Old Tearaway

My son tried it on his main computer..... it messed up all of his drivers so that a lot of hardware wouldn't function properly so he reinstalled Windows 7 again. He also had to reinstall all the essential hardware drivers that Windows 10 had deleted. We've had to turn off automatic updating on all the computers here at home, especially my work ones, because a forced installation of Windows 10 will cause so many problems, especially if vital software ECAD and CAD design suites refuse to work with it. I also use Lotus 123 / Lotus Smart Suite, as an engineer, because it is so vastly superior to MS Excel (It allows user defined functions, calculus and individual cell hiding which are all things that MS Excel doesn't do). Windows 10 presents potential problems to all businesses as it is (1) a compulsory installation and (2) you bet one's pension that it will refuse to run software packages that ran happily on previous versions (apart from Windows 8 ), requiring vast amounts of money spent on new Windows 10 compatible packages. Not the kind of expense any business wants in this day and age. There is a prophecy that the end of the world will occur shortly after Windows 13 is released.....

I watch classic 50cc road racing from Eastern Europe on U-Tube. Compared to the boring F1 like procession that Moto GP has become since the powerful and exciting 2 strokes were replaced with the boring and safer 4 strokes of lower torque, accelleration and horsepower, a lot of people have stopped watching Moto GP. Computerised traction control, etc. has removed most of the rider skill requirements so it won't be long before they just have robots riding the bikes instead. By comparison, 50cc racing is exciting, skillful, fast and close run. Riders slingshot to overtake using slipstreaming or slipstream another rider that has just overtaken them to prevent them gaining a good lead on them. The racing is more like it was in the 1950's, 1960's 1970's and 1980's before things were messed with. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3azxsC_LgAA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fxs9ooc2FaQ These 1970's and 1980's 50cc bikes actually do the speeds that today's sc**ter riding youth can only bulls**t about doing..... And a lot of the riders are middleaged too.....

Yes, it looks very nice and a better attempt than just tagging the old Triang LMS cattle wagon with SR markings that Hornby previously did.

Hamworthy station was originally Poole Junction and the Hamworthy Junction before becoming Hamworthy station in the 2000's. The track plan of the Hamworthy branch can be deduced from countless photographs taken by the RAF (and German "tourists") from the air dating from the 1930's, 1940's, 1950's and 1960's. These can be found in countless books on the history of Poole and one I have includes the old Poole station on the Hamworthy side of Poole Quay, including the opening ceremony. This had an unplanned incident when one of the 6 wheeled carriages derailed during shunting on the newly laid track and had to be jacked back onto the rails again as the ceremony progressed. The line has quite an interesting and complicated trackplan with plenty of pointwork before the 1990's, most of it old LSWR. It was originally a double track mainline and the end of the line for that part of the "Corkscrew" line, with a mainline junction at Poole (Hamworthy) Junction to Weymouth and Dorchester. In the 1860's a causeway was built across Holes Bay into Poole to link with a new Poole goods yard (still no station at that time) and a tramway built to the Poole side of the Quay. The tramway was serviced by LSWR B4 0-4-0T tank locomotives "Normandy" and "Le Harve" which also performed the local pick up goods routes on the Hamworthy branch line and surrounding station sidings around the "triangle", collecting and returning wagons to Poole goods yard. They continued in this role until the last days of steam when they were replaced by Drewrey 0-6-0 diesel machanical shunting engines. In 1872 a line was built to the new town and resort of Bournemouth which ended in a Terminus at what was Bournemouth West station. The first Poole Town station in the actual town appeared at this time and the double track branch into Poole for the goods yard became a passenger mainline. Poole Terminus on the quay closed for passenger traffic shortly afterwards, being retained only for parcels and freight. In the late 1950's one of the double track road bridges over Lake Road was removed as was the double track line from there to Hamworthy Junction. The other side of the road bridge was still serving J R Smiths steel suppliers so the double track was narrowed into a single line with a point to create a mile long passing loop. The Bath to Bournemouth West via Poole Town station mainline is more famously remembered for being the Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway mainline route. Poole Junction was renamed Hamworthy Junction to prevent confusion and was a double junction at this time. Poole Town became just Poole station. Doctor Beeching's axe saw the main line from Hamworthy Junction to Wimborne, Ringwood and Brockenhurst, which previously allowed passengers to travel from Hamworthy to Swanage, Blandford, etc. with ease. As an exhibition layout with lots of action, perhaps modelling Hamworthy in its Hamworthy Junction or Poole Junction days, before Doctor Beeching, would make a more adventurous project with a way junction with 4 seperate fiddle yards feeding trains through the junction in various directions through the original 4 tracks (3 platform touching) that were once there. Nowadays Hamworthy station is a mere shadow of what it once was.

This really happened in Dublin.....

The signal box was demolished this autumn and the last remaining semaphore signal was removed during the summer. The sidings were lifted during the summer as the sleepers had rotted away. They last had rolling stock sat on them in 1979 and those were bogie bolster E types when they lifted the old LSWR track on the Hamworthy side of the Ashmore Avenue level crossing when the J R Smiths steel yard closed and became a housing development in the late 1980's. The pointwork was also removed for the J R Smiths factory siding. This ended the bulk of the steel girder and sheet steel traffic on the Hamworthy branch. The point to the sidings remains but has a short 20 to 30 feet of track terminated in a buffer stop as a catch point just short of the bridge. This occured during the recent track and points relaying in 2015. The old points for the clay sidings on the branch line after the station were also lifted so now the track is uncluttered as it curves round the corner out of sight. Currently the station now has just 4 points, the 2 for the crossover, 1 for the branch line and 1 for the branch line catch point. That's one benefit of modern image modelling, it saves a fortune in points (at the expense of intresting running and shunting operations). The station building still opens occasionally as tickets can be bought there. Ironically it is still cheaper to travel by train into Poole and Bournemouth than by bus. Hamworthy is my local station and only 15 minutes walk away. In the 1970's the station and branch line were more interesting and branch line traffic was 2 trains per day. Locomotives were: 03 083 and 03 179 sometimes double heading cab to cab with a 50p on the govenor hauling a mixture of coal filled minieral wagons and bogie bolster B, C, D and E types with steel girders and coils. Brake vans were either BR standard ones or th ex-LSWR bogie brake on double shunter headed trains. Other visitors were a class 47 hauling usually 20 x carflats with 3 x Ford transit vans on each. These would head down to Poole Quay and a few days later be seen heading back up the line away again on the same car flats. No idea why. In 1976 the 03's were replaced by 09 026 and in the 1980's 37's had replaced the 47's as the Ford van traffic had ceased and the 09 was not used to haul freight trains, being slower than the ungoverned 03's. In the 2000's an 02 was parked at Poole Quay for shunting but now no freight travels the branch line currently and this last engine has vanished.

The Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway also used 3f "Jinties". "Jinty" was a popular regional girl's name back in Victorian and Edwardian times. However, like the Scottish "Sookie" and a few other old traditional girl's name, it is extremely rare these days. The last time I heard it was on local TV news, a few years ago, when some old lady called "Jinty" something was celebrating her 100th birthday.

In the Railway Modeller February 1974 issue, in Junior Modeller, the author has a converted Triang Hornby LNER B12 with Belpaire firebox mentioned and in one of the photographs. If I remember right, he used diagrams from the Model Railway Constructor from a 1971 issue.

I was disappointed that Hornby didn't number the N2 69561 in memory of their original Trackmaster derived Triang Railways clockwork version. Some folks have had to wait over 60 years for the electric powered N2 to finally appear. At least they've managed to produce it in the correct scale body length, unlike the old Gaiety and Dublo versions of old. Some of us are old enough to remember when the catalogue wasn't as big as it is nowadays. However some old Triang and Triang Hornby scenic and accessory items from the 1950's (water crane, lineside huts, etc.) and 1960's (bridges, electricity pylons, lineside telegraph poles, lineside fencing, etc.) still feature like familiar old friends.