Northroader

What would have happenEd if a foreman had gone up to the great IKB, tugged His forelock aNd said "excuse me, gaffer, I just seen two newts in that ditch", ??

Hey, Steve, keep this trend up and you'll be making the whole loco out of brass sheet next.

Got any great crested newts up past Bedford? We got em here in Bassett! Oh dear, oh dear...

Thanks Gordy, I've been picking up on Cannondale, good to see building has started now, it's bound to be a beauty when it's done. I didn't notice the cassettes were as short as you say, of course for exhibition usage it wouldn't be the same as back home, but it worked a treat. You're right about the width on Englefield not being enough, but I don't really want to start messing with the bench work. I intend to make the two spurs in front into a single long one, team track area at left and new industry building between tracks at the right. tHe dummy track is going, I like it, but it's very hard to get it looking right where it runs into the back scene. There will be a road crossing in the same area. The spur behind is going to face the other way, still serving the same industry. I must do some trees, too, yours look great. Cheers!

Many thanks, Jasond and F-unit mad, for your helpful comments. When I got back this morning from the weekend shop and had dried out, I shot up to the loft and started removing screws out of the Alco. Starting with the trailing end bogie, (with the chain drive), I found I could spring the jaws of the universal coupling at the lead end, detaching the cardan shaft drive to the lead end bogie. Dropping this bogie down I could undo the screws holding the two halves of the gearbox housing together, on each axle. The gearboxes, shafts with worms and spline drive could then be removed, leaving the lead bogie undriven. I did a test with this, run-in on the static cradle with a squirt of WD40, then a track test. It performed much the same as my Atlas engine, for pull and controller settings, and could handle the sets shown on the cassettes, although with some wheelslip from the WD40! While I was at it I halved the size of the leading end ballast weight. So instead of pulling the "Ocean Limited" out of Halifax I'm afraid she is doomed to toddling into Englefield with a combine car. I'm putting in a picture of her for you to pin above your beds tonight. Thanks again, ain't RMweb great?

It's the sort with a single dirty big Pittman in the middle, very nice on a big club oval pulling proper trains, but... I thought discompooperating one bogie drive and remotoring would be the most likely answer, but it's been one of those "to do" things that gets shelved very quickly. Otherwise..

So far, I've got the Granddaughter making trees. I really like the Atlas C-liner, it performs well. If I'm branch lining, it really ought to be a road switcher, so I'm thinking of a plastikard body, (louvres - aargh). It's the Alco that drives me doo-ally, no fault of its own, my controller trips out at 2amps just as it thinks about starting to move. (Yes, I know) I was warned about the drive train when I traded in my entire HO yank collection for it (jack and the beanstalk comes to mind) but it won't wear out on present usage. I've redetailed it to the MLW version, but it's very big and heavy for a simple little breach line. If I come over to Ludgershall with it in my coat pocket, and I get stop and searched, I'll get done for carrying an offensive weapon. Sorry I didn't say hello at Winchester, I have been known to get unconsidered trifles from you, a brass stock car, Alco switcher hood, and kadees come to mind. Ah well, back to chiselling, all the best!

Edit at a much later date: Newcomers to this thread will find it starts off fairly plain and simple, modelling American practice as much as you can in a very restricted space. Sometime later a trend to reduce equipment length starts to appear. Visitors of a nervous disposition may wish to go elsewhere. Things went wrong around page 8, and since then there’s been the Great Picture Crash, so it’s only on the later pages where you might get a flavour of what’s happening, and ponder… At one end of the loft is a 32mm, O gauge railway, intended for American 1/48th, 1/4" = 1foot models. My preference is for transition era, steam out/ diesel in. You'll spot it's for CNR, but I hope it will form a setting for more of the "fallen flag" lines I like. The available space would be better for a "shunting plank", but I do like to see passenger trains running as well, so it's a small station. About three years ago it got to the nearly ready stage, but nothing much has happened since, the only action being when my eldest granddaughter, who fancies herself as a train driver,pays a call. There are three main problems; One, Me. I do more building than operating. Two, the trains are patchy, plenty of decent freight cars, one good loco and one white elephant, and two passenger cars and one loco unfinished. Three, a bad layout design. The run-round loop is half on the fiddle yard, half on the baseboard. I use cassettes, but find anything over 48" is unwieldy for O gauge train plus cassette, so they're split into 20" loco, and 46" train cassettes. This complicates things, and too much happens in the fiddle yard. Here is the plan, for public ridicule, to show what I mean: The two photos. Show the track on the main baseboard: (Sorry about the photos, lack of, that is, which I’m afraid recurs through this thread, ho hum) Otherwise, I quite like the area, buildings, and scenic possibilities, and so it has drifted on. Within the last month I have visited the GOG Winchester Am & Con show, and got inspiration from a line there, Georgetown, CT, by Gordy of this parish. Having admired the look and finish, the main message for me was branch line operation with a shorter train. this would still meet what I wanted, with the plus that costs and scratchbuilding time would be lessened. Back home I got out two 48" cassettes, to see what would fit. If the loop at the station was placed entirely on the two baseboards, there was room for these sets to run round and shunt, but no passing moves, which I could live with. A 20" cassette would be needed at the right hand end, so overall the length would go from 11' 1" to 11'3" ( the odd inch is to engage the cassettes). As layouts go it's the bottom end of the food chain, and I know it won't be up to Georgetown standards, but I feel it's a step forward, and this was confirmed when recently I saw suggestions and comments on Catweasel's thread "where to start". So, divert the track gang off other work, and start lifting track.... Oh, dreary me, what was the glue I used to stick the ballast down? It's set like concrete, and the rails and copperclad sleepers are tearing the soldered joins. Scrape, scrape, bash... Don't expect another post for sometime....

What's next? I've seen coaches and locos being knocked out, do they have any "home" to go to?

Tagging along behind you from thread to thread, I'm always amazed by the ingenuity, should it be engineuity? of the bits you get off the scrap heap and turn into nice looking, meaningful old engines. Looking like you've done it again, another to follow with interest.

Looking at your dynamite store, and dredging up faint memories of one that was still about in an old mining area when I was a kid, it don't look secure enuff. Corrugated iron roof and Windows, let alone unbarred, no. (This was way before the "Troubles" too) Think iron plate building say about 10' square, single storey, riveted joins, central iron door in front. The front and back of the building had semicircular eaves, and a sheet steel roof, half cylindrical shape, ran front to back, with no appreciable overhang. No windows, the whole lot being tarred over black. If you think a very short GWR iron mink with a high roof, and single door only in end, is the best way to imagine it? It would make a distinctive model. Lights fag and presses post quickly. Edit: just to round it off, thinking about it, best practice would include a lightning conductor, as well!

I've been going thro' "painting locos without much paint" for a couple of months and recently saw your intention to run a new single driver on Saltdean. My reaction ....??? ...Enquiry... WOW!!!

Nice to meet you at Winchester today and see Nouvion in action. Thanks for showing me round the building construction methods as well. All the best.

There's an auto coach already out there, even if expensive, (to me, anyway). I think the Dapol engine is good in being at a competitive price for a RTR. I was surprised how many modellers were prepared to start chopping a highly detailed, finely painted loco to get just what they wanted. Does this mean that if Dapol had brought out a running chassis with a kit of parts superstructure (at a slightly lower price) they would do just as well? I'd like to think so, and there would be plenty of takers for branch line / industrial sized locos, rather than your mainline pAcifics at

Christ, Steve, up at 2 in the morning gluing? You deserve success. Glad to hear it's back together again.

That is starting to look a really tasty engine. I did an article on building a 222T in the GOG Gazette, November 2011. Basically the idea is to have the leading and driving axles in fixed bearings in the frame, and have the trailing one floating. yOu then add as much weight as you can, but so's the centre of gravity is just in front of the driving axle. In your case it would help to keep the tender drawbar in line or just below the driving axle centre. On my loco. The all-up weight was nearly 2lb., 890 grams. It could take three 6wheelers quite comfortably. If you're worried about the motor (Mashima 1833), I was using 36:1 gear ratio, you could always get a higher ratio, to run slower, but get a bit more pull. I'll be interested to see this one come together.

Commiserations - it would make a nice 2-4-0?

Your paintwork complements the figures really well. I've worked on quite a few of the 7mm. variety with station bystanders and footplate crew, and do like the way they fill the scene in. The army painter has set me wondering if I would do better doing my painting with a pair of pliers rather than a brush?

Second one's Llantwit.

I have used their ones without the tag and nut, where you just soldered the wire to the end of the plunger. (Were these an older type?) these were simple to do, the only thing to watch was to get the wire tinned and the plunger end tinned and smooth enough to go through the bush. Then a very rapid dab with the soldering iron to join the two, and out quickly. If you lingered at all the heat kept flowing down the plunger and spring, which melted into the bush. Not what you wanted at all! Done properly they work very well.

at one time the Swansea Harbour Trust was the Swansea Harbour Imperial Trust, and staff had sailors navy blue jerseys with the initials in red on their chest, this could be a pub story, but if you want a Peckett which is the centre of attention, feel free...

Two points; the gwml electrification does actually have wires strung up as of now, in the new reading diesel depot sidings , though doubtful if it will get juice in it for some yet. Second. On the west coast electrification, the Whitehall bean counters decided in their wisdom that in order to justify the cost, all possible traffic should be forced to go by way of the wcml. Bye- bye St.pancras. - Manchester, Farewell Paddington- Birmingham and Birkenhead, shut down Matlock - Buxton, close Wolverhampton L.L etc., It makes you wonder how Chiltern Rail and Virgin Trains will get on once HS2 gets going?