mikemeg

Arthur refers, above, to the availability of the LNER Q5/2 kit - these locos were never North Eastern in their Q5/2 state. This was/is the test build for this kit, 'dressed' more or less ex-works, in the final style of LNER lettering and numbering. Lovely kit to build and makes up into a fine model. Cheers Mike

James, I'm presuming that you have or have seen photographs of Gilberdyke - Staddlethorpe Junction when we knew it - as it was in the 1960's; it too had some fine examples of McKenzie & Holland iron signal bridges. As this is intended to be a Signal Box thread, then it might not be the most appropriate place to post some of these pictures, or is it? The thread may have digressed, a little, but it does make for a very interesting read. Cheers Mike

Is that all that was left of the Hessle Haven lever frame, Mick? Far cry from the 60 levers of the 1950's though even then I think there were spares. If there is a garden wall bond brick sheet available, then it'll save me having to scribe out some. I'll have a hunt around on t'internet. Thanks for the info, Mick. Cheers Mike

Yep, the old North Eastern didn't stint when it came to signalling. Thankfully, this signalling arrangement had been considerably rationalised by the LNER by the time of my model - 1950. Now to plan the build of Hessle Haven signal box, regretably too early to include a 4mm model of Mick, busily pulling off that distant. Cheers Mike

Just to prove that it's not just McKenzie & Holland lattice structures which I build, these are the first two signal models that I ever built, now more than four years ago. They stood a few yards to the east side of Hessle Station, until the late sixties. These were very much the prototypes for the construction techniques on all of the rest; many of the techniques 'borrowed' from Peter Squibb and, of course, Mick Nicholson. Easy to see that these are not yet in use; no down wires to the track formation! Cheers Mike

Indeed there were four; two brackets and two bridges, so for completeness and at the risk of boring readers of this thread to death with pictures of these model structures, here's the fourth. This was the Hessle Haven down signal bridge and was at the easternmost limit of Hessle Haven's block? Again, this model fell foul of the loco building fest which I embarked on last year and which I am still involved with. This will be revisited and completed later this year - honest guv! Here I should once more thank my old mate, Mick Nicholson, without whose photographs and plans none of these could have been done. So the part completed down signal bridge as it was just before its re-equiping with upper quadrants in the summer of 1950. With their NER slotted posts, lower quadrants and those beautiful finials these were just very elegant things; yet just to keep the trains safe. Mick, while those little wheels work well on upper quadrants, they're not up to driving lower quadrants. So I'll abandon that technique on lower quadrants and use angle cranks. What is it you say about scaling gravity - it won't scale? As I understand it, Mick, the Harrogate signal bridge is the last of the M&H brackets and bridges. When that goes then they are all gone, save for the listed and preserved Falsgrave bridge, soon to be re-erected at Grosmont. I hear that they plan to equip it with lower quadrants so that should be a sight when finished! McKenzie & Holland, Engineers, Worcester. Once the largest signal equipment manufacturer in the world. Cheers Mike

I'm actually photographing these models for an article intended for one of the modelling magazines so, while I've got the old digital camera out and photoshop up and loaded, may as well update this thread too. Earlier, I referred to a third large signal structure which stood at Hessle Haven, located between the two shown above. This was the Hessle Haven signal bridge, almost the same span as the Scarborough Falsgrave bridge, both around 60 - 64 feet. This was the second of the models which I made for the railway, even though the section on which this and the easternmost gantry above were situated, is not yet built. The signals, on this short section of the Hull - Selby and Doncaster main line, were such a striking feature that I decided to build them as central features rather than as incidental model railway 'furniture', hence the scratch building rather than adapting available etches. So the Hessle Haven up signal bridge, as it was when we were lads. Cheers Mike

Thanks, Jim. Yes the railway has changed a great deal since I started watching trains and I can't think it has become any more interesting, aesthetically. There was something about Victorian and Edwardian design (and most of our great stations and many of the great McKenzie & Holland signal installations emanated from those eras) which, though functional was just so elegant. Sadly, we seem now to have lost any affinity with aesthetics on some of the functional design on the railway. If you're talking 'pretty roofs' then take a look at what Gravy Train did for Peterborough North, just out of this world. Recently we seem to be seeing some incredible model architecture being built yet it is still sturdy. For me, these great arrays of semaphore signals just embodied everything which was wonderful about the railways of the 1950's - just coloured boards of wood or metal, with coloured glass over a lamp, which changed their angle and colour and then changed it back again. Simple technology but such lovely structures. Cheers Mike

And finally, at least for this small selection, here's one I am still building and have been for some time. This one fell victim to a bout of loco building which has stalled any progress but it will be revisited and completed towards the end of the year. This was one of the fabulous array of such structures which stood at Scarborough, some until the eighties and one until late 2010 - the now famous Falsgrave Signal Bridge; soon to be resurrected on the NYMR.This one stood at the north end of Londesborough Road station and was only around one hundred and fifty yards from the Falsgrave signal bridge. The model spans almost sixteen inches (very nearly 100 feet prototype span) and, again, is entirely scratch built apart from the end lattice posts which are MSE. Even the decking, on this, was scratchbuilt as I needed decking a scale 5' 6" wide. Around 200 strips of plasticard, each 1.5 mm x 22 mm, glued to the lattice 'L' angle cross members, using a very simple home made jig. I think some compromise on driving all of those arms might be necessary. Cheers Mike

And on the other side of the line at Hessle Haven, around two hundred yards east of the one above, stood this one. Correct me if I'm wrong, Mick, but this must have gone in the mid 1960's, possibly even earlier. The construction of these was covered on various threads, a couple of years ago, but they're not kits and they're not etches; these are scratchbuilt. There are no etches for these prototypes. And between the one above and this one, was an even larger signal bridge. Funny how we saw these magnificent McKenzie & Holland structures day in and day out and we took no notice of them; they would always be there. Of course, now they're not there and the last ones are in the process of being replaced and the railway is an aesthetically poorer place without them. Cheers Mike

So, in the spirit of "here's one I built earlier", then here's one I built earlier. This is a model of the down gantry which stood by the shipyard bridge at Hessle Haven, just outside Hull. The gantry was progressively modified as the layout at Hessle Haven was rationalised and simplified but this model represents it as it appeared during the 1940's and 50's. When I built this originally, I fitted route indicators to it, based on the design carried by gantries further down the line towards Hull. Only when I had finished these route indicators did information come to light that this gantry had the standard LNER rectangular half glazed route indicators on it, at least until 1957, when they were replaced by theatre indicators. But at what level were these rectangular route indicators mounted? Testament to the old adage 'everything comes to he who waits', an old modelling friend, from many years ago, sent me a photo of a D49 approaching Hessle. In the background of this photo is this gantry with its rectangular route indicators clearly visible. I can't reproduce the photo, here, for copyright reasons but here's the model, though not yet with its new route indicators. Cheers Mike

I can but echo the comments in the posting above. What you have created, Gilbert, is a masterpiece and a fitting testament to those days of the late 1950's when the railway was a wondrous thing to behold and when steam still ruled supreme. The photograph which Coachman photo-shopped, of the A3, just says it all along with so many more of the photos. So, Gilbert, you can stand once more, at the end of the platform on Peterborough North and just savour the nostalgia. Wonderful, just wonderful. Cheers Mike

Mick, The LNER black and white lining, on your A3 and D49. Is this done using transfers (and if so who supplies this lining) or is it done using a draughtsman's bow pen? The A3 and D49 do look very fine indeed. Cheers Mike

Tom, One of the older inhabitants of our village (he's probably eighty two or three) began his career in 1946 as a sixteen year old apprentice fitter on the LMS Railway, at Mirfield, where he stayed until the early 1960's. He still talks lovingly of the intricacies of the Joy valve gear fitted to some of Aspinall's locomotives. I guess he might have known your Great Uncle. What a small world! Cheers Mike

There really was nothing quite like those steam sheds in their heyday and the sequence of photographs, above, illustrate just how incredible these places were. The layout will be a real testament to that place and to those days, even if it is set twenty five years on from the photographs. I'll look forward to walking up and down row upon row of locomotives, probably on a summer sunday afternoon, when there was almost no sound, save the hissing and dripping from scores of locomotives, many of them the pride of the old LMS and still, then, the pride of the West Coast Main Line. Though you'll struggle to find an excuse for a row of parallel boilered Royal Scots! Wonderful. Cheers Mike

There's no shame in being addicted to A4's, A3's, A1's, etc, etc. Some of us became addicted to these (as I imagine you might well have done) long before we knew what an addiction was and we are still addicted. I know you saw the ECML way back in the days of steam, the last of the glory days, just as I did. Someone told me, or perhaps I read, that the two 'exiled' A4's - Dwight D Eisenhower and Dominion of Canada - are being/have been brought back to the UK on a two year loan, and that the NRM plans to have all six extant A4's on display some time this year. I fancy that many more folk may find they too have the same addiction, on seeing that line up. Cheers Mike

If you're using the Mainly Trains chassis conversion kit, which I did on both a J71 and J72, then the pull rods on the J71 kit were of different spacings. Try just holding both pull rods together and just check for any spacing differences. I found it impossible to fit these pull rods and get a brake linkage which looked right and, as you have found out, which did not move the brake blocks either too far from or too near to the wheel rims. I made new pull rods for the J71, eventually. Cheers Mike

Rarely seen in 50A Tom, just as they were even rarer at Hessle Haven. But, as you say those photos above, of finished Princess's, just look the business. Thread to watch, this one, Horsetan! Tom, wasn't there a rail tour from York to Scarborough and then to Hull, sometime in the summer of 1950 - little publicised and not photographed (wishful thinking)? Might have been a trial run for the Scarborough Spa Express, even if it was half a century later. Cheers Mike

Ken, Much as we'd all like to see you back at your bench and turning out those wonderful models with metronomic regularity, take your time. Glad the operation went well and glad you're back on here. The models can wait; your well being won't. Very best regards Mike

Tim, That is simply beautiful. I can remember when, in 1961, I read that it was rumoured that 60012 might be the first A4 to be withdrawn as it had serious problems with its mainframes. Only a week or two after reading this we were at Doncaster and managed to see the newly painted locos standing outside the Crimpsall erecting shop. There, in all of its glory was newly overhauled and newly painted 60012 and Haymarket A4's only really ever came that far south on the Lizzie or for overhaul at Doncaster. I'd completely forgottten that sight until I saw the photographs above. I know many would disagree with this but, for me, there are few machines which were more intrinsically right than a steam locomotive (and I'll concede Clipper Ships, Spitfires. perhaps Concorde) and within that steam locomotive 'genre' there can be few, if any, to rival Gresley's A4's. They have thrilled the generations for over seventy five years; they continue to thrill to this day. Thanks for the reminder of a fleeting glimpse, which was all I ever saw of Number 12, but a glimpse of her in all of her green, lined glory. Cheers Mike

Mick and Jon, The signals which you guys make are the result of years of practice, researching the prototypes, refining building techniques, identifying and adapting suitable materials. I make signal models too, but would not expect the r-t-r trade to do what we do; that's why folk are prepared to pay the prices which are charged for hand built models and I've quoted (and agreed) a price with four digits of £'s in it for one particular model. Who but someone with quite a lot of money and a very specific requirement would do that; very, very few? Most model railway enthusiasts would not expect, nor would probably be able to pay those prices and even if they were, the relatively few 'professional' model signal builders couldn't produce enough to satisfy the demand. I'm not going to comment on these Dapol models, it wouldn't be right; it's simply not a fair comparison. All I will say is that if one of the r-t-r suppliers - Dapol - has recognised a gap in the market, then good on 'em and I wish them well. The acid test of these signals is whether people buy them and buy them in quantity, not whether a few very knowledgeable and highly skilled model builders (and I'll exlude myself on both counts from this) actually rate them alongside their own efforts. I remember once being taken to task, on here, for comments on one of the r-t-r suppliers locomotive models and, in retrospect, it was probably right that I was taken to task. Far from these Dapol products diminishing the demand for your hand built and exquisite models, surely anything which focuses interest on this aspect of railway operation - signalling - will, ultimately, lead to an increase in demand for your models, just as the availability of r-t-r locomotives has not killed off the professional loco builders, modifiers and weatherers (is that a real word - weatherers?). Cheers Mike

Lovely work Mick. You have that 'happy knack' of capturing the essence of these beautiful machines. There never was an ugly British steam locomotive; just some more aesthetically pleasing than others (oh that might cause a debate)! Cheers Mike

Amen to that; isn't this sort of thread what makes this site so worthwhile? Cheers Mike

Oh I can feel an attack of the A2/3's might be coming on towards the end of this year. Mick, can I pick your brains when that attack occurs? Lovely job. Regards Mike

At the risk of being a real pedant, you could probably take the letter size down a little further Mick; just comparing the start and end points of Sculcoates Junction with Sallyfield Junction. Certainly the lettering on the most recent nameboard has come out very well for colour. Cheers Mike