SteveyDee68

I posted a question in the Questions thread (with no replies), but perhaps here (where there is considerable expertise and also crane owners) might be a better place to ask... I was fortunate to be able to spend an unexpected Xmas bonus on purchasing the red version of the crane from my local model shop. Yesterday I got it out for the first time, but am unable to remove the second of the two doors on the rear of the crane in order to lower the jib. The door for the jib eventually came out, but unexpectedly flipped over as it came out using the turning knob magnet gizmo. It would appear that the magnets are in opposition. The second (left/hook) door resolutely refuses to budge, and in fact I can revolve the crane using the magnet of the knob gizmo a good 1-2cm away from the model! Is this normal behaviour with the magnets? I have read all 38 pages of this thread, and nobody has mentioned anything odd getting the doors out other than the left hand one needed prising out. I really don't want to return it and then have egg on my face if it is meant to work this way! Steve S

Help! I splashed out big style with my Christmas bonus on the beautiful Bachmann crane but due to other commitments today was the first time out of its box properly... What am I doing wrong? The magnet gizmo to pull out the washout plugs doors to allow me to lower the jib and hook doesn't want to do that - when I put it near the plugs doors, the crane rotates! The magnets seem to be in opposition... The jib plug door suddenly popped out but not the way I expected - it suddenly revolved and flipped out (away from the gizmo). The other plug door, having a small rectangle at one side, resolutely refuses to budge. Am I doing this wrong, or have I been unlucky enough to get a Friday afternoon model where the magnets are installed the wrong way around? Appreciate any advice...

I'll be honest - I rather miss good old MacDraw! It could draw to scale, you could define libraries of objects to reuse, and multiple layers too. Cracking bit of software, then became ClarisDraw (basically renamed) and then in the shift to OSX it got dropped. It had exactly the right amount of flexibility for modellers as it was designed as a 2D vector drawing program and designed to be easy to use. It also required very little in terms of computing power/RAM. If anyone can recommend an equivalent for OSX I'd be grateful for the pointer. (Saying that, I will be taking a look at LibreOffice later!) STAY SAFE - STAY HOME - PROTECT THE NHS

I have in the past drawn attention to inaccuracies in sellers' descriptions by posing rhetorical questions and providing the correct information at the same time, but only after checking what else the seller has for sale and what language they are using. Have been thanked on more than one occasion because I have spotted they are selling multiple different items but have cut and pasted description info and sometimes neglected to update the text. Retailers also have to bulk upload items, and again that can lead to errors. One I picked up in the last couple of days were new OO gauge wagons being sold with photos of the same in N gauge! Which bit is wrong, the photo or the description? (Apparently Bachmann have said to use the N gauge photo as no official OO photo of the model yet available) I give the benefit of the doubt to sellers unless they start hiking prices and describe items as "rare" or "difficult to get hold of" - then I point out the error sometimes a little sarcastically. For example, the "rare" Skaledale water mill at a fair few tenners available for sale with multiple other sellers at the same time at half the cost! That makes me think of Barnum - there's a sucker born every minute!

Happy Good Friday! Hope you and your family are safe in these interesting times. A while ago, I commented upon how much I liked your factory kitbash. I, too, have the Chris Nevard article and have obtained the gatehouse kit with intentions of upgrading, but looking back at your building for inspiration, can you tell me if you used two gateway kits to create the gatehouse? As much as I like the "bell tower" (can't think what else to call it!) of the original kit, it is the case that it does turn up a lot whereas your variation hides it's origins so well. I also noticed you you later added what looks like part of the warehouse kit to the middle section to create loading facilities. Do you mind me asking how many kits were used in total? And finally - last question, honest - what happened to the lovely scratchbuilt factory building in grey primer at the right hand end next to the canal basin, that you subsequently replaced with the current building? Far too nice to consign to the scrap bin! Meanwhile, terrific modelling both here and on your father's layout (love the distillery) and currently torn between your DAS scribed sets and Canute Road Quay's methods for groundwork on my own micro! (If I reached half the standard of either I would be very happy!) Steve S STAY SAFE - STAY HOME - PROTECT THE NHS

Hope everyone is staying home and healthy... With time on my hands, I have been perusing eBay for all manner of items, and am always surprised at the differences in price asked for the same item, especially for "Buy It Now" auctions. I am not referring to a certain infamous seller who hikes his prices not so much skyward as stratospheric, but just generally. My attention has been drawn to the prices asked by retailers in their eBay shops, but there is one trend that I have seen which I have taken to messaging the sellers to draw their attention to. And that is? Has anyone noticed how many older, non-Skaledale Hornby buildings are being advertised as "Skaledale"? I am referring to the range of buildings Hornby produced for the "train set" market, which are clip together kits. I have seen many listings of these as "Skaledale", which they are a long way from being anything like the quality. If these were being sold at low prices I could ignore them, but often they seem to be priced more in line with actual Skaledale products. Is this a clear case of misrepresentation? Newcomers to the hobby will have heard of Skaledale and may assume these are part of that range and then pay more for such items than possibly the items warrant. I know any selling price is how much the buyer is willing to pay, and I also realise that in these strange times businesses need as much cash flow as possible (which is why I am buying my PLA Peckett loco from my local shop at a higher price than from a "box shifter" at a much lower price), but am I alone in thinking that retailers (especially, being the professionals so to speak) should be clear and correct when listing items for sale on eBay? Apologies for the ramble - I am genuinely interested in RMWebbers' responses! STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - PROTECT THE NHS

From left to right, top corner... Metcalfe terraced house (old kit, cut in half to make single building) Row (alley) House gable end - low relief (cut down Superquick "White Swan" pub - how appropriate!) Scratchbuilt house (utilising spare windows from both the Superquick "White Swan" and cut down three storey shops) Row (alley) Two storey shop (cut down Metcalfe three storey low relief shop) Two storey pub (cut down Metcalfe three storey low relief pub) Row (alley) House gable end - low relief (cut down Superquick "White Swan" pub - the other part of the structure) Road Metcalfe terraced house kit (the other half, facing in) I have had to leave out the broker's office as there isn't room. By rights, I should also leave off the second pub and have a second house instead - I have just found the Metcalfe cottage I got free with a magazine (*ahem*) so may try that instead of the pub. Using paper mock ups to help visualise - will probably post up some variations and ask opinions upon which look best! STAY HOME - STAY SAFE

I have spent some time researching (aka trawling the internet using Google!) the "hole in the wall", the White Swan and the White Swan coal yard, really to get the atmosphere for my "homage" on my layout, as the buildings will be adapted rather than scratch built. Then I discovered a photo on the Great Yarmouth Courier website of "Laughing Image Corner" (photo 1 below) when flooded in 1905 - and it turns out that was the name of the area next to the White Swan! Using that photo, Google maps (for the roof layout of The Swan - everything else has gone!) and a postcard of the same area, I sketched out an approximation of the layout of buildings as I could glean it from the photo, and then an elevation sketch (photo 2). It isn't 100%, but it was a starting point. From that, I then sketched a layout of buildings using the Metcalfe kits I have, in order to create a similar feel to the "original" Laughing Image Corner (photo 3). I will need to scratchbuild one building (the harbour master's house) but I will have spare windows from the Metcalfe kits to use. I may also "re-skin" the Metcalfe terraced pub similar to the original "White Swan". The only other change to my original idea is that the warehouse/shed at the bottom left of the layout is changed for the tower that was behind the White Horse pub at Great Yarmouth. Again, this will be an impression rather than an accurate model, but I thought it might make an interesting sight blocker. The right hand end of the layout is still to be finalised, but will feature the Metcalfe factory gatehouse, elements of the brewery kit (probably unrecognisable having been chopped about!) and the boilerhouse (arranged much like the brewery on Chris Nervard's Brew Street layout). STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - KEEP MODELLING Photo 1 (Great Yarmouth Mercury - newspaper photo archive) MISSING PHOTO Photo 2 - my "guesstimated" layout and elevation of Laughing Image Corner MISSING PHOTO Photo 3 - my "Metcalfed" layout : the 'Harbour Master's House' will have the same roofline as the original photo but windows to suit from the cut down 3-storey terrace of shops to the right! The terrace house on the right is the other half of the kit used to produce the terrace house on the left - if it fits before the brewery/boiler house! Greenery is .... fanciful!, MISSING PHOTO

Now I learn the trick! Thanks for the tip, Chuffinghell! I tried to strip a badly hand painted enamel BR green paint finish on a second hand Class 59 by soaking it overnight in Dettol. I rinsed it in water and it went sticky, so I soaked it again. Rinsed it in water again, and I ended up binning it as the whole body starting melting into a sticky mess! I ended up buying a another replacement body off eBay! Thank God it was a (relatively) cheap Lima loco in the first place, and I got the second body at a bargain price too! At least next time I will be better informed how to go about paint stripping with Dettol. Now, when was the last time I saw Dettol or any other surface cleaning agent on the shelves of my local supermarket?! STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - KEEP MODELLING

Hi - this looks excellent (like your original) so when your website is up and running - and assuming I eventually get furloughed for my supply teacher job (!) - I can see myself ordering several for my future dockside layout! As a suggestion, these are all low relief: how feasible would it be to create full relief ends so a full depth building might be created? Those ends might be available separately, with or without door openings for tracks/loading bays, to add to the original kit, for example. I realise that these suggestions might turn your simple(ish) project into a "mix and match" nightmare situation; next thing you know, I'll be asking for a reverse side with different window configurations, also available separately? This surely would be opening a can of worms a million miles away from your original intentions! As Westernenterprise commented earlier, "Some people are never satisfied!" Then again, what else might you be doing during lock down?! Steve S STAY SAFE - STAY HOME - KEEP MODELLING

Responding to an older post, but our Alsatian was also similar in that she knew when someone was about, even before they came up the path to the house! Having said that, she didn't bark at anyone she knew (including the postman and milkman) only anyone who was a stranger and she didn't like the smell of! I remember my college friend's family had three, beautiful Doberman Pinschers (sp?) which I never heard bark and were lovely animals whenever I visited. Then one day he had a call from his father - he had come downstairs for breakfast to find two absolutely terrified burglars sitting on his sofa with the three dogs sitting around them. He learnt from the police that the burglars had broken in and the dogs had let them into the lounge before surrounding them and backing them onto the sofa - all in silence! Every time the burglars attempted to move, they would see three sets of teeth bared and decided their best option was to stay put! A noisy dog is probably preferable, but at the time we did think it was funny imagining the two robbing b*st*rds sat in terror for hours, not knowing if they were going to get eaten!! STAY SAFE - STAY HOME - KEEP MODELLING

Probably not much help, but what about an urban style chapel or church hall? The kind of building that has a taller facade than the actual roofline? Your facade could run up to the edge of the world, being effectively a few brick courses deep from front to back, and the roof runs away from the facade at a lower level. At normal viewing angles, the facade should hide up the awkward corner. I've attached a few pictures off a quick google search, and indicated where the roof could perhaps be further lowered to aid the illusion. Quite a lot of Methodist churches can be found squeezed in amongst a row of terraced houses!

My only experience with insurers was for an "escape of water" which effected most of the ground floor of our house. As it came from a tap, they tried to put the blame on our then 5 year old. We engaged the services of an independent loss adjuster, who battled them for a fair and reasonable claim for the damage we suffered but it literally took nearly a year to sort! So my impression is that they will wiggle out of paying if they can find any way of doing so, despite taking your premiums off you year after year. My heart goes out to those folk who have suffered in the floods... And don't get me started on car insurers - took naive me years to learn that insuring your vehicle on its value to you is simply handing your money over to the bloodsuckers, because when it comes to the (literal) crunch they will only pay out scrap value! As Polybear and Boxbrownie have commented above, I do hope that insurers cannot wiggle out of his honouring legitimate claims. STAY SAFE - STAY HOME - KEEP MODELLING

My local model shop is continuing trading by online and phone orders, and posting out goods. The owner tells me that he is getting a lot of small orders, but everything adds up to keep him ticking over. What was a shock was to learn that he had been warned by the police that thieves were targeting "high value goods" shops, and so he had removed as much higher value stock from his shop to his home as a precaution. I commented that surely his insurance would cover any losses and was horrified to hear that he had been told that he would not be covered because of a clause relating to "civil unrest" and the company designating the lock down as such a period. Which to my mind goes against the government's encouragement for businesses to continue operating via mail order "business as usual" if insurance companies are going to claim "civil unrest" because "business is not as usual" to avoid paying out for valid claims for theft! I wonder if any small business owners here can confirm that have checked and are in fact still covered? If not, time perhaps to swap insurers?! STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - KEEP MODELLING (VIA MAIL ORDER)

Got to say what a brilliant name for your layout! Look forward to seeing it progress! Steve S STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - KEEP MODELLING

Hi A search of the forum hasn't answered this particular question... Has anybody attempted to turn the Metcalfe three storey low relief shop buildings (commonly seen in a bank, shop and pub format) into two storey buildings? If so, any tips? The overall style of the buildings in this kit fits with the look I am after, but they are just too tall! The Metcalfe terraced shops are too much alike to work in the setting I envisage. Any other suggestions welcome! Steve S STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - KEEP MODELLING

Agreed about the effectiveness of the surface texture, but I also think the proportions of your castle are really good too. In fact, I so like your castle that I may try something similar to while away the lock down hours! Steve S

Hi Daniel I realise you posted this back in January, and this isn't Scalescenes connected, but have you looked at www.anyscalemodels.com? Resin castings, they do a number of industrial machines suitable for workshops - lathe, pillar drill, press etc and also workbenches and cupboards. The may not be as crisp as those from Preiser, but at least they are chunky enough for 4mm/foot and I don't think anywhere near as expensive. No connection - just a happy customer. STAY HOME - STAY SAFE - KEEP MODELLING

I don't think I'd be alone in saying that Brierley Canal Road and Far Wittering both qualify you as a damned good modeller, never mind the cartoons! Steve S

Oh no! What a shame - if you had shouted out earlier about a lack of fishplates, I could have posted you some (the post box is on the corner and I have a spare stamp or two) - that is, of course, if you get post where you are! Nice to see your layout moving quickly forward. I spent most of the evening peering at photos of the area around the White Swan (particularly a photo showing the area flooded) in order to make a kind of impressionistic sketch of the groupings of buildings and/or rooflines near the ‘hole in the wall’. I am not modelling it accurately, but want to achieve the 'essence', mainly using Metcalfe buildings suitably butchered adapted. The Scalescenes harbour wall looks good - I have got myself some balsa to wrap the piling cover layers around, rather than gluing multiple layers of card together - John Wiffen's kits are superb, but can be hard on the cutting fingers! Just noticed - nice work on the railings on the crane. How did you do that, may I ask? Stay safe, and enjoy your build. Steve S

An old thread, but interesting to read as I have a couple of these locos, picked up at a swap meet and off the Bay of Fleas, which I am attempting to improve. Of course, I didn't know that the yellow one was rarer before I took the razor saw to it and cut the bonnet down!

That's first time I've seen that plan! I am drawing inspiration from the White Swan "hole in the wall" and have amassed many photos off the internet (thank you Google) so the coal yard looks in the right orientation behind the Swan Inn - I guess the hole in the wall wasn't possible given the tight curve (it was a straight track originally) meaning exaggerated clearances. Look forward to your build! Steve S

Thanks, Olddudders - I'll take a look today! Warning: about to go seriously off topic! I have 'used' Macs since 1992, when my first machine was the Mac LC aka "pizza box" running Apple System 7 (back in the day!) together with the high red 13" Apple monitor and an Apple LaserWriter NT (300dpi, 4 pages per minute max, cost more than the Mac LC, monitor and £800+ of music engraving software combined!). Why 'used'? I am a musician first and foremost and simply used the Mac as a tool/means to an end, rather than fuss about with internal upgrades, specs, cooling fans, processor speeds, command line interfaces etc, which at the time seemed to be all that Windows PC users obsessed about! Since then, I have had various other machines (I loved my "tower of power" Mac Performa (forgotten the number!!) but in the early 2000s I rescued (with permission) a skip load of older Macs being thrown out at the University I was working at! These I stripped down, spray painted bright colours (Halfords primer and whatever neon shades were on offer!), reinstalled system software and a host of shareware/freeware educational software (all VERY easy to do!) and donated to my friend's primary school (where they used to leave BBC Model B computers by open windows hoping they would be stolen to claim the insurance!). When I left my job, I was allowed to keep my G3 iMac (Bondi blue!), later given a second G3 iMac plus a G3 PowerBook from a professor I worked with, when he returned to America! I did buy a G3 PowerBook (by accident!) off eBay which was the first model with USB ports - and which was stolen the first day of me working in a post-16 college! I didn't rescue the Mac IIfx - it was as big as a suitcase, had 2MB of RAM, the 2nd 1MB RAM chip costing as much as the original computer! (Note - MB not GB!!) Those were the days!! LOL! My favourite rescue item is the Mac Classic SE - 9" screen, B&W, System 6 - "state of the ark" but last time I switched it on after 5 years of storage ... "ping" and it ran perfectly! A 90s vintage computer!! My iPad was also an eBay bargain when I won the auction - about £150 when at the time most were going between £250-£300, and was a "surprise" win in that I didn't increase my initial bid and then forgot about it! My 27" iMac was likewise a surprise win - I put an initial £650 bid in and nobody bid against it! It had been used from new at home by a graphic designer so had its memory extended and been well looked after! I know that it is 2011 vintage, purchased in 2016 and still going strong! My MacBook had a reserve price of £180 despite the fact that the owner could not get it to start due to missing the install DVD - I ended up in a long to and fro discussion with suggestions and websites to try, which he did to no avail. Eventually he offered to sell it me for £100 simply because he was fed up of trying to get it working - plus it was his daughter's in any case! I bought it, installed extra memory (simple), a new SSD hard drive (scary territory - done in underpants and a static strap in fear of zapping the innards!) and reinstalled system software starting with an old OSX installation CD (I think it was the original OSX 10.0!) then spent ages stepping up system installations until it runs well under Snow Leopard, so another monetary bargain that simply needed time to sort out. I have the parts to replace the hinge clutches and badly repaired rear cover (somebody didn't research how to remove it and snapped it trying to force it!) which is a job during lockdown, and another tricky (for me) bit of computer hackery! So, despite plenty of experience with the kit, I don't really have much expertise! As the saying says, "All the gear, no idea"! Only thing I do know is that everything is approx 9 years behind the curve, hence the question re: the reader software! So, totally off topic and far too much information, but it's lock down and I have time on my hands! Stay home and stay safe everyone! Steve S

Hi Got myself an airbrush kit a year ago, and haven't had the nerve to use it yet! Very impressed by your weathering - I do like Class 37s even though I don't have any myself! Will watch out for further updates during our enforced extended modelling period! Steve S

Dear Andy (or the technical team at RMWeb) I am interested in the Gold Membership, but looking in the AppStore at the Exact Editions software, it states it needs to run on OSX 11.0 or later. I have a very reliable and hardworking older iPad (possibly 3rd generation - not sure, an eBay bargain, wifi only, turns out to have a sim slot, go figure!) BUT it is fully up to date running iOS 10.3.4 so I am guessing that this is the most modern version of the system software it will run. So my questions are: 1) will the Gold Membership subscription work with an older version of the Exact Editions app suitable for OSX 10.3.4? 2) are you able to provide such a software solution to install? I bought my iPad secondhand (like my iMac and my MacBook) secondhand and - quite frankly - I could not justify spending the kind of money required to upgrade any of them at this time I mean, that's at least eight decent brand new locos, even without chips or sound! Thanks for any help. Stay safe Steve S