JohnR

Thanks for all that. The trouble with searching in ebay and Amazon, is you seem to get hundreds of results, none of which are quite what you are looking for! I'm beginning to think I may have to accept that I'm going to need two plugs (and two remotes, two drivers etc) one for each board, as those units which seem to split seem to be RGB only.

He's doubled his money already - price at the moment is 40p

Thats good to know, thanks, but the myriad of options available on ebay seem to be focussed on RGB lighting, with white options limited. I can see some which offer RGB+WW, or RGB+CW, but none that seem to offer both.

I'm looking at getting some LED strip lights for my new layout, and I was wondering if anyone had any recommendations? I had used them before on my other layout, but cant remember where I got them from. I also need a better set - ideally 2 strips running off one power supply (I'd prefer mains powered), with one control for both strips. Is a simple RGB set enough, or does it need to be more sophisticated to get a good "daylight" look to the lighting?

Would have been a concrete product from Exmouth Junction. Earlier ones would have been rough wooden huts, but the concrete ones proliferated, so it would be easy to justify one, unless you're modelling a specific location which retained one of the earlier wooden ones.

All the Southern ones were painted into Green. The only Southern Region ones that were withdrawn not in Green were the ex-WR ones in lined Maroon (not Crimson Lake).

I think that must be one of the Seconds the Southern acquired from the Western Region in 1964 to strengthen the Basingstoke-Waterloo peak services. They were the only ones on the SR that were in lined Maroon (the Southern having painted all of its own allocation into Green in 1959/60)

IN the case of a fictional dairy (or more likely creamery) at Bude, it would probably be similar in operation to that at Torrington, which moved over to tanks in the 30s. You definitely wouldnt have seen ex-GWR Siphons anywhere on the Southern! I would imagine that there would be attached to the Milk train to Clapham at Exeter Central

Game isnt stocking TT120. However, I suspect they may well do so, given that they can afford to stock the entire range (which makes sense from a Hornby point of view)

39% is a typical APR for many such store cards, and I doubt Ashley has increased it.

If Phoenix dont want to sell, theres not a lot he can do. But already he's sitting on a paper profit as the share price is currently 35p (although down from a high of 41p earlier)

I'm not aware of any ex-GWR locos on the Bude line, and the infiltration of ex-GWR types on the former Southern lines didnt happen until after the Western Region takeover in 63 (although a couple of Panniers did go to Exmouth Junction in 1959 for some reason). The Southern lines west of Salisbury pretty much kept the same motive power they had in Southern days, with the exception of the Bulleid Pacifics, of course, and the arrival first of the Ivatt tanks and later some standard types, mainly replacing older LSW tank engines. Freight on the Bude line would have been handled by a ex-SR 2-6-0, either and N or U class, and was so almost right to the end.

Although I share peoples concerns about Ashley's business practices, we do need to get it into perspective. He has simply bought 9% of the shares. That does not entitle him to tell the Hornby Management how to run the company. It might, jut might, be enough for him to get a single director on the board. But even then, that individual would be easily outvoted by the other board members. Its clear that the two biggest shareholders (Phoenix Assets with 73.4%) still have confidence in the company, although it appears that Artemis Investment (the second largest shareholders) are the ones to have sold shares to Frasers - their shareholding is now only 9.7%

Those of course would be the longer 64' ones, as the Southern were never allocated the 57' suburbans that Accuracale are producing. The sets of MK1 subs allocated to Exeter were tightly diagrammed on Exmouth branch services, so I assume it was more likely to be one of the loose Seconds (later Thirds) that were also allocated, although again they were mostly seen strengthening Exmouth trains.

Its what quite a few of us are waiting for! (hint, hint!) Those Replica ones are getting a bit long in the tooth!

The newer model has the motor moved forward, so there isn't as much room as there was, especially given the increased size of the Bluetooth chip. I'm planning on putting the speaker in the space for the coal bunker, but wondered if anyone had arranged things to allow both the large decoder chip and the power bank.

Their new employers have announced it on their social media. I've seen Rails announce a new member of staff as ex-Hattons too.

I'm looking at installing an HM7000 chip in a Hornby J83 - the example I have is DCC fitted, but only a 4-pin decoder, so it will be hard wired. Has anyone done this before? Its the same chassis as the Hornby Jinty. I'd like to include the powerbank, but not sure if theres room.

Generally speaking, I've found you dont have to pay for the van (and certainly not the fuel) until you collect it. However, to get the best deal (and perhaps to stay within budget) you do need to pay for your hotel room when you book - possibly losing the ability to cancel.

I dont think you'd need any special trickery with DCC. All you have to do is drive and obey the signals in front of you - same as drivers on the real thing. Train Tech do colour light signals that can change back to red/double yellow/yellow after a train has passed.

Wouldnt surprise me if there was still some stock running about at nationalisation that was still in pre-36 livery, albeit fairly shabby by then

Some did - rapido are offering them in both BR grey and Bauxite liveries.

When are these likely to arrive? Working out how many to order to spread out my pre-orders.

Are we supposed to see the details of our pre-order show on the Rails website? I havnt had anything show up yet.

I wonder if the solution is to make the entrance to the return loop "Clapham Junction" and maybe forget the branch terminus?