The Johnster

The 'Spud' or 'Black Beetle' used to perform this role, but seems to be difficult to obtain/out of production deze daze and 2h examples fetch inflated prices. Which would suggest that there is insufficient demand to make production viable (and this on a world-wide basis) but sufficient to boost the 2h market... I have long been of the view that Airfix-type simple plastic construction kits supplied with basic chassis components (bearings to insert in plastic frames, motor/gears, and metal axles wheels & motion) selling at between £50 and £100 for locos, around £25 for coaches, and £15 ball-park for wagons would be viable, but the trade doesn't agree or they'd be doing it, and they know more about the market than me! It would need to be 'all parts included', like the old K's kits, but hopefully with a better motor! The Churchward and derivate GW locos, with standardised boilers, cylinders, motion, &c, where different classes are created from different combinations of the standard components, might benefit from this approach.

The original M&S* Rovex set's stock had a simpler hook & loop type of coupling as well IIRC, whereas this set has the earliest form of tension-lock automatic. *'Loving tooled from chemical extrusions and designed by experts to go all bendy as soon as daylight gets anywhere near them, these are not just bananas; these are LMS plastic M&S bananas'...

It’s not a stock item, Rich, just a collection of bits from different manufacturers, Kato track and controller (which probably came from a set that the train was removed from) and a Dapol pannier with a Gresley coach, that some dealer has lying around and is trying to make a killing with. Not that the pricing practice you describe doesn’t exist and isn’t annoying…

My somewhat inexpert view is that multihulls are fine for smooth water use such as rivers, smaller lakes, coastal inshore &c, and as sailing craft are very effective and fast downwind. I am less convinced of their value in offshore/open sea situations, where they offer fast passages but are vulnerable to cancellation in heavy weather and seem even in moderate seaways to spend a lot of effort lurching about in a way that a monohull doesn't.

Trip to town sometime this week should see me supplied with some fresh Milliput for the joins and other filling jobs such as the holes in the ends for the tabs on the Triang roofs, then there will be a pause while I wait for pay day to order the bogies.

No. But it is many years since I used anything other than acrylic paint for this purpose, and in fact almost every other painting job on my layouts; what difference, if any, this makes I have no idea. Tarnishing seems to occur if there has been more than a couple of days between running sessions (the layout doesn't like being neglected and protests in this way), and I usually start off with a track-cleaning jag in these circmustances, but the layout is in a bedroom in the heated/ventilated part of my flat and this may also have a bearing on the situation. I had a loft layout in my teens and tarnishing seemed to be a very frequent occurrence on that, despite the rail sides not being painted.

Seems an odd definition of 'fantastic value for money for the beginner'; the beginner in eBay selling, perhaps. It is a train set in the sense that there is an oval of track, a loco, a coach, and the controllers needed to run the thing, but the loco is not in any way related to the coach and even the most basic and simple form of train cannot be recreated with it as there is no brake coach. I suppose if you are the sort of person who spends that much over the odds for a bunch of unconnected items such niceties do not bother you much... Not convinced about a 'project layout extension', assuming that to mean a project to extend one's layout. Arguably, if you were modelling ex-LNER or ex-GW some of the items might be of some use to you, but the track provided would result in a surplus of curved pieces for most projects! Or could the explanation possibly be that the seller is a Mendacious Chiseller on the lookout for the one born every minute. I know which of these alternatives my money's on... Have to say I'm rather enjoying a lot of this AI-generated nonsense, at least as a spectator sport, though. I work to the default principle that anyone using AI in this way is fundamentally dishonest and hiding behind the AI's vague and somewhat meaningless descriptions, and I don't make it a habit to deal with clearly dishonest people, so the presence of AI in a description is a sure-fire way of alerting me to the fact that the seller is a Chiseller of Mendactity and I will not be buying from him/her, and I would imagine that a fair proportion of potential customers feel the same way. It looks to me, therefore, that not only is this sort of AI description mendacious, it is also simply bad sales technique.

Downloaded free app to my phone, the range can be set, and it is set to 0-100. The first number generated is the percentatge chance of an event occuring during today's timetable; it is then up to me to decide whether it will or not. Then a further number decides what the event is from a list with allocated numbers (hot axle box on mineral train, wagon/van on mileage siding not unloaded, auto-gear on loco not working, &c). The third number delineates what time of day the incident takes place, and the fourth the actual working affected. Arbitrary decisions on further details are then made according to how much fun I want to have with it; a major snafu such as a fusible plug mishap will put the timetable for the branch out for the whole rest of the day, and in the 50s trains were not cancelled as readily as they are nowaday, the ethic was to keep the service running as best you could whatever the delay. Serious delays of the sort that affect manning and require relief crews to be found by Control are probably rare on shortish branch lines like Cwmdimbath, but on main line could have the phones running red hot in Control as diversionary routes were found, pilots and relief crews arranged, connections held and so on. For locomen, guards, and signalmen 12 hours rest was mandatory before they could book back on duty after their last shift, and this meant that manning problems might easily carry over into the following day. A landslip on the branch trapping a train behind it would be fun; the engine would need to be kept in steam and the crew relieved, possibly by taxi in the days before traincrew minibuses, at regular intervals, and possibly food arranged for them. I once got stranded on a Sunday ballast job that overran badly, and was sent a packed lunch from the Buffet at Cardiff Central, cold chicken portion, cheese roll, fresh apple, bottle of light ale.

🎵 'One wheel on my wagon but I'm still rollin' along'...🎶

Wasn't he the idiot specimen who some years ago reckoned that there was sufficient demand for passenger traffic between Swansea and Ilfracombe to justify a fast-cat (or was it a foil service), without apparently realising that the craft would not be able to access Ilfracombe at low tide, or am I thinking about another idiot specimen? He also suggested one between Cardiff and Bristol, where at least there is a traffic flow, with a 40-minute timing to compete with the train; how this was to be achieved using the lock at Cardiff Bay Barrage and hurtling up the Avon at low water, then negotiating the Cumberland Basin locks was a mystery to us all... Bloke's a fool.

She's got a point, though...

And those stops where the display is not always accurate. Ours sometimes show buses due that left two or three minutes ago and there are 'ghost' buses that never turn up, at least not in this dimension. The app is more accurate and the buses can be seen approaching, position updated every 30 seconds. You can also see the fleet number and how full it is; probably the app I use most when I am out and about.

Looks like he's getting revenge by peeing on your car!

Ok, so I've fitted out the cab thus; a tipup seat on the left hand side, handbrake standard centrally located, a cabinet on the rear wall (containing first aid kit, fire blanket, and similar brake van equipment), ladder & wrecking tools under seat, setter between centre and left windows. Yet to do; red painted spare screw coupling, hung on rear wall, and vacuum gauge, also rear wall. I've got some brass tube somewhere to cut a slice off for this, but can't put my hand on it now just. I have decided to bite the expensive bullet and order Stafford Road 3D print bogies.

I would suggest sealing with pva as a default if you are going to use the buildings outside in any case, rovex, and to seal the parts before assembly as well so as to prevent damp getting into the joins by capilliary action. Once that's done you won't have to worry about it any more even if it turns out later that sealing is not necessary...

To the extent that the raised lines on the tank for painting the lining on are reproduced. ISTR that there was one cast from CoT kit that had this wonderful scale feature as well...

Cab interior over the weekend, already made up a handbrake standard and a 'setter', but I'm having to wing it a bit. There has to be an interior, since the compartment has windows on three sides, but I have no idea what it consisted of. There has to have been a method of ringing the sheep-scaring bell, which I believe was foot treadle operated as per in auto-trailers, and a brake setter, probably a gauge, a handbrake, and probably a tip-up seat, but the positions of these items in the cab are anyone's guess. Any comments or, better still, information will be gratefully recieved, but I seriously doubt if the information exists, and it was probably taken to their graves by the last guards to do the job with these coaches in 1958. The postition of the setter and its standpipe is probably related to the routing of the brake pipe beneath the cab, and the handbrake linkage to the bogie brake rodding, but that's as far as semi-educated guesswork will take me!

I certainly knew plenty of guards, and drivers for that matter, who didn't need to be anywhere near a van or a loco to be unbalanced, one or two were outright psycohotic, and back in those days there was a fairly heavy macho drinking culture to encourage their being unbalanced... Brake van specials were usually worked as unfitted Class 9 trains without the bags connected, and of course an arguably sentient brake operating mechanism in the rear van.

I read that as 'pass a sinister bear in 17 miles'. Then, presumably, exit stage left, pursued by...

The situation on the ground in the 70s was that vac-piped vehicles were not visually distinguished from vac-fitted except by the colour of the pipe, white for blow-throughs (which of course we should have called 'suck throughs, but the terminology was loco-orientated and one 'blew' brakes off with the exhauster) and red for fitted. And of course the lack of vac cyldinders and release cords. Through pipes were rare except on brake vans, which did not have vacuum brakes as there was a (debateably sentient) brake operating mechanism aboard the van, though they may have had brake 'setters' (manually operated inlet valves) and gauges. I was familiar with the cokehops mentioned, but the majority of blow-through piped vehicles I came across were air-braked but piped for use in fitted heads, and were often ferry vehicles. Blow-throughs could be used in fitted heads or in class 6 fully fitted trains so long as the rear four axles of the head or train were vacuum braked, and of course the required brake force was available. In the days when brake vans were used on fully fitted express goods trains, it was common practice to marshall two fitted vans behind the blow-through brake van in order to steady the ride for the guard at the high speeds sometimes reached by these trains, which prior to 1967 (Thirsk derailment, but there had been a series of short-wheelbase wagon plain line derailments due to the poor riding of the wagons) and the blanket 45mph speed limit on 10' wheelbase vehicles could be booked to run up to 60mph, and if some of the accounts of running fish trains to express passenger timings on the ECML with V2s and pacifics are to be believed, sometimes a bit faster than that!* Academic by my day; the 1969 single-manning agreement allowed guards to ride on the locomotive on fully-fitted class 6 trains, and brake vans were dispensed with on them except where there was a particular operational need. The only such job in my link was the empty Canton Sidings-Calvert bricks, 50mph 'PIPE' fitted wagons, which picked up traffic at Lawrence Hill including a dedicated brake van with a setter and gauge. I worked this to Swindon for relief then home on the cushions, but the train reached its destination by being propelled along several miles of long siding on the formation of the former GCR London Extension; this was also my only booked working with a brake van through Box Tunnel. *As the old rhyme would have it, 'the guard is the man/who rides in the van/the van's at the back of the train/The driver, in front, thinks the guard is a (something that rhymes)/and the guard thinks the driver's the same....'.

They have all sorts of uses on the layout, I have several yards of wooden fencing made up of them and have used them as barrow/footpath crossings and the floor of the signalbox. The Glyncorrwg coach is progressing slowly, as other parts of my life have interfered with the modelling a bit over the last week, but the compartment dividers and seating is now in place, and the coach has acquired its bell. Spraying brown before glazing is next, along with detailing up the cab with a handbrake stand and a vacuum 'setter' with a vacuum gauge. I checked out Stafford Road Works' website last night for the bogies, and am having a bit of a rethink; the prints are a bit crude and basic, and at £36 including postage are not really worth the money. My previous clerestory conversions have used the original BR B1s, which are the correct wheelbase (8'6") and, with the tiebar cut out and coffee-stirrer footboards cut lengthways for the correct width and trimmed to clear the axleboxes look the part well enough. The bogie frames of the B1s are longer than the Deans, though, and this time I'll cut them back a bit and change the pivot position to compensate. Decision not finalised yet, and I may yet relent and go for the Staffords eventually anyway. Onwards and upwards, or perhaps diagonally and widdershins...

Six and seven years service on a BLT respectively for the 4575s; they improved haulage-wise over time in exactly the way you outline. IIRC Bachmann at one time plated their wheels with an alloy that is a bit slippy until it wears in, after which the microscopic irregularities it develops enable decent gripping. I have also played around with the strength of the springing of the pony and radial truck, as I was of the view that this was too strong and trying to lift the driving wheels off the track. My solitary 45xx, 4557, is mostly employed on the pickup which it is completely at home with, and seems happy enough with its occasional two-coach passenger work. I have a feeling that the sandwich auto work may have an effect, as it means that the loco has to haul and propel the stock simultaneously. Difficult to pin down, but this could mean that the compression of the leading end of the loco may mean that haulage is affected differently to simply hauling three coaches; this theory is bourne out by the fact that slipping occurs more readily when the locos are hauling one trailer and propelling two. Moreover, one of the trailers is a Silurian Era Keyser A31 whitemetal kit, and this thing is a serious lump of heft; it cannot be used in a 3-coach train as it will cause any of my locos to slip to a standstill.

'Frankly, my dear, I don't give a bund'. No, it hasn't quite got the same feel to it, has it? You can refer to Bannau Brycheiniog or Yr Wyddfa in any way you want, Hroth, but the English versions are not recognised in official documents such as National Park literature/promotional material, Government documents, maps, &c. I prefer the English abbreviation of 'The Beacons' for the area in general because the Welsh version, 'Y Bannau', the Fans, to my view, specifically refers to the area incorportating Fan Fawr and Fan Gyhirych including Fan Llia and Fan Nedd, north of the 'waterfall country'. It works like this, the sandstone escarpment from west to east runs Bannau Sir Gaer (Carmarthenshire Fans), Bannau Sir Brycheiniog (Breconshire Fans), the two compromising the general area of the Black Mountain, taking its name from the Glasfynydd which actually means blue or clear mountain but can mean black in some contexts. Fforest Glasfynydd (Glasfynydd Forest, but the Welsh word retains the ancient connotation of a wilderness; to confuse you further it is the site of a large Forestry Commission plantation) lies to the north of it and is the source of the Afon Wysg (River Usk). Divided from this upland by the A4067 road and the trackbed of the Neath & Brecon railway is Fforest Fawr (The Great Wilderness), which covers the 'The Fans' and the waterfall area, then the A470 road separates the Bannau Brycheiniog (Brecon Beacons) proper, the mountain mass culminating in the peak of Pen y Fan. Divided fom this massif by the Wysg and the A40 road, and to the north-east of the the central area, is the Black Mountains (keep up at the back), a further sandstone escarpment upland reaching a peak of sorts at Waun Fach (little common), one of the best and most underrated viewpoints on the island of Britain on the right day*, extending finally to Penbegwn (Hay Bluff). In geological terms it is all part of the same escarpment structure. *Better than the higher Pen y Fan, from which the main range of Yr Wyddfa (Snowdon) is concealed behind Cadair Idris. From Waun Fach on a clear day it is possible to see directly north to Y Brynnau Clwyd (Clwydian Hills, and coming around clockwise Pendle Hill in Lancashire (another stupenduous viewpoint), Y Berwyn, Cannock Chase, The Wrekin and Shropshire Hills. the Lincolnshire Wolds and that escarpment down as far as Southern Gloucestershire, beyond it the chalk ridge from High Wycombe to Dorset, the Forest of Dean, all of Gwent and most of Glamorgan, in fact the entire country of Wales except that hidden behind Pen y Fan, the 'Black Mountain' and Yr Wyddfa, the English Severn Estuary and Bristol Channel coastline from Gloucester to Hartland Point, Lundy, Exmoor, and Dartmoor. Most of Wales and not far short of half of England! You cannot see the full length of the Wolds escarpment from Pen y Fan, and the Preseli range is hidden by the 'Black Mountain'. But you can see Bodmin Moor and Pentire Point from Bannau Sir Gaer.

I think you mean the hose, John, the flexible bit, the pipe is the solid thing under the wagon. The length will vary according to the size of the buffer housings, but should not be long enough to drag on on the ground; photos are probably your best reference and I refer you to Paul Bartlett's website (HMRSPaul here), he is the NRM's head honcho wagons and has a comprehensive supply of suitable photographs of all the wagon types you describe and more.

Not an uncommon problem with tender driven locos. Something is fouling as the wheels and motion move, but not to the extent that a little top finger pressure won't overcome it. There are several things you can do, but don"t use traction tyres on the loco wheels as they aren't driven and it won't improve traction or the 'rollability' of the wheels and motion; what it will do is spread crud all over your layout, catch on point blades, and cause derailments and other problems. Ok, let's do some diagnostics, bearing in mind Sherlock Holmes' quote that 'when you have eliminated the impossible, whatever is left however improbable is the truth'. .Firstly, check that the track is laid level and that adjoining pieces are connected smoothly together, and that there are no sudden changes in gradient or direction. .Do the wheels and motion seize up at specific locations on the layout? To test this, run the loco around as slowly as it will reliably run several times over all your track in both directions, noting the location of the seizures. If you have established regular seizure locations, then we have something to go on. Do the siezures happen on curves or where curves start or change radius or direction? If so, are the curves of a radius tighter than that recommended for the loco (this information is contained in the user service manual that came with it, but as this loco is 2h you might not have this. It can be downloaded as a PDF from Grafar). .If it's not location-related, check the wheels and motion for smooth running by holding the loco upside down and turning them gently by hand, feeling and listening for any clicks or resistance. I'm going to assume that the wheels are all running true and square, but this is not necessarily a given with a 2h loco, and I'm assuming that the back-to-backs have been checked. The axles have a degree of sideplay in them to enable the loco to negotiate curves, and you will need to test for clicks/resistance at all stages of sideways play. There will be a tight spot somewhere. When you find it, examing the loco closely under a strong light and maginfication to see if the motion is fouling even very slightly anywhere. This can usually be rectified by some very careful levering with a small screwdriver or similar. .If you can't find a tight spot visually, the problem may be one of lubrication, especially if the previous owner has had trouble and thought he could lube his way out of it. The coloured grease that lubricates new models goes off hard over time, and attracts crud. Remove the plastic keeper plate that holds the pickup strips (small x-head screws, insert them into Blu-Tac or even chewing gum to keep them from getting lost, they are sentient and will try to make a break for the border just to annoy you), carefully so as not to strain the wires, take the axles out carefully one at a time, putting them back before taking the next one out, spray the grease it away with a rattlecan electrical switch cleaner, and clean the residue with a cotton bud, allow the switch cleaner to vape off, and relube sparingly with a non-mineral plastic-safe machine oil, also lubing the points shown on the user service sheet. Any surplus lube will attract crud. Keep a modelling file handy as you might want to remove edges and burrs that might be the cause of your seizures. Clean up the filings after you. If all that doesn't get your loco's wheels turning smoothly, get as much extra weight into it over the wheels as you can. I find Blu-Tac useful for this, easily shaped to clear any moving bits.