60027Merlin

That was a long cycle trip! Well worth it though as these days will never be repeated and appreciate that you liked the photos. The last time I saw Glen Lyon was on the Haymarket dead-line in early 1962 after it had been withdrawn from Hawick in late 1961. The Director, Malcolm Graeme, was for quite a while on the same dead-line before it ended up at the Caley station where it was used for heating purposes. Hopefully your work on the layout will soon be complete and appearing in these pages.

Tom Yes it is a J37 which were strong engines and often used for passenger work when the occasion arose. They had bags of power. More pacifics will feature in the next instalment, perhaps too many, and am planning to take more photos soon. By way of a preview attached is one photo of a handful I took yesterday in between some weathering work on a couple of locos.

Unfortunately North Eastern was never shedded at Haymarket who only ever had their 5 favourites from that class. However don't let that stop you as friends in Hawick confirm that it was seen on The Waverley Route on occasions being a member of the "borrowed" fraternity.

Hopefully that's the full set of photos now all across. Thank you Andy Y for your help.

Success! First lot transfers through the universe.

Unfortunately most of the photos have disappeared in the transfer across, it seems to have worked for only the last few. I'll try again with the rest once I have a cuppa.

One morning back in the Spring I took a few shots of Pinkhill before going out into the garden for a digging session and now with the gardening season winding down more free time becomes available for some photo taking in between the many modelling jobs on the “work to do” list. Just for a change I thought that it would be an idea to add to these Spring photos and feature Pinkhill station and goods yard only, with not even a shot on the branch line. Rather than just one shot of a particular loco and train I have put each train into a little group of shots to hopefully give a flavour of the shunting and other loco movements which take place during running sessions on the branch. I hope that this will not be too boring as I have attempted to cover the same train from different angles for variety. This proved rather difficult to keep a semblance of reality as a backscene is not practical for the branch station basebord. I tried to keep the floor, other parts of the layout, work tables etc. out of the camera view. Not successfully in all shots, however imagination is a great thing. During these running sessions usually a variety of Haymarket’s finest would be gliding along the up and down main lines plus CDs with the Stones or the Who etc. belting it out in the background however all was quiet to aid the concentration. So here is a rare occurrence on the layout – a pacific free zone!

Sorry for the delay in replying as I only usually get the lap-top out a few times each week! I always change the bogie wheels as a matter of course on the Hornby pacifics as their bogie wheels are not so hot, not matching the standards of the rest of the loco. I use Markits wheels which I have found, as always, to be excellent not only in looks but also for running. From memory I think that there will be sufficient clearance if you use the Hornby wheels, if there is not, remove the top fold over piece of the frame etch. This will allow you to move it up slightly to a sufficient clearance to suit your purpose. Do not use quick acting super glue as it will not give you time to manouvre the etch into the right spacing to suit! Hope that this will be of assistance to you.

Great ECML atmosphere Gilbert. Just succumb to temptation and plan to get all four candidates, that will save the worry of making a decision!

All are numbered using the HMRS Methfix range as I feel that they are the right size and shade. The nameplates etc. are a mixture of Fox and CGW plates.

David Here are some close up shots, even one with a torch light aimed at the loco! Hopefully they will be clear. I removed the top fold-over piece of the frame etch so that I could fit the etch a wee bit lower to enable minimal clearance between the lower edge of the frames and the bogie wheel rim. It's just down to personal preference as I prefer to have less daylight in that area if possible as it gives the front end of a loco a heavier and to me more realistic look.

It's a DJH kit built in the late 90s. being one of the batch based at St. Rollox. They were fairly frequent visitors to the Caley station and from memory any time I saw them on the Caley line on the long straight section at Kingsknowe they were always belting along, real action stuff!

David Please see the posts numbered 113/114 (somehow 113 was duplicated when being transferred across). We are going on holiday in a couple of days and my camera is packed away now. I'll try for some close ups when we are back as I had planned to take some more pictures of Pinkhill then for the next feature so I'll get an A4 out and see how clear a close up shot is of the front end. Gilbert Re the CGW headboards; I forgot to mention that depending on the lamp iron fitted on the loco the hole in the headboard piece may require opening out by a fraction, Take care as they are fragile and may snap off!

It is an excellent set of etched fittings and well worth the fiver. The instructions are well illustrated running to 4 pages. I used most of the etched fittings, it's really up to the individual as to how much to fit depending on the practicalities, I concentrated on the front frames area and all associated fittings on plus the footplate support brackets. The instructions mention that "it may be a little awkward to fit the chassis to the loco as the rear chassis tongue has to clip under the cab" and as such perhaps "remove a small part of the splashers". That's true, however I got round it by snipping a couple of mill. from the lower end of the splasher prior to soldering them on to the frames and also doing the same to the rear end of each frame etching which gives sufficient clearance for chassis fitting. Once the frames are painted you would never know as that area is behind the cylinder and of course it's practical for running which is the main thing. I would recommend this product.

Many thanks for the comments lads, most appreciated. The Elizabethan headboard is a CGW product. It has a small circular piece with a hole in the middle attached to the middle of the lower edge. With a small pair of pliers carefully bend this piece 90 degrees to the rear and put a miniscule bit of blue tack in the hole. Then just place it down the lamp iron and straighten it up, the blue tack should stop it "shoogling" about when the loco is running round the layout. Feel free to jump in David, most welcome! The tender arrangements for Haymarket's A4s during the 50s until closure to steam in 1963 remained unchanged. Nos. 4,11 and 24 had the 1928 corridor type whilst nos. 9, 12, 27 and 31 had the 1935 streamlined corridor type. All my A4s were out of service for a couple of weeks recently as I was fitting them with most of the parts from the new Brasssmasters etch. Before putting them all away in their storage boxes I took a some snaps of them lined up and then deleted all but two on the camera! These are attached below, totally unreal regarding a layout scene but there we are for all that! Number 1 link of 64B.

Many thanks for the comments lads, most appreciated. The Elizabethan headboard is a CGW product. It has a small circular piece with a hole in the middle attached to the middle of the lower edge. With a small pair of pliers carefully bend this piece 90 degrees to the rear and put a miniscule bit of blue tack in the hole. Then just place it down the lamp iron and straighten it up, the blue tack should stop it "shoogling" about when the loco is running round the layout. Feel free to jump in David, most welcome! The tender arrangements for Haymarket's A4s during the 50s until closure to steam in 1963 remained unchanged. Nos. 4,11 and 24 had the 1928 corridor type whilst nos. 9, 12, 27 and 31 had the 1935 streamlined corridor type. All my A4s were out of service for a couple of weeks recently as I was fitting them with most of the parts from the new Brasssmasters etch. Before putting them all away in their storage boxes I took a some snaps of them lined up and then deleted all but two on the camera! These are attached below, totally unreal regarding a layout scene but there we are for all that! Number 1 link of 64B.

Over breakfast this morning (those organic corn flakes fairly set the mind into top gear!) I thought that another potential source for you to investigate is that of the gangway connections, if you have them fitted, as I couldn't make out from the photo if they are. If there is insufficient lateral clearance for them to move with ease on the curves but just enough to avoid a derailment then the effect is to make the coaches concerned very rigid as though they were all one long unit. This then acts as a brake. How do I know? - ah the joys of practical layout running!

A last minute decision to take a few photos of Union of South Africa acknowledging the final run of The Elizabethan on the 10th. September 1961 following on from my posting of the 12th. June. Silver Link and Union of South Africa took the final Down and Up trains respectively but in order to ensure that they returned to their sheds without diagram complications loco changes took place at Newcastle. No. 28 took over the Up train for the run to Kings Cross whilst No. 9 took the Down train to the Waverley taking over from No. 14. In this last week Union of South Africa and Mallard worked it each day. When typing this I recall visiting Haymarket a couple of times that week to “cop” Mallard as word had spread that it was the loco Kings Cross had chosen. As Kings Cross did not use it often on The Non-Stop it was one of the few 34A A4s I hadn’t seen. A few of us went along to the Shed just when darkness was falling as the evenings were, by then in mid September, getting dark early on. Taking the usual way in, via the steps beside the retaining wall in the small yard in Roseburn Street at the furthest point of the west end of the Shed, there was no sign of it so it had obviously been coaled, watered and turned for the next morning’s Lizzie. Therefore the search was on which meant us splitting up for some “low key” walking between the roads in the Shed which was still fairly dark even with the lights on. We found it positioned near the front of one of the roads in the Shed at the east end facing towards the Waverley, fortunately a couple of pacifics were in front of it which gave us some cover from the “high heid yin’s office”, the position of which gave them a clear view of the front of the east end of the Shed. The opportunity, of course, was taken to cab it individually whilst the others kept a look-out on each side of the loco in case any fitters happened to appear! It’s amazing how events and their detail instantly come to mind after all these years! The final journey - job done. To finish – Rather than on a sombre note let's go back to the glory days with a black and white shot taken in the spring sunshine last April, It was in colour before e-mailing it to a friend who did some computer magic and then returned it within a few minutes!

Sorry to read about the pulling problems with The Elizabethan set. Are the coaches coupled up as provided i. e. via the bogies? A few years ago I changed the coupling system to the method written about in a BRM article by fitting the coaches with the wire bar and hook fitted on the buffer beams. This seemed to make the running a lot smoother as the bogies were now really just taking the weight of the coaches rather than being pulled with the resultant tension. Perhaps additional weight in the loco may provide an improvement re better traction on the driving wheels and as 34th. letter says the tender pick ups can be too tight causing a drag on the loco. I recall viewing a layout at the Model Rail Scotland Show a few years ago where a pacific had a similar problem with pulling a 10 coach set and it was O.K. on the straight sections but toiled on the curves and on occasion came to a standstill. The radius did seem a bit tight so perhaps that could be something to investigate. Hoping you can solve the problem as "The Lizzie" must run!

Good to see that you are now running trains on the layout with all your hard work and planning coming to fruition. Now the real work begins in keeping them all fully serviced and running on schedule! I enjoy seeing your variety of locos and stock running on the southern section of the ECML, all excellent models, and was glad to see that the final photo featured a familiar loco from the Top Shed!

Another excellent selection of atmospheric photos. At this rate you will soon be heading up Leith Walk past the junction with Pilrig Street and onwards to Elm Row where you could always include the front of Harburn Hobbies! Wonderful work Andy.

Visited the Show on Saturday and for me it was the best layout in the Show. Great work.