BWsTrains

That is a great photo and this a topic near to my heart being a Weston boy and (very) loosely basing my own modest layout on a mythical Westown. Hence I have these resources FWIW. Map circa 1936, clearly shows position of the goods area at top left The 1950s plan of the main Eastern approach Yes, the Locking Road station was separately named, large numbers of excursion trains arrived there in Summer. It had two platforms and 4 lines. Colin

Kevin, I deleted the PM about the Toad when I realised yours was from Oxford. If you have my link that should still be relevant WRT the weight locations. I like the low profile lead wheel weights that we can still get here in Aus from older vehicles but the Fe ones will do, just can't cut them to fit. Will repeat PM with additions Colin

Kevin, I suggest you add some extra weight before reassembling for better shunting and performance. This brake should weigh around 65g IMO but it does look as if the Oxford model has a more generous weight than my Bachmanns which as delivered were only 38g and tended to hop off points when being pushed. PS (edit) can someone tell me when the large high "G W" was replaced by the small low version on the Toads? Colin

can't be real, there's brilliant blue sky.

Perhaps this says more about your protection systems than anything else? I've been in and out of the H site thru the Christmas period with no issues, I use the Windows defender that comes built in with the operating system, as does my IT savvy son and his family. None of us ever have had a "threat" get thru. IMHO your product is more of a millstone than effective prevention

Since this opens the door on the tricky issue of on-line payments let me share my experience with my Australian Bank, perhaps not the same as yours? I made two separate on line purchases of rental accomodation within 10 minutes, each over 1000Euro and within 30 sec of clicking on the 2nd, telephone rang and it was Westpac (10pm at night) asking me to confirm that I was really making such big purchases on a UK based site. That gave me great confidence in my Bank. Clearly their automated systems are checking / trapping these things, real time, if your bank is rejecting much smaller repeat purchases you might well address your questions to them not Hattons. IMO companies the size of Hattons have little alternative to depending on the other players in the payment chain, they could not manage the order thruput that they do otherwise. As noted before, you pays your money....... If a bank blocks payment, you can't blame Hattons for holding off on shipment but they might well look closer at a way of placing a temporary hold on orders where payment problems arise. To lose a pre-owned item that way is totally frustrating, I'd agree.

Larry, Re Post #1594 ....That Bachmann 57XX never stalls since I packed the keeper plate to allow the middle driving axle to drop. Mind you, the final snowdrift halted it but it still whistled! Dumb question dept here. Why does that let only the middle axle drop and by how much did you pack the keeper plate? Colin PS glad you're keeping OO Carrog going.

How about we test this "Bit of a Joke" assertion by looking at some data?. I've had 14 orders during 2017 so plenty of data points, I took the date of each and the order number of each. From this I derived the Daily Orders rate between any 2 of my Orders as follows: (Order no(2) - Order no(1)) / Days between the two orders This is the chart: Data a bit thin between August and November because of travels but clearly my Nov 22nd data point spans the whole "problem period and they've averaged 760 orders a day. If they choose a pricing structure which you dislike it seems reasonable to go elsewhere, I have, but hardly "joke" of a business all the same. People sometimes shop for reasons other than lowest price believe it or not! Edit with PS: anyone who wants to add data (anon of course) just PM me an order no and date and I can better populate my analysis

Great call, I can see it all clearly now. There are these distortions in the time space continuum, those that cause SWMBO to gravitate sideways towards a shop when walking in a shopping mall. "O" Gauge is just the male equivalent. Let's face it, "Resistance is useless"

Hi, I sent you a PM with some useful stuff to answer your questions. I've already posted on RMWeb quite some time ago.

Johnster, Apologies that this is off topic but you reminded me of a sidesplitting event when a chemist in our industrial lab (ICI - 1967) decided to "dry clean" his bright orange tie (OK - it was the 60's). Throwing it in a beaker of some chlorinated solvent, probably "carbon tet" it promptly dissolved in a flash turning the whole beaker's contents bright orange! Look on his face - priceless! I guess the moral is never assume anything about anyone's competence, whatever their credentials Colin

That link's content is enough to put any rational person off using Kadees for life Colin

order accepted 10:31, processed 10:33; packed 12:46; collected by courier 5pm. nice not to be in a picking queue when you've paid for a courier, well done Hattons should have the goodies across the globe to me by Monday.

Hmm, that's interesting. I posted a link to these pages on the Hattons "Live Chat" earlier today with a "please bring to management attention" comment. Someone's taken notice at least, the proof will be ahead. Thanks RD

Re the plan: The genius is that there's relatively little building stock in a physical sense compared to the impression you get from looking at it, wherever you look. Superb! The curved corners have a very big impact on giving it a sense of greater size as opposed to a being just pitched in a rectangular box

I agree with Western Dave, I'd noticed a gradual deterioration myself thru 2017 although with far fewer data points. Delays with picking, then a purchase, 1 essential item of which was actually out of stock which messed up my shipment to Aus., lack of info on a release that appeared to have issues. These were symptoms of something much less than perfect that management didn't get on top of in time. Dave's comments are most constructive but I'm left wondering whether the problems of September have just been papered over for now and if I should order or not? A very disappointing turn of events.

It's been done! Andy'll just do it better. My photo: see the railway stuff here: at Berlin LOXX, worth a visit, Colin

More info on Storage: This article is most instructive regarding usage and storage, both before and after opening. http://www.permabond.com/2014/07/17/storage-shelf-life-cyanoacrylate-adhesives/

Disraeli revisited it seems! A 14xx with dodgy drive mechanism + chassis design and DCC operational issues, nicely detailed but no ashpan etc. - "misfortune" A14xx with traction tyres, uneven wheel alignments, 1980s body work etc, - "calamity" both with impossible (or near to) to remove chassis, glued down it seems. decision made.

Jeff, yours in situ looks a lot better than in their promo shot! Can't complain about how it turned out for you. Colin

Hi Jeff, can't agree here, see attached comparisons. Rather poor representations in my book. Despite some protestations that oaks should be open, the real things have very dense foliage with only limited glimpses of sky visible, I have a 30m example in my back yard! Colin edit: for typos

But there is a blank mounting area on the smokebox door for a 14xx variant numberplate. Stands out like a sore thumb on the buffer numbered variant. "smokebox-gate?"

Some "after the event" comments from the safety of distance. Hatton's weren't the first and won't be the last to suffer a major disruption due to technology and it is testament to the quality of their people and systems that they are back up and running relatively quickly. It is not that long ago that a technology melt down was effectively a death sentence. We have come to expect / demand excellence and when things go off the rails are rightly miffed, ask a few million bank customers when their Bank went down how they felt or what about BA?? "Just two months after more than 670 flights were canceled due to a power failure, British Airways hit another embarrassing glitch Wednesday morning when its systems crashed across London airports". How quickly we forget how dependent we all are on technology when it lets us down. I'm not an apologist for Hatton's, just a realist suggesting some tolerance is warranted when things do go wrong, they take time to fix as I believe Hattons have proven. They need to learn from this incident.

Model photos are now posted on their site. looks like fairly standard "Railroad" issue. From these photos paint appears dull, likewise the lettering. Compare with the last GWR release R3317 from 2012 (not Railroad) Pity about the traction tyres, but at least there is an ashpan!

The post by "rue_d_etropal" set me thinking.. "are we at a turning point where an emerging technology changes the very core of how things are done in Railway modelling?" Think Horse v Steam up to film v Digital; Desktop iPad v etc. If 3D design and manufacture is adopted on a large scale by a resourceful player, the 40+ year old toolings that are moaned about will become redundant in a flash. Prices of the new are high now because we are early in the cycle but as overall volume increases there is huge potential for cost down. Note this would not suffer the same volume constraint of current manufacture as each unit could be custom produced even at high volume. Such is computer control, print me 50 Diag Z then 20 U's please.