Philou

WHAT?!!!!! I'm at the bottom of page 14 and you're going to rip it up? Say it cannot so be? (I realise backs can be very dodgy things). This is nail-biting stuff and I shall have to wait 'til much later this evening before turning the page ..................oh noes!

@ Black Rat Yup, Mr Williams. He worked downstairs and was more into the model aircraft/boat side of the business. I think he wore the nylon coat less and less in later years. His sister in law, the petite one (Mrs Williams), was up in the railway room and so was Bud's sister (the taller one - Mrs Morgan). I think I was moved upstairs when one of the 'ladies' retired - or they only did half days on Saturdays for a while before finally stopping altogether. Mr Williams was an ex-steelworker from Port Talbot and he drove a black Singer (Riley 155 style) and then a Marina - I know - he used to give me a lift home on Saturday evening after a quick pint in The Jockey in Womanby Street (once I was old enough to drink ). All the staff were brilliant especially to me being the 'youngster' - at the time. Funnily, I don't remember their first names - mind you in those days, it was always a bit of minding your Ps&Qs - so 'Mr' and 'Mrs' it was - even Bud!! Cheers, Philip Edit: Lyn Williams - now for the two 'ladies'. Only an hour of thunking. Re-edit: May Williams - now for Mrs Morgan - not bad, two hours only (it was 37 years ago when I left!).

I seemed to have overlooked this thread for a while as I started a layout thread and sort of got involved in that. I still haven't decided what I'm going to do regarding the toilet window colour! I like the discs on the wheels - looks like I shall order some too. I've put off doing too much regarding varnishing and the colouring of the blank window as I want to take the coaches apart and put lighting in and the BILs (orange door open lights as I used to call them) at the passenger access doors. John Gymer of YouChoos is your man if you want to do the same. He can also provide the 'beep beep beep' sound if you require - if you're putting in a sound chip. I shall place an order for all the gubbins at the end of the month - I'll let you know how I get on - then I shall get round to sorting out the colour match and varnish . Cheers, Philip Edit: Got John's name wrong -sorry!

@ gordon s Well, you were kind enough to provide some ideas for my own proposals and I thought I ought to have a look at what you were doing ............... I haven't yet been able to put my eyeballs back in yet!!! I can now see the constructional details of the framework - good job you did there (BTW only on Page 7 so a lot of catching up to do) and the trackwork is amazing - I hadn't really considered doing DIY as I wanted to get on with things fairly quickly - but now I'm having a rethink - especially as there are some areas where the pointwork shan't be able to be laid simply using using RTR. I hope you'll be able to get your hands on some rail soon - it seems a pity to stop for the want of materials. I did like your comments of being 'retired' - same here since 2003 (but got called back on a 3-monthly contract to help out ........... it lasted 7 1/2 years!) officially put out to grass in 2011 and still haven't found the time to get started! Cheers, Philip

Surprise parcel arrived for me yesterday from L&B - it was much bigger than expected. Class 66 'Evening Star' was inside and so was 'Sir Daniel Gooch' .............. but not the Class 47 that I was expecting but the GWR Class 800 - nice! All had been pre-ordered save a couple and I got lucky. Thank you Lord and Butler. Cheers, Philip

@ gordon s Well! What can I say? I've only just started reading up on your layout (page 2 at the moment) - it truly is mouthwatering. I can see that I'm going to have to up my game by a yuuuuuuge amount once I get started . Bravo! Regards, Philip

If I can just add my tuppence worth (or 2 centimes if you will ), when I were a lad and we had no internet, we had CJ Freezer's plans handbooks, pencil, piece of paper, a huge rubber and drew lots of plans and did track laying - and inevitably something would have gone wrong and it was a case of start again. I will say that today, seemingly we may spend sometime behind these 'ere screens - at least by the dissemination of information rapidly between lots of people, we can get advice and be aware of potential pitfalls that may await us sooner than rather when it is too late, and that is a positive thing. Of course, sometimes advice is not taken up for ....... well, reasons. Whilst I agree that there's nothing better than 'doing things', some of us are cautious and others (like me) may not have anywhere to enable a start just yet. For space saving, again when I were a lad, in our house where the ceilings were high, I made a layout in my bedroom measuring approximately 8'6" x 10'6" that folded up completely against one wall floor to ceiling - and it was only about 9" deep - so it took little space. Cheers, Philip

Sorry chums, These replies are all out of sync - arghhh! @ Joseph I'm not sure if it's been better down in the south of France these last few days - woke here to 4" (100mm) of snow this morning - melting fast. I'll say something for those based in the UK and might be in the snow at the moment. Our village is in the sticks - the nearest sizeable 'town' has just over 1000 souls in it, the county town is minute - 20000 or so - but the snow plough has been through TWICE already!!! Regarding the neighbouring house - if it's saying to you 'buy me' why not? You probably won't make money re-selling it later as houses over here are sold by the m² - not what YOU think it's worth - the barn is probably worth having though . As I'm a half-breed (Frenglish), one side of the family has always been here, but I was born in the UK, worked there and then retired here. @ Denbridge Yes - as Joseph has said - over here you can get adjustable feet in DIY stores easily. The club uses them on their modules so as to adjust between modules and make up for any slight deficiencies in the floor when they go to shows. I shall use them regardless of the quality of my finishing - but thank you for your kind remarks. (@ Joseph - I might have caused a bit of confusion - I meant page 8 of this thread). Edit: Eeeek! I'm not really English - I'm Welsh and I should have said Wench or Frelsh . Regards everyone, Hope you're not too cold wherever you are, Philip

Yay! Harlequin wins! Yes, it was elm. The local woodsman sold it to me - he'd had in stock for years from when the last few elms were cut down. Some of the planks he had were a bit far gone so they've been used in the risers and the good stuff went into the treads. A bit like oak as the good stuff was quite hard with which to work. @ Denbridge Around here, oak isn't protected and I burn it in the woodburner. The large trunks go into coffin and furniture manufacture - one of the biggest makers of coffins in France is about 5 miles away - and no I haven't put myself on their waiting list for one thankyouverymuch. @ Joseph_Pestell Thanks for the update on the Ledbury info - I went straight to page 8 and hadn't seen your reply. Regards, Philip

@ Joseph_Pestell Thanks - I was lucky that someone in the village has a mass of woodworking machines - real professional ones (about 100 years old some of them) and he gave me a hand to plane and square the planks I had. (Not saying at the moment what the wood was as I'm waiting 'til this evening to see if anyone can guess). BTW - and if it's not being too inquisitive - where abouts in France are you based? Salut, Philip

@ Phil No - much rarer than that - not exotic tho'. UK/European. I doubt if anyone has stock of it anymore. Philip

Can anyone guess what was the wood I used?

Chums, Just a quickie or those that might have been following the stairway to hell heaven saga: Here is a photo of the finished thing (well - not quite as I have to back-fill the join between the render and the stairs). I just hope I can do a decent job in the barn laying the new floor . It is about 4m up in the air!!! Domestic harmony has ensued for a while. She must be pleased as she didn't bat an eyelid when I announced that there was yet another parcel arriving for me on Saturday (no not the Super D, that'll be next week - this week is the GBrF Class 66 'Evening Star'). Cheers, Philip

Here you go - in raising the point regarding my own layout proposal, 'gordon s' of this parish kindly did a run for me on templot and found that at 45mm centres you cannot run coaching stock side by side on a radius of less than 7 feet. I'm using 1.0m as a minimum so I will need to check the spacing on curves before any final pinning down. It may well be that it will be 50mm - we'll see. Cheers, Philip

@ DavidCBroad I didn't know that, though it was mentioned earlier that it was a route to London before the Severn tunnel was built. Good to know though - any excuse for a bit of 'Rule 1' . Regards, Philip

@ Mike Just had a quick peruse of the information in Michael Clemens' website - it is excellent. I may have to add an Ivatt 2-6-2T to my shopping list (card dashes for cover). Thank you. @ Brassey I agree - it was the livery that caught my eye. I do have an unbuilt Ratio coach in stock lurking in the bottom of a crate - I have a feeling it may be an LMS non-corridor one tho'. I'll dig it out tomorrow and have a look. Cheers, Philip

You are such top guys! Not only help and ideas with the layout but information on stock movements, and where to get rolling stock, to boot! I am so pleased that I started the topic and that you've ALL had such positive things to say - even though some of the ideas haven't been followed through to the end. Kind regards, Philip PS: As I said above, I am not going to let this die off as I am here most evenings. I might have to start a new topic in a more appropriate thread, once the barn improvements start. BTW, I wish I hadn't put the scaffolding off by a week - the forecast is temperatures reaching +20°C after the weekend - Scorchio! (Welsh for hot - I think! ).

@Denbridge Silly me! I forgot about the Webb Coal tank - I have it here already with a sound chip in it but nowhere to go. But thank you for the advice regarding the Super D. I shall need to wait until the end of the month - which being February is that much closer - though I think the stock at a certain Liverpool supplier was restricted to LMS/BR versions. I was asking regarding the coaching stock as I saw some on the web yesterday - they looked very smart - but they were kits (brass if I recall). Cheers, Philip

Hello Mike, In between the grandchildren and the stairs, I did a little (skimmed perhaps) reading on the LNWR. I never realised just how big or powerful company it was prior to the 'Big Four'. It does seem to me that the LMS was in effect the LNWR in all but name. I did want to ask, and I hope you'll forgive me if you're into making locos and rolling stock, where can I get some RTR models that would give the flavour of LNWR running through Pontrilas? I can only see one loco in the Bachmann range that is LNWR (D2?) and as far as I can tell, no coaching stock to be had from anyone. I did do kits years ago (plastic coaches and whitemetal locos) but what was passible then ....... quite frankly I don't think my skills would be up to scratch when I look at the pictures of some of the finished kit built items out there. (Mind you, I have seen some stuff on the web and I think .....eueuh! Even my kits from 40 years look as good). Time is the main factor here for me (and probably most of us - unfortunately). Regards, Philip PS: Thanks for the laser cut idea - as this is long term I'll put up with cutting strips the same width over and over and over ................. what was that address again ?

I thought I'd add this too: I do have another project on the back-burner for a rainy day. 00 scale model of the Walnut Tree Viaduct at (was) Taff's Well. I'd done a lot of research via t'intertubes and found a lot of photographs. I'm pleased to say that my original 'guesstimate' of its size was pretty much spot-on as I acquired later by pure chance a copy of some original engineering drawings. It's taken a while to assemble enough cardboard to start the thing - 6.2m long overall and 50cm high at the deepest part. Oh yes, it will be built (even if I only get a few spans done I'll be happy). The longest span is only 720mm so it can be built bit by bit. Just need the dining room table and lots of cutter blades (and sticking plasters!) . Cheers, Philip

Well! That's a bit of a turn-up! I think we may have as much as a near dammit possible probable layout at #72 subject to tweaks and revisions notwithstanding. I have a funny feeling that I shall have to invoke Rule 2* from time to time on the layout. In terms of strict prototype operation, it will have to be a case that once a train leaves Ledbury (or Pontrilas) it has gone 'elsewhere'. If there happens to be more than one operator then it will be a case of receiving or dispatching a 'train' in a prototype manner, regardless of whether it should have been there or not. I really can't thank you all enough for your ideas and historical information. I am going to ask my son-in-law who is a bit of a mechanical whizz, of the possibility of rigging something up following Harlequin's idea of a giant turntable - otherwise it'll be a variation of gordon s's traverser. I'm not going to let the thread disappear as I'll keep you all updated regarding the building works, especially once I get started on the barn. I've put back the scaffolding for a week - we're having a spell of cold weather - down to -15°C (chill factor included) at the beginning of next week. Stairs are completed (subject to final fixing), laid the last step at 7pm (your time) this evening. Will I have to start a new thread once the layout construction starts? Dymented could be a good title . Cheers and thanks again, Philip * Rule 2? See Rule 1.

@ Chimer @Brassey, That is it in a nutshell - though linked there was little through traffic - even today, all trains (other than an odd freight or two) coming from points east (Birmingham/Worcester/London) through Ledbury terminate at Hereford. The only through trains are those on the Newport/Shrewsbury line via Hereford. Connections for Ledbury at Hereford, are cross-platform. (I believe though, there were a great number of exceptions only during the war.) Regarding Phil's latest plan, there is another point in that there is now a polarity issue with the branch, whereas the others have avoided it. Nonetheless, I did say I would have a fiddle with it and see where it takes me. BTW, if any of you have been following the stairway to heaven saga, is been a bit of an uphill struggle - all went well yesterday as I managed to place three treads and risers. This morning I partially dismantled seven of them to relay them square again - somewhere I mis-read the bubble. All done and dusted in an hour so it wasn't too dire a job. I should be finished Friday (which is just as well as a 'parcel' is arriving tomorrow ). Cheers, Philip

Oh noes! Please! Don't leave me all alone with ideas in my head - you never know what may happen. Seriously though - I am so pleased you've come back with yet more thoughts and counter-thoughts. There may well things that I had already put to plan (and not shown here) and ideas that have come forward recently that when mixed together could perhaps be THE plan (or dog's breakfast of course ). Those that want to come and have a look - you'd be more than welcome - there's always room. Mind you, Chimer, I may not get a visa to get back to the UK and worse of all, I'll no doubt have to pay additional VAT on models imported from L&B (other model emporiums are available) . Kind regards, Philip

@ Harlequin Thanks for the plan! I hadn't thought of skewing the stations even more. I'll play around with it this evening and probably tomorrow - we have grandkids here this week that require entertaining!!! . Cheers, Philip Gah! Edited for typo.

@ Stationmaster @Denbridge, Thanks for the observations - you are probably right - KISS it is. Regards, Philip