AncientMariner

I don’t know if this is of any help but:- I have in my possession a book entitled Historic Carriage Drawings – Vol. 1 - LNER and Constituents. Author: Nick Campling; Publisher: Pendragon, 1997; ISBN No. 1-899816-04-6. The book contains drawings in 4mm scale of both Diagrams 167 and 168. I seem to recall that there have been some issues raised on RMWeb regarding the accuracy of some drawings, and in his introduction page, David Jenkinson acknowledges this when pointing out the pitfalls involved in trying to accurately produce a 4mm drawing from works drawings which may not themselves incorporate design modifications. Unfortunatley, it doesn’t contain any of the photos that you are asking for, or much info in the texts, although it is pointed out that both diagrams ran on the same underframe and running gear, but that photographic evidence should be checked for battery boxes on dia. 168. Sorry I can't help out with the photos. John

I’ve travelled on the Bournemouth Belle and Brighton Belle. My first experience of Pullman travel was in about 1965, as a teenager on a train spotting trip to the south coast from my home in Cambridge at the time, paid for by money earned from a paper round. I travelled from Southampton to Waterloo on the Bournemouth Belle. The loco was 34089 “602 Squadron” I travelled on it again about a year later when returning from a visit to the Isle of Wight on its last weekend of steam operation. Again it was hauled by a rebuilt light Bulleid pacific. A few years later in the early 70’s, I lived in Brighton and used the Brighton Belle quite a few times, splashing out on a 1st class ticket a couple of times. By then it had been repainted in blue/grey. As I recall, the usual modus operandi was for the conductor to walk through the train collecting the supplementary fare of a few bob from each passenger. One feature was the table service, and although we often have a trolley service on trains today, it isn’t quite the same as being able to order freshly made sandwiches and a pot of tea and then having your request brought to your table. Also the interior surroundings had an air of opulence that didn’t quite match that of a Mk 1 open coach of the period. This was particularly true in 1st class with its 1 + 1 seating. Anyway, time to get on with recreating some other youthful memories, so It’s off with the rose tinted spectacles, and on with the Optivisor. John

Be careful here. Under Rule 170 of the Highway Code; when a pedestrian has started crossing at a junction, he/she has priority over a car that is turning off the main road. http://www.highwaycode.info/rule/170 John

So the president of the Flat Earth Society used GPS to get around! 8th paragraph down. https://www.theguardian.com/global/2010/feb/23/flat-earth-society Amusing irony that. John

Earlier today. BBC Spotlight reported a level crossing collision, showing very briefly a picture of a DMU buried into the left hand side of a courier van. The local paper reports:- https://www.plymouthherald.co.uk/news/plymouth-news/live-trains-plymouth-gunnislake-cancelled-2325675 I'm not sure why they had to show an HST in their illustration. The usual charabanc on this quiet branch line is either a two-car 150, or a single 153. Thankfully, no casualties. John

If I'm correct, section 385 covers transportation. I've often found railway books in this section. John

The loco had also been correctly renumbered to represent D326. John

Meteorology is amongst the most complex sciences around. In order to advance my career professionally, I had to study, and pass examination papers in meteorology. This gave me an understanding of the basics, but it fell far short of making me an expert. The real experts IMHO are the highly qualified scientists and mathematicians who do the research needed, and crunch the observations using some of the most powerful computers there are, inputting data that isn’t as comprehensive as would be ideal. At sea, many ships volunteer to provide observations at 6-hourly intervals to organisations such as the Met Office, providing data such as wet/dry bulb and sea temps, air pressure and tendency, cloud cover, types of cloud, wind, wave and swell info, and the list goes on. This is something I have always supported, as hopefully, it provided a small contribution towards the accuracy of forecasts, as well as giving the observing officers a better awareness of what’s happening around them. Conversely, many shipping companies avail themselves of professional routing services from companies that specialise in this field, and which will advise the optimum route for a vessel’s voyage, hopefully resulting in savings of time and fuel, but more importantly providing for a safer passage. By and large they provide a good service. I well remember the old weather faxes of the 70’s and 80’s, and having to try and make sense of the low res output, and the sometimes undecipherable maps that came out of them. In those days, we referred to hurricanes (or typhoons in the Far East) as tropical revolving storms, although I believe the term tropical cyclone was used across the pond. In these cases, the wind speed needed to be a sustained 74 mph or more to become classed a TRS. Yesterday evening the probability of rain indicated 40 percent on the provider I was using (Foreca). From the comfort of my living room, I watched a load of heavy cumulus drift over. It could well have developed into precipitation, however it didn’t, but it may well have done a couple of miles away. I ended up having to go out and water the flower beds and the runner beans, instead of letting nature do it for me. I’m inclined to use Met Office pressure charts to supplement my looking up of the weather, and despite being 6 years into retirement, I still listen to the shipping forecast, a Met Office product which the BBC still broadcast. John

I’m going purely from personal memories of the early 60’s, as a spotter in my early teens, and living in Cambridge. Many stations at the time displayed posters giving departure times of all passenger services, each departure being arranged in chronological order. I certainly recall an evening train in the departure timetable with a through service to Glasgow. This stuck out because no other service from Cambridge offered anything approaching such a faraway destination. I never gave any thought to the fact that the service may have originated in Colchester. The Stour Valley branch line from Colchester was still open at the time, although via Ipswich and Bury St Edmunds would have been a possible option with a reversal at Cambridge. I never actually saw the train, and have no idea of its make-up, but I would imagine that the class 31 (Brush type 2 in those pre-TOPS days) could have well have been the standard iron horse for that service in that area, as it was for numerous other services in East Anglia. They were generally regarded as pretty mundane by local spotters in those days. John

My time on LPG ships was between 1975 and 1999, and during those years I had a few incidents with ammonia that I would not like to repeat, although nothing as serious as MarkC’s experience. My last incident was in the mid 1990’s. I was master on a 27-year-old fully ref carrier of about 20,000m3. Unsurprisingly, the old girl had issues with corrosion, mostly in the ballast tanks, but also affecting the cargo pipes. We had taken a full cargo of ammonia from western Canada to Japan without incident, and were on our way back to Canada to take another load of ammonia for the USA west coast. About half way across the Pacific, I had a call from the 2nd mate at about 3 a.m. informing me that due to a problem in the engine room, speed had been reduced. Almost immediately, a received another call, this time from the chief engineer informing me that there was a serious stern seal leak, and that I should get down to the engine room asap. Before I could get below the main engine stopped, and I was greeted by the sight of a broken prop shaft. Clean break between the stern seal and Plummer block. The stern seal used lignum vitae, a type which in those days was becoming something of a rarity. Needless to say, our voyage continued behind a tug. It was decided to call in at a port of refuge in the Aleutian Islands, partly to get a break from the horrendous winter weather we were experiencing, and to properly prepare the vessel for the subsequent tow to drydock. On arrival, to add to my problems, there had been a disciplinary incident which resulted in my having to send a crew member home. The last thing I needed was a release of ammonia, but something gave way, and that is exactly what I got just as the vessel was berthing. Not surprisingly, this was immediately apparent to those on the shore, and the local authorities quickly came down on me like a ton of bricks. Fortunately, despite its age and the corrosion issues, the ship looked good cosmetically on deck, in the accommodation, and in the engine room, which obviously helped, along with what was basically a good professional attitude from the crew. So I got away with a friendly warning, in exchange for a letter of explanation and apology. Not a trip I’ll forget in a hurry, and I was glad to leave the vessel on arrival in drydock at Vancouver (I was due off anyway). The vessel was repaired and traded for a couple more years before becoming razor blades. I was only home for a couple of weeks before I was away again. My next ship also had a leaking stern seal, which required an emergency docking to put right. But at least she only carried LPG and had stainless steel cargo pipes. John

Another perspective using AIS tracking, found on the gcapt website. https://youtu.be/vEI0aCnUmDE Thankfully, no casualties according to the reports I have seen. John

Underway is the correct term, and is best described by quoting COLREG Rule 3(i) “The term ‘underway’ means a vessel is not at anchor or made fast to the shore or aground”. In layman’s terms, that means a ship that is readily able to manoeuvre, but not necessarily making way through the water. The term “under way and making way through the water” has a horrible habit of being used in Courts of Enquiry. The term aweigh refers to the anchor. When heaving up, the anchor is aweigh when it is clear of the seabed, and its weight borne by the vessel. The traditional procedure when weighing anchor is to have a guy operating the windlass, often the bosun, or perhaps a suitably experienced crew member, and a deck officer. The windlass operator cannot see the cable (the correct term for an anchor chain), and the officer has to peer over the ship’s side and observe the cable, which has markings to help determine how much of it is out. When the officer determines that the anchor is clear of the seabed (this take a little bit of experience when you cannot actually see the anchor), the event is relayed to the bridge, and the time recorded in the ship’s log. In my very early career, I was once castigated by the 3rd mate for writing “anchor away” in the log instead of “anchor aweigh”. Many years later, sailing as master, I found myself drawing attention to this point of pedantry on a couple of occasions to junior officers. And when I want to catch a train, I go to a railway station. The term “train station” seems to be an Americanism creeping into our language. John

My first Christmas at sea was in 1968 on board m.v. Heythrop – a Panamax OBO - in Libya. We had a request played for us on The Merchant Navy Programme on BBC World Service. In 1971, it was on board m.v. Eridge (a sister ship of Heythrop) dry-docked in Yokohama. That was fun. In 1976, I was on board m.v. Garmula (LPG tanker) in Saudi Arabia. That was not so much fun. We decided to delay festivities until immediately after we left. In 1984, after taking a cargo of quartz from Leirpollen, at the top of Norway, we went round the North Cape to Iceland and spent Christmas Day in the most horrendous weather aboard m.v. Rollnes, a mini-bulker. We were then sent back above the Arctic Circle to Glomfjord, Norway, and saw the New Year in alongside and idle. Dark pretty well all the time at that time of year, but I on the passage to Iceland, I was treated to the most fantastic display of Aurora Borealis I have ever witnessed. In 1998, m.v. Hermann Schulte (LPG tanker) it was in southern Spain. Just a normal working day, and any festivities could not be allowed to interfere with that. Today, I'm an assistant cook and mess boy. Just hoping the little people around me don’t get too fractious. All the best. John

I count myself lucky in that the domestic authority sometimes directs her creative skills towards the scenery on my layout, and is capable of turning a few bits of old electric wire and plaster of Paris into an acceptably convincing tree. If the weather stops her from doing the gardening in 12 inches to the foot scale, then sometimes she can be persuaded to do so in 4mm scale. A couple of years back, we decided to downsize from a fairly large Edwardian semi into something that, in our retirement, would be hopefully be easier and less costly to run and maintain. That of course meant finding a new home for my unfinished 11’8” x 8’ layout. It was good to have an understanding spouse who was prepared to accommodate this. It took a bit of searching, but we eventually settled for a 1970’s 4-bedroom house, bedroom 3 being 11’6” x 10’, with the door in the corner I wanted it to be. After a bit of surgery, and with some of it intruding an inch or so into the 7’6” wide and 6” deep window space, I could fit the layout in. I decided to scrap part of the original layout and take advantage of the extra width to create a roundy going along the 4 walls. I could use the integral garage (19’ x 11’) if I wanted to go to the trouble and expense of climate proofing, and that would potentially give me a more ambitious layout which I could never get close to finishing, however, I didn’t want to feel isolated from the rest of the house. With the present set-up, the work bench is directly above the living room sofa where the domestic authority sits when watching TV, in which case, if I drop a white metal loco screwdriver or similar onto the laminate flooring, it hits the deck about 6 feet immediately above her head. Drilling and hammering operations are unwise choices during Strictly Come Dancing. John

According to my 1948 Ian Allan, Lincoln (40A) had a number of J11 allocations, and I believe this continued well into the 1950s. I don’t think it would be taking modeller’s licence too far to imagine these locos reaching the western fringes of Norfolk on occasion. I would also guess that they could have also reached the marshalling yard at Whitemoor, near March, although I have seen no photographic evidence of that. A bit of irrelevant info from the LNER.info website. During LNER days, some were transferred to East Anglia, and shedded at Norwich, Lowestoft, Yarmouth and Cambridge between 1927 and 1933. John

If you want to use a rattle can, then I believe that Ford Burgundy Red from Halfords is a reasonably close match to BR maroon. Acknowledging that Tony Wright brought attention to this a while back. John

I regularly travel between Plymouth and Dawlish on family visits, and depending on when I travel, and what is supplied, I get to travel on HST’s, Voyagers, 150’s, 153’s and 143’s. As the trip usually – but not always - involves a change at Newton Abbot, I may get to travel on four of the above on what is approximately an 80-mile round trip. The worst case scenario is when a Voyager is terminated at Newton Abbot due to the wrong type of wind and tide along the Dawlish sea wall, and its hapless occupants then have to disembark, and squeeze into what may be a two-coach 143 to continue their journey. I only have to endure 12 minutes of this, but many passengers have to continue to Exeter to catch another Voyager, and continue their journey, probably an hour late, and having lost their seat reservations. I don’t get why Voyagers are called so, as the term indicates a sea passage, and Voyagers are probably the most unseaworthy of all trains. A hint of salt water in the air, and the service the Voyagers provide is shut down along the sea wall. In my professional life, I was accustomed to checking the tide and shipping forecast prior to a voyage, but not for a train journey. The 12-minute trip I often undertake on 143’s doesn’t upset me too much. Assuming I can find a seat, I don’t find them too uncomfortable to sit in, especially when they are stopped at a station as then I get the chance to legibly insert my crossword characters neatly inside their little boxes. But given the choice, I’d prefer an HST every time. John

Quite a few years ago, I was watching a TV programme about collectors, which featured a guy who had bought a Hornby train set. It was his intention to keep the set unopened and in its cellophane wrapping into perpetuity in the hope that it would become a collector’s item. Each to his own, but I don’t see the fun in that. John

What, of course, is laughable is the entire concept of strapping two ships together side by side, separated by 3 knackered Yokohama fenders, and then trying to tow them through the Bay of Biscay in heavy weather. John

In choosing my forum ID, it never felt the need to use my name, and saw no harm in using one which reflected the fact that I am a retired old salt. I normally sign off my posts with my first name, but not my surname, and intended nothing sinister in the way I post. If I was to reply to a PM, then my full name is incorporated in my email address. Some of us have very commonplace names. Put my first name and my surname together, and I find that there are a fair few of us on the local electoral register. Many years ago, I even came across a namesake in a Norwegian telephone directory (stuck in a Stavanger hotel with not much better to do!) By Googling my name, and looking at Wikipedia, I find that I have shared my name with four MP’s over the centuries - the last retiring in 1997; 3 American and 2 Australian politicians; the leader of the first expedition to reach the summit of Mount Everest. And the list goes on. I also share my name with someone who is well-respected in the sphere of railway photography, and with whom I am totally unconnected, apart from a common passion for steam locomotives. Given the size of RMWeb membership, it wouldn’t surprise me if a few members shared a name. Having been the victim of identity theft, I can understand if someone chooses not to disclose their name, so it’s not an issue with me, so long their posts follow the spirit of this forum. Anyway, I am not going to get concerned over how anyone wishes to describe themselves on this forum. What has upset me more recently is a points failure on my layout, which has taken hours to rectify, hours which I was hoping to spend replacing tension lock couplings with S & W. John

The UK Hydrographic Office offer free tidal predictions for any port, but these are limited to up to the next 7 days. It is necessary to register with them. http://www.ukho.gov.uk/Easytide/easytide/SelectPort.aspx If you want predictions outside the 7-day range, then there is a small charge, but the info you are looking should be available. John

My wife looked at this quickly and came up with: "My Dear Edith Just arrived at Builth .... standing on Builth Bridge .... have just passed me coming back.... Expecting to stay at Hereford tonight. Have lost two days owing to rain. ....hope .. doing famously?" This is Pitman's shorthand, but not at a very advanced level so she tells me. She'll have a closer look at the bits she couldn't decipher when she gets back from the dentist. John

LNG Carrier “Arctic Discoverer” anchored off Brixham yesterday, probably about 8/9 miles from the platform I was standing on. I note that she’s been there for well over a week, and would guess that she is awaiting orders – not very unusual at this time of year when energy demands are lower. I see on AIS that anchored off Southwold, there are around a dozen tankers in the 100,000 – 300,000 tonnes dwt range (Aframax to VLCC). John

Good day Micheal, Cougar Ace, with a beam of 32.26m is Panamax sized. Another incident in UK waters was Hoegh Osaka, which I believe became unstable during a fuel transfer. The latter ship was deliberately grounded before things got worse. Ironically, despite having its entire cargo written off, Cougar Ace is still trading and is now a 24 year old ship. I did an AIS check this morning and she showed up in Bremerhaven. John

Correct on all counts, Jim. I served my cadetship with Trident Tankers, and was still in the P & O group during the revolution. The Erne did indeed end up on the Kiwi coast, having been converted into a bitumen carrier. I think she may have been on bareboat charter and manned by NZ crews - but I'm not 100% sure on that though. I was with Gibsons (then under Denholm management) for a couple of years in the mid 1980's. I served on the Quentin twice, and the Borthwick once, on the run described by MarkC. John