Normally, however, when the elements are removed leaving empty, large diameter flues, the hot gases will take the line of least resistance, i.e. through the empty flue, rather than through the small tubes with a serious reduction in steam production. The GNR large Atlantic suffered from this when it was steamed for a special in 1951 and was effectively being towed by its older stablemate 990. Unfortunately this still doesn't really answer the original question..... Ray.

Malcolm's carriage kits all come with bogies but wheels are extra. The bogies, which are excellent, are available separately - about 37.00 GBP. https://www.sidelinescoaches.co.uk/ Ray.

Around 1974/5 the, then, Chairman of Steamport Southport made enquiries with J.A. Brown, as apparently,one of the remaining RODs worked on the L&YR for a short time. Unfortunately it was pure wishful thinking as we had no funds for that or anything else. When I was Operating Officer at Steamport I had cause to go through some of the old files and found the correspondence with J.A.Brown complete with the attached photo. Presumably this was the chosen loco but I'd have to check. Rather than just the rapidly rising cost of a Barry loco at this time it was also the perceived difficulty/cost of replacement parts. A straight out of service continental loco was seen as a cheaper deal. Cheers, Ray.

I find the Railmatch 'early' grey too dark so add their post 1965 grey to it in the ratio of 2:1. I suspect that in 'real life' the variations were endless. Ray.

I built one from the 7mm scale Impetus kit many years ago. I painted mine in black with the smallest size of 'cycling lion' crest as per the instructions. I also purchased a colour slide from ColourRail (DE516) which confirmed this livery. Unfortunately it also showed that these locos had acquired a few modifications from the standard Simplex over the years viz: self- contained wagon type buffers and an inverted Y of angle iron to support a lamp bracket each end. The photo below shows that I didn't bother with these modifications! I've just had a look at the Impetus instructions and, whilst there are exploded diagrams, there isn't a drawing as such. Hope this helps. Ray. Edit: Further photo here https://thetransportlibrary.co.uk/index.php?route=product/product&product_id=127783&page=4065

I know it sounds picky but there were single buffer beam gussets on the early WD Austerities. Later batches, built new for the NCB etc. had double gussets. I don't, of course, know if the tooling can allow for this. I'm sure this will be a popular model with plenty of options for 'personalisation'. Cheers, Ray.

Two of the Dutch Austerities are preserved in the Netherlands (NS8811 and 8826) but another (HE3155/44) was repatriated to the UK and restored at the Ribble Steam Railway as 'Walkden'. Photo courtesy of RSR. Ray.

See also Ray.

I came across these 40 yr old images whilst scanning slides last week but wasn't sure which thread to post these in. They were taken at the MSC's Ellesmere Port depot in October 1982. The van is an ex LMS D1659 (built to an MR design) and clearly still in use, Hope they are of interest. Ray.

The photo was one of a large number of negatives left to me by a friend the late Chris. Weldon. The neg folder is labelled "Winwick 6.67". Looking at the 1:50.000 O.S. and other negs on the roll I reckon the photo was taken from a minor road bridge just over a mile South of Winwick Jc. Although a mostly dull day one photo shows strong shadows so I would say 3001 is heading North. Could the engine cover have been left off to assist in cooling for longer journeys? According to Wiki the electrification of the WCML north of Weaver Jc, to Glasgow wasn't completed until 1974. As Apollo says perhaps it was going to EE for major repairs .... but would it go under its own power if it needed major repairs ??? A bit of a mystery. Ray.

Here's another photo that raises more questions. Where was MSC 3001 going when it was photographed, headed North, light engine, at Winwick in June 1967? Ray.

If the location is really Dallam could the Sentinel be en-route from Salop to Preston Docks. Do we have a date for the photo? Ray.

Bolton Station Down 'Box was an example of an ex L&Y elevated box. I always thought that it would make a nice model. Ray.

I used to own that loco, Ironbridge No.3 (P1990/1940) so thanks for posting that photo as it brought back some happy memories. Interestingly, well to me anyway, the numbers stamped on the motion suggested that it was really No.1 with the boiler, cab and tanks of No.3. It went back to Telford when I moved to the I.o.M and is still there though long o.o.u. Cheers, Ray.

ISTR that Chowbent (John Robinson) produced a NSR 'New L' in 7mm scale for a while - late 1990's maybe? The Chowbent stuff disappeared into JLRT mostly never to be seen again. This was a pity as they were good kits in their day. Ray.

The diagonal stripe only banned certain classes from working under the wires south of Crewe. Ray.

F reg's began in August 1967. My first car was an F reg Minivan first registered in the October. Ray.

Sincere apologies - no offence to Scotland intended as I'm 50% Scots. In my defence I was going off what was stated on the Fakenham Gsaworks website. I'll go and beat myself with a Sunday Post.Thanks for the link. Cheers, Ray.

I think that was a pre-requisite of the job in those days.! Ray.

It certainly appears so, but it would be very unusual for a loco to go from unlined to lined at that late stage as 'economy' repaints were going the other way. All I can say is that the loco in my photo is definitely 46441 (I still have my notes from the day) and it was lined. Going back to your initial enquiry you say that your chosen time is late 50's early 60's (as is mine) but checking Buxton's allocation for 1961 it had no Ivatt 2's so really you have to be looking at workings which might have brought one to Buxton. On the other hand you could just use 'modeller's licence' ..... Ray.

As you say, not all the Swindon built ones ended up in green (lined or unlined). In answer to a question posed on here last year I found the Ian Allan/Janes colour albums useful for finding out which of the 46503-27 were green. It was only in their latter years, say 65 - 67, that the W.R. green ones were re-allocated to the LMR. Interesting that you have a photo of 46441 in unlined black in 1964 as the attached photo at Carnforth in July 1968 shows it in front of Thundersley and it is definitely lined. This was after purchase by Dr.Beet but before repainting in the (in)famous 'fairground' livery some months later. Ray.