RANGERS

Hard to say if that's a down Langley working, certainly the routing is northbound on the mainline but the 47 was usually a give away for the Langley. I believe the reason was that it was an out and back working and the crews responsible for the WR leg weren't universally trained on 45s. Also, those tanks look like heavy oil or bitumen rather than kerosene which I think Langley received. There were irregular workings/ specials for ad-hoc flows to cover deliveries of fuel oil to some customers who needed standby supplies for instance.

This looks interesting : http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/131099442731?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1423.l2649

This was almost certainly a return Corby - Lackenby. In the early days (1980 onwards) it was booked a loco change at Toton, there was no dedicated pool as in later years so the stretch from there to Corby usually involved anything allocated there. At some point, around mid1983 I think it was, it changed and the same locos worked through. I'd have to say I don't know the full history but all manner of locos worked through, including NE allocated 20s, 31s, 37s (the norm), 40s and 46s. The last two were comparatively rare and I was never sure if the 20s had worked through in one go, fuel range would have been on the limit I'd have thought, but all were seen more than once at Corby. That's probably the most comprehensive collection of pics I've ever seen of Twywell, it was a bit far for us to cycle and trains too infrequent to make it worthwhile,The material was ironstone sand, basically very soft ironstone which was quarried and ferried to the railhead in trucks. It was mixed into the furnace charge as part of the sintering process I believe.The 31s weren't common so these pics add a bit more spice. I'd be interested to see any shots you might have of the tipper trucks used, it might settle a bit of a mystery which came up a year or two back.

Wonderful pics from my old haunts, many a Summer afternoon was spent leaning on the fence shown in the pic with the two cars, opposite Glendon Nth box, after biking from Corby. I'd BR pretty certain though that this pic is Glendon Sidings rather than Storefield. The picture was taken from The main A6003, just North of Storefield Cottages, the road in the foreground is Station Rd from Storefield to Rushton, the road sign being the giveway sign where it joins the main road. Glendon East box would be just off the shot to the right. 9T27 was the Glendon trip for ore from Glendon to Lloyd's Sidings from where BSC Minerals class 14s would trip them to the ore crushers. I seem to think the empties worked back from Corby Sidings. 9T26 also would have worked this way from the stump of the Kettering - Huntingdon line to Twywell but that was a type 2 turn, possibly type 4s were barred from the branch. Storefield closed in the late sixties and would have been of shot to the left of this picture, the remains of the level crossing there have only recently been removed by work on the new A43 link.

Picked one up yesterday on impulse, after convincing myself that I didn't need one, I had a close look at one in one of my chosen retailers and parted with a very reasonable sum for it. Now had a close look at it and bar for the the over scale MU jumper fittings on the bogies, it's a super model. Not been run to any great extent but a quick test run hasn't thrown up any problems, so far, so good.

John was still with us a year or so back and I've not heard anything to the contrary. He still writes/ edits a series of books published by Venture Publishing, the successor to TPC, as you say now run by his son from a shop in Glossop, always worth a visit if you're that way.

Nice shot, what year was it taken? Not sure about the 350yd rule applying here though, the box is on the end of the platform the DMUs standing at and from memory it's 11 coaches in length putting it around 750ft away.

Frank was a truly inspirational character to many of my generation and the succession of His layouts which featured in the old Model Railways showcased the best practice for just about everything in those days, hard to believe it but almost 40 years ago now. 'Market was the only one of Frank's layouts I ever saw in the flesh but having seen it a couple of times in its original state and again a couple of times in the new guise, it doesn't appear to be an old, dated and obsolete piece, such as much of the RTR stock of that era appears today against contemporary standards, but more of a masterpiece which has matured into a true classic and can still show the newcomers something of great value. In short, it's a glowing tribute to a true genius who contributed so much to the hobby.

Strange how things can turn up, I once sold a showmans lorry, built/ kit bashed from a plastic kit, at a swap meet. It turned up about four or five years later on a web forum where the poster described how he'd converted it himself! Curiously he wasn't far wide of the mark in his description of the work, only the origin of the wheels eluded him, he said they were unknown origin, in fact they were from another kit, turned down by hand to correct the tyre profile and hub shape.

I've acquired one of these as a first step towards DCC having set out to buy an NCE Powercab (there was a great deal on offer thanks to the Hobbyhorse 25% discount a few weeks back). The wireless thing was the clincher but I've yet to test it, the intention of doing it with the rolling road this weekend was put on hold thanks to storm damage to the railway shed which needed urgent attention. Looking to try it next weekend now. Now have a bit more flexibility after acquiring a used Multimaus so it'll be interesting to compare the two modes of operation with my DCC chipped locos.

Well deserved, a great shop run by a super team.

Barnstaple was the subject of a pretty detailed study in the first Model Railway Compendium

One of the East Lincs line bridges ended up at Sycamore Lakes campsite and fishery at Burgh Le Marsh. It was still there spanning one of the lakes a couple of years back and I guess still is.

Sounds like there's 375 cheap pianos needed..... http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=FTf1siNx5_4

In 1994- 5 there was a loco hauled set which worked one return trip a day on the MML, I think from Derby to St Pancras and back. Diagrammed for 2 x 31s, the down train was 17.15 out of St Pancras and became a bit famous in it's day. The stock was from Etches Park and did change during the lifetime of the diagram but it did include NSE stock. Fallback loco was usually a 47 although I believe a single 37 worked it once or twice. In the opposite direction, NSE stock appeared in the excursion sets from Sheffield and Nottingham to Skegness, as did Scotrail, Sealink and Inter City, often in mixed sets. These would also have been Etches Park sets so it seems likely that they inherited a number of them as they were cascaded out.

I can't be certain of the date but I'm pretty sure it was in June, possibly early July (school hadn't broken up for Summer hols) and it was a Saturday.

I was at Toton for that open day. 44008 was painted up specially for it and I could have been in the cab on that shot! I still have a penny which she ran over, there's probably thousands of them around it seemed like everyone there that day had one. It was quite a day, DMU trip from the disused platform of the east side of Nottingham station to Toton and then a day among what seemed like hundreds of blue diesels. There were at least three green 20s at Toton that day, 147 and 157 I think were two of them but I'm not certain, there were probably more than three even.

Magnificent stuff!

Just about sums up what I came across, it was in a much worse state than I'd guess it ever was in its time at Barry. Very sad to see it but given its current state, I'd doubt it'll ever be in a complete state again, let alone steam.

I came across an LMS Crab in a very rural area of Lincolnshire a few weeks ago, the wheels had been removed from the frames and running plate and the cab was separate from the rest of it but it was unmistakable. I'll keep the location under wraps to keep the metal fairies away but I'm more than a little curious as to what it was doing there? Presumably it was there for some part of restoration but it was an odd place to find it, any information would I'm sure suppress my curiosity.

Acquired a Princess yesterday and apart from the steering wheel having moved (it's horizontal above the dash!), it looks pretty much perfect to me. About their best yet IMHO

Every time this thread crops up again, I come up with a completely different list of layouts. There have been so many inspirational layouts which have formulated my thinking over the past 40 or so years, I doubt I could ever produce the definitive list. The Border layouts and early P4 BR blue layouts of Ian Futers were the ones which sprung to mind this morning as I was laying out a couple of points on a board.

Inspirational stuff here. Puts me in mind of the Iain Rice layouts of the '80s which inspired so many around that period, this one takes the ideas to a new generation of modellers.

That's true, it's a bit of a rarity but if you allow for the changes of ownership of the original business, there are one or two examples, not least of which was the Routemaster fleet, some of which saw 40+ years. I know of one coach operator who ran a coach from new until it finally went for preservation in 2009 at the tender age of 36. Specialist vehicles are usually the most numerous, we've a few tractors around here which comfortably exceed 40 years and one which is now in it's 64th year. There's a Coles crane with a local steel fabricator which is now approaching 40 and still road legal, although I can't say if they've had it from new but it is a local plate so quite possible.