Regularity

Interesting point.To be classified as fit for human consumption and resale, the animal has to be slaughtered by an appropriate person, so these could not be butchered. Instead they would have to go to the knackers yard, who would come and collect it. And quite possibly, butcher it and sell it out of the backdoor!

I think that was the problem... Purchase of the LDEC, which connected with the “Joint line” near Lincoln, would have significantly improved the GER’s medium and long term financial security (as would have purchase of the LTSR 5 years later*), providing freight revenues from coal to London. As it was, the traffic went onto the GCR metals once they had acquired it. As a might have been, though, “Chesterfield Great Eastern” is an extremely viable layout scheme - much more probable than “Buckingham GC” - and I am surprised it hasn’t been done. * Am I alone in connecting these two failures (in the eyes of the board) with the fact that the GER changed their General Manager after the second instance?

...then I think you are in the wrong scale, if not the wrong hobby! Skill requires time, but time can be replaced with money (which is used to buy someone else’s time, effectively). If you lack all three, then you need to sort your life out, big time, ‘cos you are comprehensively effed. You can have beer tastes even with champagne money, but the converse is incompossible.* * A lovely word coined by Ambrose Bierce.** ** Google him.

The steel underframed GER 5 plank wagon is the one the LDEC used. I did do one in S, which I gave to a friend some years ago. No idea what has been done with it (and I can’t even remember which friend had it!) I used the HMRS LMS pre-group wagon transfers to letter it: L from LYR, D and E from the Midland E D letters, and C from the Maryport and Carlisle. They seemed to be the same font! Funny thing, we ran it on East Lynn whilst at Chesterfield in the late 90s, and a lot of visitors noticed it, as it was very much “their” railway, but very rarely modelled. I couldn’t help but wonder why, if it was so cherished, none of them actually modelled it themselves.

Yes. Also coal traffic from the LDEC, which had such a close working relationship with the GER that they used the latter’s wagon designs. (I also suspect that the GER would have rather liked to have got their hands on it, rather than the GCR.)

A JLTRT kit for a loco was what, £500? Add in any extra bits such as wheels, motors, and you are still going to come in at under £700? That’s less that £2 a day saved up over a year, which is less than many people’s caffeine habit costs them. How is that expensive? It just means that whilst dreaming about building a layout, if you start saving £15 a week, you build up some savings, buy something (wood, track, etc) and carry on saving whilst putting the purchases to good use. Plus, you can always request money rather than presents at Christmas and Birthdays. Given the quality results possible, and the reasonableness of their price when saved up for, these were never expensive kits. They just seemed that way to people who confuse buying with modelling. Now that is a balanced view, which suggests that you have accepted that you will go without, buy a cheaper kit (if one is available) or build from scratch.

A couple of hundred miles seems achievable. Loaded on the Highland, maybe stopped and watered, etc, in Edinburgh, then York. Down the GE/GN joint, with a layover again if required at Spalding, then on to CA. A shade over 36 hours, maybe, including stops.

Not aware that it quoted the New Testament!

Is that because you don’t have Sky, or because you have taste? Edit: or because, like me, despite the trailers, you did watch a few minutes of it?

Uncanny. And that’s not a thick Geordie.

There’s always Britannia from Sky...

The hitherto unmentioned side-benefit of the need for cattle to be discharged, watered, inspected and then re-loaded en route is that for those modelling through stations, there is an excuse to put a whole train of loaded cattle wagons into the dock, leave ‘em there for a while, and then set off again. Many stations had quite reasonably sized cattle docks. Usually these were only really used on market days, so the rest of the time there would be plenty of opportunities to stop and deal with the cattle. I also think that through cattle trains, once they got moving, would travel at more than 15 mph, and an average speed of 20-25 mph is quite realistic.

Hear that noise? The sound of a penny dropping...

Why no wye?

No. They’re Scots, not Spanish. Ah. His weakness.Also known as Dianne Abbot.

Do you find spittle to be more effective than water when wet sanding?

To say that you weren’t happy with the kit you did finish reflects some very high standards, Jordan. I have yet to see another instance of that kit finished well enough to compare with yours, indeed most commentators felt the kit was all but unbuildable, and that you had achieved the impossible, for the model actually looked like a representation of the prototype. I would rephrase your last sentence: managed to look almost, but not quite, totally like the real thing. But you have finally explained what it was that you didn’t like: being short of spare time, having to devote all of that time to those kits, over the course of many months, & to the exclusion of any other modelling at all, wasn't that satisfying. Some might say, “Why not put it aside for a week or two and do something else?” But I think I might guess the reason: you would have never picked it up again, so glad to going on and it was now being completed not because of the pleasure of it, but because it had become a nagging imperative. I can understand completely how that would take the joy from the hobby, and only salute you for seeing it through, especially to the high standard you achieved at the end. I would have given up long before then! Interesting, too, that you describe yourself as both time and money poor: I think this is an increasing problem as for the past 10 years we have seen economic “stagflation” (prices go up, wages stay the same, so we are poorer in real terms) and the real pain (NHS and other services) has only justed started. Maybe if we weren’t going directly from civilisation to barbarism without the usual periods of hedonistic excess and decline in between, then the future for manufacturers such as JLTRT wouldn’t be quite so bleak?

Commercial scale milk production in Georgia didn’t really get going until the 1930s, it seems. (http://extension.uga.edu/topic-areas/animal-production/dairy.html) I suspect that before then, milk and dairy products were largely distributed locally, save for a few shipments to larger centres, with trains picking up cans (=churns) en route. And yet, when FDR arrived in Georgia in October 1924, he arrived on the milk train (info via google Books), and Tennessee Williams wrote a whole play called, “The Milk Train Doesn’t Stop Here Anymore”. It is almost as if a whole part of North American railroad operations across large parts of the country (some areas, when the milk train remained long enough to be diesel hauled, seem to fare OK) has been wiped not only from memory but also from history!

Au contraire. Fun is transient and ephemeral.This is all about satisfaction and enjoyment:far more enduring, and getting closer to the prototype is far more rewarding.

Thanks, Brian - that seems to be a bit more inland than Georgia, but confirms what I was thinking: mostly cans in baggage or the combine. And yes, I have a copy of that document, also one of the RRM milk cars, hence the questions. I wonder where Iain got the inspiration/idea for an on-line creamery on its own spur?

I agree with the latter point: and about time, too.As for the rest, I am perfectly chilled. Not me who felt the need to draw attention to the end of a losing streak. Not me who thinks that match is a big deal, either...

I’m not upset: Scotland deserved to win - even when England are playing, I want them to play well but I much prefer to see the best team win: this is union Rugby, after all. Wasn’t me who felt the need to trumpet moving from a 74-39 deficit to a 74-40 deficit.

Funny. So that’s what, 14-1 and you still think it sweet? Well, I suppose it’s a big deal for you, but really it’s just a minor annoyance. When she saw the result, my wife asked me how long it would be before Scottish friends crowed over it. Thank you for confirming a national stereotype.

Not any great authority on the Brighton by any stretch, but put simply that’s not a terrier at all. It is, I think, a D1 tank.

And just how many years have you had to wait to say that?