Chamby

Re: the W1’s flangeless wheels, there is an interesting comparison in the new Bachmann V2.  Bachmann have also gone the fitted flangeless trailing wheels route, and have also supplied flanged replacement ones.  However Bachmann have given these much more side-play than usual, allowing the loco to negotiate third radius curves when the flanged wheels are fitted.

Admittedly, the greater length of the W1 will mean that any side play will likely not be sufficient for to allow negotiation of R3 curves but it would undoubtedly improve things.

I do wonder why Bachmann bothered with the flangeless V2 wheels?  There can’t be many folk who will be forking out £200 for a V2, but are restricted to using R2 trainset curves.  

Another difference is that the Bachmann flangeless wheels actually sit and roll on the rail head, rather than just hang limply in the air.  Whilst this looks much better, it can cause shorting issues when the trailing wheels swing out of gauge when running over some RTR turnouts.  Which is probably why Hornby do it the way they do...

2 hours ago, jwealleans said:

Someone's drawn a pair of boobs on that diagram.

Yes, but they’re protected by resistance!

Hi Jesse,

Have you made any modifications to the Peco bullhead turnouts?  I recommend that you test each of your loco’s over them several times...  they can short out where the tolerances between the frog and the opposite polarity blade rails are very fine, also sometimes where the frog check rails extend beyond the electrical break in the running rail.  

Problems are more likely with RTR flangeless trailing wheels on the curved track, and too tight back-to-backs, especially with longer wheelbase loco’s.

There are workarounds documented on the relevant thread in the Peco section of RMweb.

10 hours ago, robertcwp said:

..... If Hornby get round to doing their LMS kitchen car in BR liveries, things will improve dramatically for LMR steam era modellers too.

 

Similar comments about available liveries of assorted RTR stock appear from time to time here.

I do wonder why the relatively straightforward task of re-liverying an available RTR product is so commonly seen as a problem, rather than an opportunity?

6 hours ago, Tony Wright said:

Good afternoon Andy,

 

Thanks for the clarification.

 

I've sold so much stuff on behalf of bereaved families or for other modellers (with a substantial donation to CRUK) that I forget what went where, to whom and when. Anyway, I'm glad you're pleased with your SJ; it is rather nice.

 

I'm sure Hornby will do the West Riding as well; after all, the formation is exactly the same as the Coronation (without the Observation Car). It'll just need rebranding.

 

What Hornby could also do is the spare set; the one not branded Coronation or West Riding, but with roof boards. This was used for any of streamlined services, including the Silver Jubilee when that set was out of action.

 

A pair of that spare set (BSO/SO) appears in the current Hornby 2022 magazine yearbook (No.14) on page 79, forming part of a 'Footex' extra. Why Tim Shackleton thinks they're 'Thompson articulated coaches' I have no idea, but the roof boards reveal it as part of the spare set (unless the previously-branded cars later received roof boards in BR days?). I don't think Thompson was responsible for any articulated stock, and the pair is definitely from an ex-streamliner.

 

Anyway, I emailed Mike Wild pointing out the 'error', and the upshot is he's coming to photograph Little Bytham for Hornby Magazine next month! Obviously, he prefers to take his own pictures, so it'll be interesting to see his approach. 

 

Given that Little Bytham has already been featured in BRM (obviously), the Railway Modeller, the MRJ and in TCH, could this represent 'over-exposure'? I know it's common now for layouts to feature in several publications, meaning? More publications and/or fewer layouts? Who knows? We'll have to see, but I'm, looking forward to it..........

 

Regards,

 

Tony.  

You might be wise to have a chat with the Hornby magazine chaps about the merits or otherwise of photoshopping smoke and steam effects on photographs of featured model railways... they have a habit of doing that in their layout articles.

11 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

The difference in overall height is the difficulty there, Steve. SMP uses thin sleepers, so the height is about 1mm less than Peco (Code 75 FB and BH are the same height, as I understand it). I've dealt with this in the hidden areas by using a combination of 3mm and 2mm cork trackbase to get the rail heads level. It would be trickier (but not impossible) in the scenic areas. It is certainly a possibility though - probably plan C (plan A being not to run out and plan B being to scrounge some more SMP from somewhere).

Easily overcome with a little packing under the SMP sleepers towards the transition.  Once ballasted, it is unnoticeable.  

I can recommend Peco’s Code 75 bullhead track.

I would have thought that Hornby have most to lose from this scrap, by establishing a precedent.  

Rapido should announce their new Flying Scotsman and IC125 models next week.

22 minutes ago, t-b-g said:

I understand all the reasons why things may look the way that they do and that all our eyes are different and that all our screens are different.

 

I have just "snipped" another portion of the image.

 

 

If anybody wants to tell me that the handrail and the cab/tender side sheets are the same colour then I should probably never paint a model ever again as my eyes are not fit for purpose when it comes to colours! We can argue until the cows come home about what the correct shades of green are, or whether they are green, grey or dirty metal coloured, or whether we are all seeing the same thing on our screens but can anybody really say that they look as if they are the same colour as the body sides? Even the sides catching the direct light look different, so it isn't just an issue of shadows.

 

Anyway, if nobody wants to agree with me, that is fine but if I ever build a model of Sir Hugo as it was in August 1946, mine will have dark green handrails! 

Yes the handrails do look a different shade to the flat sides of the loco and tender... but then compare them to where the panels curve in towards the cab, which will definitely have been painted from the same pot of paint, at the same time.

2 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

With a little bit of overtime, I laid all the remaining track at Polperran over the weekend. The point motors are still to be fitted, and I haven't started any wiring at all, but I'm pleased to have finished it this weekend.

 

This is the view from the buffer stop end. You can see a Barry's Buffer in the foreground. I'll replace this by the usual Hornby-Dublo buffer stops in due course but I'll have to build some more scale ones first, to release those that are in temporary use on the scenic sections.

 

Once the glue's dried, I'll add some cosmetic sleepers to support the rail joints.

 

This view, from the other end, shows the clear space at the throat between the fans. The point control panel will go here and there'll also be room to store spare wagons for the freight trains.

 

The five roads at this end are for:

 

1. the ACE

2. the long clay train (which is at Paddington at the moment)

3. the WR Truro freight

4. the SR Wadebridge freight (the Hornby and Bachmann vans will alternate on this)

5. spare (at the moment but watch this space)

 

Trains that use these roads will access them via the headshunt at the other end.

 

Back to work (from home) tomorrow so there won't be much more action, other than tidying up, before Saturday's running session.

Might I suggest retaining the “Barry’s buffer” and also continuing it along the side of the sidings that faces the adjacent walkway, to protect the trains parked there from being accidentally dislodged by passing persons.... something like this:

4 minutes ago, Atso said:

Interesting to read the discussion about Sir Hugo's handrail colours. Personally, I believe that the shadow on the underside of the handrail is causing an illusion which makes some of us believe that it is a different colour from the cab.

 

I think that this could be a real life example of Adelson's chessboard illusion.

 

 

Believe it or not, squares A and B are actually the same colour. However, your brain will probably be disagreeing with this.

Oh dear, that cylinder definitely more like Hornby Pea Green than anything coming out of Doncaster or Darlington....  

Last night I had a further play around with my new V2, to see how much the locomotive could pull before the crabbing tender effect kicks in.  Using Bachmann’s Thompson coaches, there was no noticeable crabbing with a rake of up to four coaches, but adding a fifth coach introduced the full crabbing effect.

The physics of this, is that the weight of the train overcomes the strength of springing between the loco and tender, resulting in the coupling opening up and therefore moving to an offset position.  Surely, this is something that should have been picked up during development and testing of a product with an RRP over £300?

13 hours ago, melmerby said:

They haven't reverted to it, they've been using it for years.

 

Point taken, Melmerby.   I was referring specifically to the changes made to the V2 model and expressing a personal opinion about perceived longevity: the new models run well for now, in their brand new condition.  

My comment was solely based on my experience of plastic axles on older models, which deteriorated over time.  

Time will tell. 

I do not profess to be an expert about the details of the V2, so will refrain from adding comment to what has been posted already about this model.  As a purchaser I thought I'd post some of my own observations here, and show a comparison with Bachmann's previous model, which I also own.

I have purchased 60845 in BR lined black livery with the early crest, this particular locomotive spent 18 months allocated to Woodford Halse between Spring 1950 and Autumn 1951 - so apart from the shed code used on Bachmann;'s model, it is an ideal model to run on my Eastern Region (ex-Great Central) layout.  

First impressions are very favourable, it is crisply modelled and runs very smoothly straight out of the box.  As Bachmann's DCC sound version of 60845, first impressions of the sound file are good, perhaps not quite up there with the best but perfectly acceptable, although some adjustment of the relevant CV's will be required to properly synchronise the 'chuffs' to the wheel rotation.  Whistle sounds are crisp and bright, albeit unusually operated using F4 and F8.

A couple of issues emerged during running in.  Firstly, the model comes fitted with flangeless wheels in the 'trailing bogie' (Cartazzi truck), hanging low enough to run on the rail surface.  Surprise surprise, these bridge the insulation gaps on Peco Code 75 Bullhead turnouts, consistently shorting out and stalling the loco.  Fortunately the supplied replacement 'flanged' wheels were fitted and fixed this problem for me, though modellers with R2 curves on their layout will also find this fix problematic as the flanged wheels require a minimum R3 (505mm).  The second issue I'll come to later.

Some comparison pictures then, between Bachmann's new V2 and the model that it replaced:  Firstly looking at their faces: 4771 is the 'old' model on the left in LNER green, 60845 the new one in BR lined black.  60845 has yet to have its front coupling hook and vacuum pipe added, as it is still undergoing acceptance trials following its receipt from Kernow Models!  

The re-tooling here is obvious, much crisper mouldings, much greater detail and generally showing the level of refinement that you'd expect in 2021.  As I said before, I won't comment on its accuracy as a model, just those points that are obvious to the 'average' purchaser.  The only obvious thing to me on the new model is the minor loss of crispness in the rivet detail on the top of the smokebox, presumably a consequence of the moulding process.

A similar level of detailing is observed around the cab and tender area.  The tender itself is substantially different, although it bears a 'family resemblance' the detail differences are many and obvious.  To my mind the coal load is poorly modelled, though this plastic component falls out easily and will be replaced with the real stuff as and when the loco passes its acceptance trials:

I also thought it worth illustrating the revised arrangement between the tender and loco underneath - new model on the left (below).  This is very different - the Cartazzi (trailing bogie) arrangement is simply a fixed axle with a lot of play, it is lightly sprung and goes round R3 curves (20" radius).  On the right, the old 'swivelling' arrangement.  The tender wheels clearly have been remodelled to allow electrical pick-up, though why have Bachmann reverted to having a plastic section in the middle of the axle???  I can only see this giving reliability problems in years to come...  The electrical connection between the locomotive and tender is very different to the little white 4-pin plug we have become accustomed to.  The arrangement used here is large and unwieldy but mostly hidden from the normal layout viewing angle.  Its design will be familiar to modellers who also have the 'Blue Pullman'.  Bachmann have also supplemented this with the same pivoting arrangement that they use on bogie coaches, that opens up the gap between loco and tender on corners... :

That rigid connector and its pivoting arrangement leads me to my main issue with this model, from a running perspective.  As a light engine, the model runs very freely and well: first impressions were excellent and the model traversed the entirety of my layout without issue.  However after the obligatory 30 minutes running in, I put the new V2 on the front of a train, a freight totalling 34 axles of RTR stock (5x 4-axle bogie bolster wagons and 7x 2-axle open wagons).  This relatively modest load pulls on the tender to such an extent that the coupling between the tender and loco becomes stretched even on straight track, and consequently gets swung off-centre as if the loco is traversing a curve.  On straight track, this results in the tender 'crabbing' behind the loco, offset from centre about 4-5mm:  this effect is very obvious, occurs with both examples of the new V2 that I have seen, and occurs every time the train travels on a straight section of track after traversing a reverse curve.  I'm still scratching my head over how to fix this... any ideas?

Apart from that, it is a lovely model, runs well and it looks great in the BR black livery.  But I'm definitely scratching my head about what I can do to fix the dodgy tender coupling....

16 hours ago, St Enodoc said:

At last, Porthmellyn Road signal box is complete, apart from the steps which I'll make and fit once the structure has been mated with the yet-to-be-built island platform. I do still need to fix the roof in place with Black Tack though.

 

Here is the finished article:

 

The roof vents are by Scalelink, as I mentioned before. After fitting small pieces of .010" styrene as flashing, I drilled the roof and inserted the vents. I painted them with Railmatch cream, the main roof colour is Humbrol 31, the flashing is Humbrol 64 and the gutters and eaves are Precision HST underframe brown as for the rest of the buiding.

 

The window handrails are .025" styrene rod, painted black before fitting.

 

The nameboards are courtesy of @Harlequin who kindly sent me a PDF in advance of a new range of designs he is developing. I printed them on to self-adhesive address labels and stuck these to .020" styrene before cutting them to size. They're fixed in place with double-sided adhesive tape. They look absolutely super and I'm sure that when Phil brings them to market they will find a home on many a layout. Thanks Phil!

 

The notice on the door is from the Roger Smith range of photographic notices and signs.

 

I fabricated the soil/stench pipe from .080" styrene rod.

 

 

The chimney is the original from the kit, with the H top cut off and a (Ratio?) wagon buffer glued on as a cowl. I think the chimney should be taller than the roof vents but a trial piece looked too spindly, so I left it shorter.

 

I didn't use the downpipes from the signal box kit, as they have a joggle at the bottom to clear the brick plinth on the standard kit. Instead, I used two from the Ratio 538 gutters and downpipes accessory pack.

 

You will have noticed the small vertical rod - the same material as the handrails - to the right of the chimney stack. This hides a particularly poor vertical join between two sheets of brickwork. Is it a water supply pipe? Is it an electrical conduit? Who knows? Who cares?

 

That's it for building construction for a while. Next I want to fit couplings to @Barry O's china-clay wagons and also do a few other odd repair jobs on locos and rolling stock. After that, if I can get some 9mm plywood, I might finish off the Polperran baseboard and lay the rest of the track there.

 

 

15 hours ago, TrevorP1 said:

Very nice indeed John.

6 hours ago, Nick Gough said:

That signal box looks top notch.

Proper job!    Just needs seagull sh!t spattered across the window panes now.

I know that the original thread on this has been locked, but I just wanted to thank Andy for the improved functioning of RM Web on tablets now.  Yes, it’s still not perfect but I can navigate the site properly and read everything.

I get the impression that this wasn’t an easy fix... your efforts on our behalf are much appreciated,

Phil

Strangely there’s nothing really floats my boat from the proffered list.  Probably an indication of how much quirky stuff is already available now!

Regarding other suggestions, how about the Janus missile train from James Bond’s Goldeneye film?  Should be a relatively straightforward modification from a Class 20...

11 hours ago, drmditch said:

RMWeb appeared to remove 'Wright Writes' from my list of followed content the day before yesterday.

I became suspicious when 'WW' did not show in my 'Content I Follow' stream for two whole days.

Obviously, everybody knows that 'WW' always has several new posts every day.

 

I appreciate that the country/human race/planet is in a right mess at the moment, but to loose links to 'WW' would be a real disaster.

 

Does anyone have an idea as to how this could happen?

It might be something to do with this problem, that tablet users have been experiencing for some weeks now:

1 hour ago, woodenhead said:

If it's a GC allocated Royal Scot then it's not meant to run well.

Annesley, from September 1962 until withdrawal.

On 12/12/2021 at 18:02, MikeParkin65 said:

I'd cite the Locoman A4 project as the definitive - so far - example of what can be achieved with DCC sound in a 'steam' loco.

 

The majority of what makes models realistic is in the imagination of the viewer or operator - therefore what we need is a minimisation of the distractions that remind us that we are watching electric motored mechanical toys. Suspension of disbelieve they call it in the theatre. This is what makes Little Bytham such good layout - there are very very few such distractions. 

I would add Locoman’s Q6 and 8F sound files as ‘state of the art’ steam sounds too.  His A3 file on the LS5 chip also beats the other available versions by a country mile.

I understand why some folks slag off sound, especially steam, because there is some awful stuff out there!  But I would also point out that  there are also some awfully put together locomotive kits.  So don’t write off sound universally, just because you have heard RTR stuff making puny toy-like noises.  There’s an art to it, of course, with a steep learning curve just like any other aspect of the hobby.

That said, adding sound to a layout like Little Bytham would be mostly wasted, owing to its predominantly high speed running, where ‘steel on steel’ is the overriding sound.  I would just fit sound chips to the loco’s that stop/start in the station, shunt the yard, or chuff along slowly with a heavy freight.  Slow chuffing and communication whistles are where steam sounds work best.  Even with sound equipped models, I often turn off the sound once my models get up to speed.
 

The exception on LB might be the Deltic.  That is one high speed runner that probably would be worth chipping!

I’m now using my smartphone instead of my tablet to view RMweb.  It’s an annoyingly small screen, but at least it avoids the tablet format’s advert problem.

Adding my voice to the frustration.  

For example, it is now impossible to click on the notifications button because of overlaid advertising, and the workaround site navigation is both tedious in page count and further impeded by adverts.

I understand and accept the need for some advertising... but being incessantly bombarded with mindless cr@p at the same time as being unable to access the content I actually logged on to view, I find myself increasingly logging off prematurely these days.

13 hours ago, Tony Wright said:

Good evening Sandra,

 

I think it was MONS MEG, but it wasn't numbered 60504. Was it 60997, or something like that? 

 

Unfortunately, I never took its picture. 

 

I'm sure Roy built it, but, like you, I don't know what happened to it.

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Tony, as recently as this weekend, you included a picture of 60993 running on Retford among the photo’s in your virtual exhibition article!  It was one that Andy took.

Some stunning photographs of Retford on today’s virtual exhibition, thank you, Tony.

In one of Andy’s photo’s I spotted 60993 en passant, a certain Mr Thompson would not approve, I think!   Is there a bit of a story to be told there?   

12 hours ago, Tony Wright said:

I had a phone call the other evening from a widow, asking for my assistance in 'disposing' of her late husband's model railway collection. Her husband had died in August. Though I can't recall him, I must have spoken to him at shows, since he had my card (which his widow then used to get in touch with me).

 

From what she said, his collection was mainly locomotives, and all RTR - Hornby/Bachmann/Oxford/Heljan/etc, all steam-outline and all boxed. The 'problem' was he'd detailed/altered/weathered, etc, all of them, so they were no longer original. Ironically (so it would appear), despite their then being 'more accurate', their resale value (especially to collectors) is then less.

 

Sadly, I told her I did not 'deal' in such things and advised her to contact the second-hand dealers. One hopes she'll get something back. 

I had a similar situation recently, only in this case the widow had been married to a club member so I helped out.  

Not being savvy with internet selling platforms, I found the best place to sell such modified loco’s was in clubs.  I contacted three different clubs relatively local to me, and after a couple of visits to each, managed to sell the whole collection.  Inevitably, some sold quickly and for better prices, the last few for rather less, but the collection made rather more than I had initially anticipated.  The club members got items for less than the resellers ask, and the widow got rather more than a reseller would have offered for the collection, plus the knowledge that her deceased husband’s treasured items had gone to fellow modellers who would similarly appreciate them.

That said, it is not a task to be undertaken lightly.  Every item needed to be thoroughly test run, parts checked and in some cases repaired, then catalogued and assigned a reasonable value, then each item demonstrated to the potential purchasers.  Throughout it all, is an awareness of a commitment made and a responsibility to deliver the right outcome.  In my case the widow received a four figure sum for which she was very grateful.  But I will think carefully about taking on such a task again, given the amount of work involved.

The site lends itself to either an engine house, or something along the lines of St Michael’s Chapel on Roche Rock outcrop.  

With an Antarctic explorer performing a fly-past overhead, of course.