Adam88

5 hours ago, Edwardian said:

 

No, your 'phones work, it's just that everyone outside Norfolk (and Wales, obviously) is already dead from the Plague.

 

What appear to be our answers are in fact being generated by computer algorithms, which, though very clever at mimicking our responses, like those lovely Google Adds, do occasionally go wrong. 

 

Look, here's my favourite locomotive ...

 

 

Is this class still running in West Norfolk?

When I was eleven years old I became a commuter of sorts and travelled to school by trolleybus.  Sadly it did not last as they were all scrapped and replaced by slow and smelly diesels.  We always used to let the diesels go past whenever there was a chance of a trolley.  In more recent years I have found trolleys in various overseas places although and even managed to take a ride.  Last summer I saw some very impressive new ones in Rome which are battery powered in the city centre and then automajically connect to the wires once they've reached the suburbs.

Regarding car rides, I thought there were only two passenger states - pink or white knuckles.

35 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

The Mustang a  merlin engined P51 C representing a Red tail aircraft.  It's a fairly early model as it still has the factory style hinged canopy.

 

Later versions were were fitted with a Malcolm hood which was a blown and bulged  plexiglass  canopy that slid back. I believe it was retrofitted to many P51B/C aircraft as it allowed better visibility to the side, rear and below the tail.  They also fitted them to the 'Razorback' P47 in an attempt to improve visibility for the pilots.

 

Fantasy of Flight was set up by a very wealthy man, Kermit Weeks, who is a lifelong total aviation person.  I first came across his name when he bought the Short Sunderland flying boat from Edward Hulton and had it prepared to fly back from Calshot to Florida back in the 1990s.  At the time I had a colleague who had his ear to the ground on such matters.  When work took me to a meeting in nearby Orlando in 2014 I travelled a couple of days early and took the opportunity to visit.  Kermit was flying the Mustang - low and slow so everyone could get some good snaps and after he landed he circulated and nattered.  It was a very interesting day and the restoration to flying condition of many of his aircraft was really top-notch.  As an example current aircraft engineering specs do not allow or would frown on cotton-covered, rubber-insulated cabling so Kermit's team uses current spec cables and then sends them away to be braided so they appear genuine.  There is no functional benefit, it's an extra cost and few people ever see it but it feels right.  Since 2014 the focus of the collection has changed, moving away from a venue principally for enthusiasts to something with a wider appeal.

On 13/10/2020 at 11:28, Happy Hippo said:

I once went around the stores shed at Fantasy of Flight in Florida.

 

There was a rack up to the ceiling of the hanger, full of Allison V-12 engines as fitted to P38, P40, P41 and Early Mustangs.

 

The guy taking me around looked at them all and said whistfully:

 

'Pity they ain't Merlins!'

Edited 6 hours ago by Happy Hippo

I went there once as well and also went on the stores and workshop tour.  As you say, the whole set-up is very impressive and just shows what can be achieved with determination and a not insignificant quantity of cash.

... and https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:King_William_III_Statue2,_Petersfield.jpg

1 hour ago, Happy Hippo said:

Excellent work.

 

I know things have probably changed a lot since I was in the Army, but the Basic Fitness Test was 3 miles. 1.5 miles in 15 minutes as a squadded march/run, then a further 1.5 miles individually requiring a max time of 11:30 for under 30's, 12:00 for 30-35s, 12:30 for 35 to 40, and the over 40's had much longer.

For the last two years I was in, they'd stopped us running in boots for long distances as the early model Boot Combat High, was causing a lot of tendon problems, so we were instructed to run in trainers with 30 seconds taken off whatever the original time had been.

 

My last BFT before I was exempted  because of medical downgrading due to Arthritis in the ankle meant I physically could not run, was 09:35 aged 37yrs old.

 

I was getting faster the older I got!

I once knew an ex-tanky and we reckoned that in his regiment (not RTR) they used a ring gauge rather than a BFT.  If you fitted the ring then you could get through the hatch otherwise you were out.  This chap had no line of sight from head to toes.

1 minute ago, Coombe Barton said:

If you tried adding old style money (L:s:d) on a spreadsheet then I'm very grateful for decimalisation.

On the contrary, decimalisation and general metrication occurred slighty too soon for advantage to be taken of calculators and spreadsheets.  Were we still to use £sd then the spreadsheets, etc would have the functions already incorporated, after all they represent and display dates pretty well and they are much less structured.

29 minutes ago, PeterBB said:

Bear weighed in at 83/84Kg back in March   - one of these days I might understand what these strange units mean in terms of people weights - stones and lbs, now there's a system that I do understand.

 

Perhaps even stranger is that in chemistry and physics SI units were always used and in shopping (not that I actually do much of that) have grown used to these 'odd' measurements.  

 

That has just brought up the memory of the chart in the corner of the first classroom  960 farthings make one pound together with all the other aspects of that currency and of course seeing someone with a big white £5 note with black printing handed over to someone at London Airport - now Heathrow - for a flight round the airport on a visit must be nearly 70 years ago.  Cheques still have at the end xN new pence and that expensive change happened in 1970-71.

As someone said at the time: "They should wait until all the old people have died before they change anything".

1 minute ago, TheQ said:

This be norfuk,  we be used to drivin slow behind all them tractors, says he in a good west country accent. 

I remember walking down the line both hands on hips,  getting stabbed from each side having vaccinations for everything,  during the first week in the RAF. At least one of our intake  of about 64,  didn't make it to the end before fainting.

Michael Bentine gave the definitive description of the RAF's approach to innoculations - https://youtu.be/7BRMqDmdYvQ?t=215.

Another source is regional fiction.  The late Tom Harland's Bramblewick is closely based on Robin Hood's Bay and the name Bramblewick comes from the novels of Leo Walmsley who grew up there as a boy.  There have been numerous layouts with a Wessex tone drawing names from Thomas Hardy's works and many other examples spring to mind.

6 hours ago, Happy Hippo said:

It was agreed that the increasing fleet of grandchildren might

I was getting worried that they might be in line for downsizing too until I read a little further.  What it must be to have friends in low places.

5 hours ago, Edwardian said:

Anyway, I am also boning up on the Border Reivers. I am fascinated by the subject, having been up to the Wall recently for my first Covid-era tourist jolly, and picked up an intriguing and very readable book by Graham Robb on the Debatable Land. So, also I'm now tucking into the classic George MacDonald Fraser (he of Flashman) treatment of the subject, The Steel Bonnets.

Pleased to see you posting again, I was starting to miss your erudite contributions.

I confess that the only work of George MacDonald Fraser which I have read is Quartered Safe Out Here, his memoir of serving in Burma with the Border Reivers.  He read it in installments on R4 and it was difficult to read the book without then imagining his Borders accent.  I found it extremely well written and it has acquired a reputation as being one of the finest books to come out of the war.

That reminds me of a public lecture I attended on pyrotechnics where the speaker related the tale of being able to shoot a tallow candle through a church door.  Not having an oak door at his disposal he fired his candle through five sheets of plywood, I don't recall how thick they were but I would say that they were at least three-eighths each, i.e. equivalent to about two inches in total.  The weapon he used was some sort of muzzle loader with a charge of home-made gunpowder.  Of course in this the key thing is to impart sufficent kinetic energy to the projectile and not its strength.  It's a shame I don't remember more of the details, particularly the name of the speaker - I think he was a chemist from one of the midland universities but it was a long time ago.

A better known pyrotechnician is of course Rev Ron Lancaster and for those many NM-ers who are 'interested in interesting things' there is a very good film of him in action here (10 mins) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf1mCiAodl0 .  NB a) he's still got all his fingers and b) his PPE is limited to a comfy old lab coat.  There is an unexpurgated version (c85mins) - here.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M03esB_HBzM

9 hours ago, SM42 said:

Just a minor change or incident can have major ramifications with UK traffic flows.

This often happens with systems which are highly optimised.  They are sometimes described as brittle.  In a similar vein I can be on a main road in the country and get caught behind a tractor and trailer bumbling along at 20 or 25MPH.  How I might curse.  On the other hand there must be many motorists caught in their local stop-start urban traffic who would be only too grateful to be going as fast as 20MPH.

19 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

This thread is fascinating to anyone who is interesting in the "Wimbledon School" in the 19202-30s.

 

Was Lord Brabazon of Tara an MRC member?

 

I ask, because he was very definitely a model railway fan, and would have had the connection with Szlumper.

Well that sent me looking for my copy of his autobiography "The Brabazon Story", Heinemann 1956, which does mention his interest in the hobby when discussing a patent:

Quote

I had always been a very enthusiastic model-railway expert, and when I thought over this problem I noticed that when a train rounds a curve where the centrifugal force is more than compensated by the banking the train runs smoothly because the flange of the wheel is up against the rail...

It doesn't mention the MRC, well not as far as a quick skim through revealed, although there are plenty of other interesting, and often self-promoting, topics therein.

47 minutes ago, Happy Hippo said:

I have a sneaking feeling those are not Scale 7 wheels!

Are they Aveling and Porter's?

What's wrong with Skegness?

It's worth investigating text books on signalling such as those by H Raynar Wilson who was signal superintendent for the L&YR - "Mechanical Railway Signalling" and "Power Railway Signalling".  These were republished 'recently' (1990s?) and, although possibly out of print, are readily available.

30 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

I thought that it was common practice to gut all animals immediately after slaughter; you certainly do that when you shot a deer or a wild boar, even though you may not skin and dress the animal until it has hung for some time. There is an excellent reason reason for getting an animal immediately after slaughter and that is all the cheerful little microbes in the animal’s gastrointestinal system are still happily alive and, worst case scenario, will start consuming the gut contents and happily produce methane  - causing the belly of the ungutted animal to swell and possibly to explode. Furthermore, even if the guts don’t swell and explode, they can leak colonic contents into the abdominal cavity contaminating the meat with little bugs like E. coli (not all E. coli are malicious little pathogens, many are quite beneficial, but in the absence of a proper analytical laboratory , you’d be hard pressed to tell which was friend and which was foe).

 

Something similar happened after William the Conqueror died.  He is reputed to have exploded causing his mourners to beat a hasty retreat at his funeral in Caen because of the smell.

On 19/09/2020 at 11:28, Anglian said:

 

If the digital file is corrected by a professional who knows what they are doing there won't be unwanted side effects. Individual areas can be altered without effecting other parts of the image. However, such an approach can be very time consuming and there has to be a strong understanding of exactly what is required for such adjustments to be successful.

 

As a wider note on using Photoshop to alter photographs – if you can see it's been used then it hasn't been used to a professional standard, unless a surreal effect is wanted.

That would be akin to colourising colour images.  We are only seeing a camera's interpretation of the event - with particular lighting: intensity; colour cast; direction; diffusion; etc, film type (incidentally, I doubt Fuji were selling film in the UK at the time this picture was taken), processing, duplication, scanning, etc.  The blueness of the BR totem is probably a reflection from the blue sky of a sunny day.  There is though sufficient information here for the picture to be helpful, we know the location, the type of locomotive, its number, its crest, its task, its lamps of course - important for WW readers.

It's difficult when people try and colourise monochrome photographs and film.  I generally don't like it, apart from the contemporary Alf Cooke/"F Moore" type images published in The Locomotive and the Railway Magazine in days gone by where I think the photographs were used to help the artist.  Even then much depends on the artist using the information.  This example intrigues me, an LNER locomotive in an attractive hybrid GNR (brown frames)/LNER livery.  I don't think this is a true reflection of the prototype but is it helpful?  Other prints of the type lighten the frames to grey to help show detail.  The perspective here shows that this picture is based on a photograph, probably one of those superb builder's photographs where everything was painted in matt black, grey and white.

In one recent example a colourised photograph used on a book's dust jacket there were green L&Y carriages!  The further we move from the time and date of the photographer the worse the problem becomes.  Tony has often alluded to this with his comments on photograph captions.  Often information is lost forever - sometimes almost as soon as the shutter was pressed, there has been much discussion about Eric Treacy's collection.  In the modelling domain we also get further from the original with all our compromises, for many the trick is to pull it back as closely as we can to whatever we are trying to achieve.

20 hours ago, Tony Wright said:

I've just started taking pictures of Hornby's latest large Prairie.................

 

 

Both of these run beautifully on my test track , and this afternoon I'll take some moving footage of them on LB. 

 

Tony,

Is it an optical illusion or are the slide bars out of alignment?  They don't look to be parallel with the cylinder centre line.  If so, then doesn't the piston rod bind or are the clearances sufficient for this not to matter?

Adam

I would visit this shop if I ever had cause to go to London for work purposes, time permitting of course, and perhaps once a year would have a special book shop trip to places such as: Charing X Road, Motor Books and Ian Allan's.  The other shop at the corner of Lower Marsh mentioned above was also worth visiting and they do (did?) have other branches including one in Southampton Row or thereabouts.  There is a limited railway selection at the London Transport Museum at Covent Garden.  I also used to go to Kings Cross Models and W&H in New Cavendish Street but those visits were very many years ago.  I never managed to get to Bond's O' Euston Road but did visit them occasionally after they moved to Sussex where they had a small area at the back of a rather good ironmonger's, alas they too are gone.  On the plus side, there are still some very dedicated railway book shops and publishers who have very good on-line ordering systems although it's never the same as being in a shop and seeing the books themselves and occasionally picking up interesting looking titles.

15 hours ago, jwealleans said:

Lovely.   Compare that to the real thing here (starts at 6:28).   I think you've pretty much got it.

I would have loved to have shared that film with my father.  He started at St John's College in York in 1939 so possibly would have witnessed the frozen Ouse, I don't recall him talking about it though.  One thing he did recall was that on occasions students, operating in pairs, would reach out of the corridor windows to drop a destination board near the river (from the Scarborough Railway Bridge perhaps?).  Apparently the boat house had quite a collection of these.  I doubt that this was approved of by either the college or the L.N.E.R. but they probably never knew what was going on.   He did not have many good things to say about the Duke of Kent so perhaps it's as well he never saw it!

On 03/09/2020 at 07:58, Tony Wright said:

Many thanks Adam (is '88' the year of your birth?). 

 

I'm glad I didn't drop too much of a blooper! 

 

You're right; this is a model railway thread and details on various bits of models should take precedence. However, English is also very important and it seems to me that 'standards' are continuously being eroded across the whole media thingy. 

 

It's my belief that general standards of spoken/written English have never been universally-good (is that a correct use of a hyphen?). I only need to look back over my years in teaching to recall letters from some parents (who were educated long before my 'training') to tell that, but the 'professional' media going back some 40/50 years (and more) was usually correct - the radio, telly, newspapers and so on. Not now.

 

Anyway, a delight to correspond. I don't mind being picked up where I get my English usage incorrect (I deserve to be), but it remains the case that some correspondents are 'sensitive' if their (poor) use of English is commented on.

 

Best draw a line..................?

 

Regards,

 

Tony. 

Tony,

The reason for '88' is far more prosaic.  When I signed up for RMWeb the name Adam had already been taken so I just tapped a couple of times on the keyboard at random to distinguish my handle.  When I was young I knew no other Adams but nearly every Tom, Dick and Harry seems to be called Adam nowadays.  Had I been a child of '88 I would have missed out on a number of fascinating steam era railway experiences - going to on holiday to Robin Hood's Bay, luggage in advance, changing at York (seeing the ex-LNER pacifics) and Scarborough.  When I was about three or four years old my mother took a part-time job with Neilsen's market research agency and that involved a lot of travel by local steam-hauled train to the regional office for a briefing and then back to the station for another train ride to wherever she had been sent and the reverse in the afternoon.  There seemed to be several mums doing this as I can recall that the offices had a collection of Dinky and Matchbox toys to keep myself and a few other children out of mischief during the briefing.  It was a formative age and gave me a life-long interest.

The line we're drawing may not be straight or continuous but it will do for now.

All the best,

Adam