AyJay

The ability to cope with an increasingly bewildering world.

I found The Banana Splits tune so irritating. If I ever have another cat, I will have to name it Skimbleshanks.

Looks like Rhubarb has landed on his paws then. You realise Jim, that if you take another in, you will have to call it……. Custard!

Then you have not read T.S. Elliot’s ‘Old Possom’s book of practical Cats’. They are creatures of dignity and must be treated as such. 😀

Well this is turning out to be a stimulating discussion and, typically, subject to some scope creep. I’m pleased that Mike ‘Stationmaster’ put his bit in, for that’s where I am. I never set out to model a railway, for if I had, then I would need a timetable, roster, bell codes and who knows what else??? No, I just love running engines, especially big express engines and I have built a picture frame to show them in. As has been pointed out, each of the big 4 is represented; I don’t care, I bought whatever appeals to me. The only constraint, they must have the BR totem; except for one carriage which is from Hogwarts, keep that one to yourself 😉 I wrote this for me; but please adapt and use as you wish.

Ah Railroad! Think I'll give it a wide berth. See you all at The Great Electric Train Show this w/e, I'll be drooling over the Pete Waterman layout.

I think the title says it all... Now £129.98 Ever on the lookout for a bargain, but I am left wondering why? Is it worth having?

Chris, this technique of capturing requirements can be applied to just about anything: Your next home. Your next car. Purchases. Arranging an activity. Prioritising your thinking. Mike, I can recall things that I did 50 years ago like they were yesterday. But sometimes, I don't know what I did last week, so I often rely on notes to self.

I imagine others get deluged with spam for fashion, flash cars, under 30's romantic holidays, or the latest must-have's? I get spam for Over-50's life insurance, Prostate health, Retirement homes and Funeral plan's! Say's it all really! Phil, you cannot take a penny of it with you. So long as you are meeting your financial commitments to your family, then I say go ahead and order whatever you want. I have spent a big chunk of my life having to do without. Now I can enjoy my 'grey pound' and The Wife has instructions that if she outlives me, then if nobody wants my layout, she is to turn to a trader in the magazine. Under no circumstances is she to call in a 'house clearance' vulture. I'd like to think that in 50 years time, my nice model buildings will be featured in 'The Repair Shed'.

Thank you for your encouragement all. As a person who has Aspergers, I have to constantly battle against lack of confidence and following the conviction of my own beliefs. I find writing things down, helps me to 'ground' my thinking. My first adult layout was a good teacher, because I did not have a clue what I was doing and it was truly dreadful. Everything was wrong. Then I got work into user interface testing on Mobile phones and learned how to write test specifications. So, I applied this to writing a construction spec for my next layout. At exhibitions, I would talk to exhibitors about their creations. I wanted to know "why did you do it that way and would you do it again?". Thus I was able to build up a clear picture of how I wanted to build it. There were a few things wrong, but they were the things that I did not look at. Move forward to a new career in handling project work, I learned about Requirements Capture and this led to my current layout. You are probably doing in your head what I have described, without even being aware of it. Sure, it;s not for everyone and you may find this approach too much like hard work. but then if you have ever had to undo something because you forgot something important, then you might want to reconsider that stance. Also, if you are a club considering your next project, then perhaps this approach will show it's worth in helping to keep everyone on the same song sheet. I have experienced one club member who kept everything in his head; a challenge from the club for answers ended with him walking out. So it is important to make sure everyone is 'on-board'.

Yes Mike, I think it has killed this one dead! I go to share the things that I know and just get shot at. Being of a sensitive personality, I think I’ll just keep to myself in future.

Very well then, I’ll continue, but first a word about context that may help you understand it all. The attached file contains a number of documents that are in the correct order. It is not one document, which is why there is repetition. They follow the style used in a previous employment, so they are supposed to look that way. I just tailored the template to fit my need. They were written over a period of about 3 years, so there will be differences. In places, they are incomplete, but that does not matter. The whole direction is to lead the reader to the Requirements Specification and this is intentionally solution independent; that is why you will not find what the end result looks like. It is not supposed to give a final design. Requirements are supposed to provoke you into considering alternative options; what you need, not how to achieve it. So why do it? Well to answer that, have you ever gone straight to the solution that you want, bought it and then within a year found it to be completely useless? Didn’t fit. Can’t upgrade. Can’t get spare parts. Difficult to use. Won’t work with what you have and so on and so on…. So long as your creation only exists on paper, you can rework it as often as you like; but once you start pouring concrete, welding steel, or cutting plywood, then you had better be clear about what you want because rework is expensive. Who will this be of use to? If you are clear in your mind and confident about what you are doing, then this is possibly of little use. But perhaps you are a beginner, unsure which way to turn? Or perhaps you are a club and you want to make sure that all members are in agreement as to what you are doing. Or perhaps in your last layout, you forgot something. Then you may find something useful in my offering. All explanation needed should be within the Strategy document. Please feel free to adapt to your needs. If you wish to pick it apart or criticise, then I politely ask you to move on. If you find any of this helpful in any way, then please let me know. Thank you and “good reading” Model Railway Combined Documents.pdf

P.s. At this year’s Warley, can I expect to see any “There are no trains running today due to industrial action” layouts? Perhaps we will see a proliferation of figures holding “Official Pickett” signs.

I’m all in favour of doing things right. But….. When at an exhibition, I find that the oh-so-slow shunting exhibits where everyone leans in to peer intensely as the loco couples up, bores me to tears and having lost the Will to live in about 60 seconds, I move on in search for something with a little more excitement. You will usually find me hanging around the O gauge live steam exhibits, as they rattle around at breakneck speed, showering me in hot oil fumes. That or the clockwork tinplate exhibits 😎

Morning all, you may have seen this thread before, for I am also on another forum. In my professional capacity, I have come across a lot of technical documentation. With time on my hands before I could start on my current layout, I decided to apply my skills to writing a set of documents in the same style as if for a major work project. I found this approach to be very helpful, for it forced me to be disciplined in looking at what it was that I wanted to do. It also forced me to consider the things that I knew nothing about and to which I had no answers. I am offering to make this material available to all. If you are thinking of starting a construction project but don’t know where to start, then this may be helpful to you. If you are not familiar with project documentation, it may read a little strange, but then it may also challenge you to consider something that you would otherwise not think of. I want to test the water here and gauge the level of interest? Is this something that you would like to see?

A recent visit to Stratford-on-Avon was most interesting. There is a pedestrian bridge with a white line down it’s centre and arrows indicating to keep left. They need that around my local shops. A recent walk across Tower Bridge showed the same; although being totally ignored by the overseas tourists who all just had to do video selfies of themselves on the wrong side, so that they could be viewed against the railing. B****y forest of selfie sticks!

Also late to this topic and also seen the series. This is not the first time I have seen the ‘going as slow as possible across the wobbly bridge’ approach, and I wonder if some of this is based upon the idea of being able to jump back quickly if you feel it going; which clearly you cannot do with a steam loco. As far as the sand goes, I wonder if because the running surface of the wheels are not horizontal, any slip might increase the tendency for the rails to splay out? As for the speed of crossing; I suppose that’s to reduce vibration. But I would be tempted to take a good run at it and go as fast as possible, to reduce the exposure time.

Hello Edward, this looks a very interesting model and a subject that can so often be overlooked, along with miscellaneous outbuildings. My one suggestion would be, would you consider having the roller door open and a fitted interior to the workshop?

Good morning all. By way of sharing information which may be helpful to others on their modelling journey, I am presenting an account of how I constructed a castle out of card, for my model railway. This is presented in the format of a pdf file, so you will need to download it. In this, I present various techniques, some of which may already be known to the reader. I am currently working on preparing a similar presentation on how I surveyed, designed and built another model of a church near my home. Hope you find it interesting, your comments welcome. Etal Castle.pdf

I noticed that when I was looking, then contact did happen with those who were not. Then I tried an experiment, I pretended to be looking sideways at all the shop windows while ploughing a completely straight line; not a single contact. The other things that riles me is when a group take up the entire width of the path, or when two groups insist on walking in a chevron, of offset pattern. It is impossible to walk beside my wife.

good afternoon. Probably not a good subject heading, but you should get the meaning soon. This is something that I have observed for some time now and it is beginning to grate on me. I presume that most others here are ‘Baby boomers’ as I am? Well when I was in primary school, one of the lessons drilled into us was that we should give way to our seniors, even to the point of stepping aside. It’s just respectful. Yet nobody else today seems to know this and it seems that those younger than me are the worst! When I walk along, my eyes are scanning ahead, checking where others are and where they will be. The result is that I end up weaving a path from side to side around others that just won’t give an inch! I have been shoulderbutted in the past by people that just ignore me. The scenario is always the same; I see person approaching and they are looking everywhere but at me. Then at the critical moment, they are distracted by the conversation with their friend and they continue straight on, neither slowing down or attempting to avoid. Young females seem to be the worst at this. I have now started the ploy of slowing down and pretending to be distracted myself. It really is disrespectful. Does anyone else feel this?

Has anyone received a text saying that you have been exposed to the omecron virus? I just binned it without opening.

Tempting though it is to say something, waste their time etc . I know, in response to that shallow and meaningless opening "Hello, how are you", I am tempted to reply something like "There has been a tragedy in the family and we are waiting for the Funeral Directors" By far the best response is, if you don't recognise the number, don't answer it. If someone wants you, they can leave a message. Well I just found this on Quora and it reinforces what I already suspected.... What should you never say to a scammer? I know that it makes you feel better to tell off a scammer but at the end of the day, it doesn't bother them. Understand that these people are thieves. They are preying on vulnerable people - typically the elderly, students, and immigrants - who they feel they can bully. They often use threatening language to scare taxpayers into giving up information or money: in one such instance, an older victim was so distraught as a result of threats from the scammer, that he crashed his car on the way to pick up a wire. These are not nice people. Your threats, bad language, telling them off? They've likely heard and said worse. You're not fazing them one bit. Don't waste your time. Rather than engage with the scammer which may result in you giving out sensitive information about yourself, Just hang up. You can also contact fintrack.org (OR support@fintrack.org) to report the scam and have a shot at getting a refund on your stolen funds. They only get 10% of the recovered funds at the end of a successful recovery process so you must have gotten your refund first before undergoing any payment. I think you should never engage with scammers because when you do, you've just confirmed two pieces of information for the scammers: they've called a working phone number and you'll answer the phone. Remember that identity theft isn't just about getting money out of you one time or stealing a tax refund check, it's an entire industry. Your data typically isn't getting stolen in one fell swoop: your identity profile is being put together piece by piece. Key bits of information about you may be stored, repackaged and sold from one scammer to the next. The fact that you answered the phone and were willing to engage? That's valuable to scammers who might try it again later - or sell your number to the highest bidder. When you tell scammers to stop calling you, you may inadvertently give out more information about your phone number. When you offer comments like "stop calling my house" or "don't call me at work" or "this is my cell phone," you've just added to the database. Not only do the scammers know that it's a good number, and you'll answer, you've now offered up more details about the number the scammer just called (i.e. it's your house, workplace or cell number). If they're simply calling off of a stolen call list, you've just made your phone number more valuable. When you tell scammers that you know you don't owe anything, you might have confirmed your name, that you're a taxpayer, and worse, possibly your Social Security Number (SSN). Remember, this isn't some kid calling with a script: these are professional thieves who likely do this for a living. They know how to get what they want. It can be easy to give out or confirm additional information even if you don't intend to. For example, if a scammer says, "Our records indicate that Charlotte Vogel with SSN 123-45-6789 owes $5,400," and I reply "That's not true, I always pay my taxes," I might have inadvertently offered up more information. Not only does the scammer now know that my phone number is good, they have a name to attach to it. And since I automatically didn't say, "That's not my Social Security Number," that may be an indication that they have the right SSN, too. So now they might have the name and SSN of a taxpayer who claims to be current: that strongly suggests that I have a job or other taxable income and that I have enough in assets to pay my bills regularly. I just became an even more valuable commodity to the scammer. When you make threats back, you might be offering valuable "out of wallet" information. It may be tempting to bring out the big guns like "I'll get you, I'm a lawyer" or "How dare you, my dad is a cop" or "Just wait until my Army husband, Bill, gets home." But think about what you've just said. Yes, more information about yourself. Those additional nuggets are helping form your profile. Pieces of data are matched to other data. Suddenly, you’re no longer just a random phone number. You’re Jane Smith, SSN 123-45-6789. You're a lawyer, and your dad is a cop. You live at 123 Elm Street, Anytown, USA 12345 (since that address matches your phone number). Your spouse’s name is Bill, and he works for the government. That data – especially once it’s been matched with more data which can be found in other places, such as social media sites or from a recent hack – is incredibly valuable. Don’t fall for their tricks. Keep your personal information safe by remaining alert. assist in our marketing efforts. Cookies Settings Reject All Accept All Cookies

Afternoon all. Not wishing to go down yet another rabbit hole of a discussion but….. I have become rather concerned about China. Mainly their treatment of minority groups, but also their aggressiveness towards Taiwan. I wonder if it is now time that Hornby disassociated itself and brought its manufacturing back home?

This is a very depressing subject to read. Sorry if I ramble a bit. Our society has become heavily dependent upon international trade and we have become reliant on products that come from overseas; just take a look at the products in your weekly food shop. I think that we are now heading into 'the perfect storm'. The Evergiven grounding in the Suez Canal was a wake-up call as to how fragile international trade is. Now we have Russia behaving like a playground bully, the increasing cost of fuel and there is industrial action at Felixstowe. What's going to kick-off next, I wonder? I once heard someone say something that sounded very true at the time: "If you owe the Bank £100, then you have a problem. If you owe the Bank £1 million, then the Bank has a problem." I really cannot imagine what is going to happen as the fuel cap just keeps increasing in silly figures. What will happen when people en-mass just cannot pay their utility bills? This is uncharted ground. We have all lived through recession, It tended to happen at times when I was out of work and my reaction was to cut back on spending to only what was absolutely essential. Well now I am looking forward to retirement, no debts, few responsibilities and the 'grey pound' waiting in my pension pot. Yet I think we are heading for hardships like nothing we have seen since wartime austerity. As far as my modelling interest is concerned, my big-ticket spending is just about done now. I won't be buying any more locomotives in the near future. Those brass signal kits in my bits box will keep me busy for ages. Perhaps I might replace some plastic wheels for metal ones, but that's just about it Looking at how to reduce costs now, the union membership has been cancelled and since the mobile contract came to an end, I went SIM only, so that's saved a bit. The only other personal saving that I can make is to cancel my BRM subscription. Last week, The Wife and I were discussing the coming winter and heating. We are considering just heating the kitchen - diner. I can also move my workspace to the corner of the room, where the heat that my work computer and screens chuck out, can help to keep us warm. I am really concerned about how our model shops can survive as we all pull up our drawbridges?