BournehamRob

D6703 has landed and oh my she looks good! Quick little unbox before I get the crew fitted and have a play later on tonight. Just waiting on D6700.

First visit to GETS and for me overall it was an enjoyable day. Left Brum around 08:15 and got to the Bowl car park arround 1hr 30min later. Car park at that time was around half full but the stewards there where managing it well in my view. My first minor gripe would be that I don't recall getting any communication about the change in parking, it would have been nice to have had that, but lucikly for me I checked the website in the morning and had seen the new parking location. Bus from the alternate parking venue was fine, although reading here it was to break down later. The advanced ticket queue was massive, but it moved very quickly and the gate staff must be commended for that. The show itself was great in my view, highlight layouts for me where James Street, Burntisland 1883 and of course Making Tracks. James Street for me captured what it must have been like to see the railways back in the days of steam in the 50s/60s. Burntisland was amazing for me in the era chosen, massive break frrom the multitude of 60's to modern day layouts (says he doing a 60's layout!). Couple that with some ingenous features like working capstains and coal hoist! Making Tracks is well all about the sheer scale. I saw it later on in the afternoon when things where running better and it just looking down the layout and waiting minutes for a full length contrainer train to get from one end to the other is something else. Yes the venue was busy, but in my view it was no worse than Warley last year so no issues there at all. Spent perhaps a bit more than I should have but I do now have a very nice Green Arrow and assorted coaches to go with. As others have stated the transport situation on leaving wasn't great. I walked out arround 15:20 and the issues with the busses was already making itself known with a rather large queue forming. After a while I did ponder just walking back to the car but at this point thinking about sunken cost fallacy and decided to stick with it. That did work out in my favour with one of the Key Model World staff showing up just after a bus taking 4 us to the car park in his car. I must commend Key Model World staff for realising the transport issue and doing the best they can to ease the issues. For those saying why did Key Model World book this event on the match day. I brought my ticket way back in February and no doubt the venue booking was done earlier than that. The football fixtures for this season where released back in June, so way after the venue was booked and I don't think the FA will be to worried about a Model Railway show clashing with a footy match. Journey home was fine and all in all a good day. I do think I'll make a trip next year.

I'm think something with an EE 16SVT mkii lump in it. 😁

Thank you for the replies. I've decided to go with diagram 2. I hadn't thought about the reverse curves that Robin pointed out and that swung the balance in it's favour. I did consider cutting off 8mm from point 1 as suggested by Suzie but I discounted that due to it only leaving 2 functional sleepers before the tie bar I felt it was best avoided. The 3rd sleeper closest to the end of the rail after the cut would have had the chairs cut away to allow for the fish plates to slide into place.

Working on getting my first layout started and while i've been designing it Anyrail I have a small gap in the junction to my storage yard. Laying the track out on the baseboards shows this gap to be about 8mm. Is it sensible to keep the layout below and try and cut and fit in 2 8mm lengths of rail or do I complicate things slighty by changing the right point, labeled 1 forr a single slip and introdruce a right hand point connected to point 6. First diagram is currrent design with 8mm gap, see circled in red. Second Diagram is proposed alteration. This area of the layout is off scene so any worries about junction not being prototypical can be thrown out the window.

Sitting here at work whistling away to myself wondering what it could be 😄

Must not forgot to mention a Stanier 8F to go with a new Class 40

If it's steam then hears hoping for an 8F, either than something GN or GC. As for another diesel well sign me up for a Accurascale 40.

Received my sound fitted Robinson A5 yesterday, BR 69804. Very pleased with the model, no issues that I can see with the assembly. Bunker all likes nice and square with everything else on the model . Motor/drive train seems a bit loud but nothing that I can complain about really, It maybe that this will quiet down over time. As others have already mentioned the livery application looks great. My only minor grip is with the pre-fitted lamps, but I'm sure that can be rectified at a later date. The lamps themselves though do look good in my view. With regards to the sound, this being my first non Hornby TTS sound steam loco sound wise I'm impressed. The feature set on the sounds is exactly as I would have expected when going from TTS sound. Features that I've been impressed with are the different chuff levels for light, normal and heavy loads. Crank up the speed steps to much and wheel slip sounds. It would also seem that it has 'active drive' drop the speed steps to 0 and it will coast to a stop. or press F5 to apply the brakes. The only two issues I would raise with the sound, is the cost. Loco + Sound is more than an Accurascale loco, which this is not. If the sound fitting included a stay alive pack then I think I could accept the price. The other issue is the level of provided documentation provided for the sound fitted loco. All that is included is a an A4 sheet with the sounds and function key mappings. It would have been nice to have at least had some more documentation on the chip fitted. I appreciate though that Peterfgf has identified the sound chip used. All in all though, very pleased with this loco and if Sonic Models bring out another loco that fits my modelling era then they've got a sale. Rob

Very informative video. Its great to see the challenges faced in modelling the real thing and the compromises that are faced in 00. This all bodes well for hopefully when an Eastern/Midland region steamer is announced.

First post, and first review here so Hi everyone! To start with i'm absolutely blown away by this Deltic, I've got D9004 sound fitted, was a bit of a late purchase but very much worth it in my opinion. All my previous locos that i've got have been either from the big red/blue box companies and on the whole i've been happy with them and the level of detail. This is considering that i've only got back into the hobby 3 years ago compared to the last time I had a trainset over 25years. The unboxing experiance in my view was a joy, felt like a child again at Christmas. After all thier is something to commend for a well designed box. I do though I feel have to agree that the icecube pack may need a slight rethink for a model of this detail, but this is only minor. Unfortunatly as a few have reported here I did have some loose detail in the box, 3 steps, a bogie chain and a bit of the fuel tank detail. No bother though as that was soon carefully sorted. The only other slight issues i've noticed is a small mark on the cab roof, but that can easily be sorted in the future with a bit of weathering and the of course the well reporting missing screws causing the vibration rattle. My only other issue that i've noticed is with the couplings. One is pointing up and the other is pointing down. Now this hasn't of yet caused any issues so I'm sure I can continue without this being an issue. Running wise this loco is top draw in my book. It's amazing how quiet it is, well untill I press function 1 :D! I need to tweek the CV for the low end crawl as it seems to start to run smooth at 3% power on my digitrax. I've seen some posts on here with some recommended values so will give those a try when I get round to setting max speed and acceleration/deceleration values. The sound to my is just magical. My only other 2 locos with sound are TTS fitted and the difference as you would expect is night and day. I can't wait to get more of my locos fitted with 'Pro' sound like this. Overall, this being my first Accurascale product I can't wait to get my hands on D6700, already on pre-order. My wallet is also being seriously tempted to get the Class 31 and the Mk1 suburbans and the HOP and MCV's when their back in stock! Put very simply I'm blown away by this loco and can't wait to see what else Accurascale release. One question for you all, would these Accurafolk be the right crew to fit to the D9004 https://www.accurascale.com/collections/crews-and-people/products/class-55-deltic-crew-driver-secondman-early-br Rob