johnofwessex

4 hours ago, Rivercider said:

I don't think any previous experience is required to be in charge of the engine room of the Bristol Queen at present.

Sadly she  is on dry land beside Weston-super-Mare station, more or less where the former gasworks siding were,

I have no idea what the  future holds.

 

cheers

Ah, no the real Bristol Queen

20 hours ago, Mol_PMB said:

But the 03 and 04 have already been done in O gauge by Heljan, and are still fairly easily available online. And before that were available from Bachmann Brassworks and they come up on ebay from time to time.

Better to make something new rather than duplicating other recent models!

I suspect that a Dapol 03 would be much more attractive price wise than a used Heljan or Bachmann one

Also as 'smaller' layouts are more attractive on O I suspect that they might find a ready market

3 hours ago, kevinlms said:

From The Age, in an area where there are fires raging out of control and likely to be made worse by high temperatures and winds in the next few days!

 

Quite surprised that the police, didn't say he was charged with drunken driving and/or on drugs, to add to the list!

 

"Cook said it was disappointing that a man allegedly drove a car on its rims, sparking spot fires along the Western Highway near the current fire zone on Sunday night.

The damaged Magna covered in police tape in Beaufort on Monday.Credit: Nine News

Triple-zero callers reported a green Mitsubishi Magna was travelling on its rims in Buangor, 180 kilometres west of Melbourne, after 6pm. Sparks from the car allegedly lit four separate small fires in grass along the highway that fire crew then extinguished.

In a statement, Victoria Police said the vehicle was driven erratically into the fire-affected town of Beaufort, at times on the wrong side of the road, before nearly hitting a pedestrian.

The driver then dumped the car in parkland, before locals chased and held him until police arrived.

A 27-year-old Sebastopol man was charged with two counts of reckless conduct endangering serious injury, driving while disqualified, careless driving and using an unroadworthy and unregistered motor vehicle."

 

 

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/driver-charged-with-sparking-spot-fires-near-bushfires-20240226-p5f7pu.html

I think it a great pity that the Office of Inspector of Lunatics was abolished along with the County Asylum because he appears to be an obvious candidate for the attentions of The Inspector

What I can say is that a model engineering society of which I am a member is a Community Interest Company (CIC) which may be simpler than becoming a charity

First Born took my meths fired mamod traction engine in for 'Show & Tell' when he was 5

Teacher was in her last year before retirement and when I warned her about pools of burning meths on the floor her reply was 'that sounds fun'

He ran it with a TA first so they knew what they had let themselves in for

Interesting suggestion here,

https://news.sky.com/story/officers-should-be-allowed-to-ban-drug-and-drink-drivers-at-the-roadside-police-chiefs-say-13077983

Given the nature of a Drink/Drugs test I cant see why it should not be adopted, after all my neighbour's Driving Licence was taken away on medical grounds so why not the same for Drinkers & Druggies?

Anybody fancy some engineering of the proper sort?

https://savethepuffer.co.uk/introducing-our-first-training-course-in-traditional-steam-engineering-operations/

I dont know why you need a course for that sort of thing, I was just told I was in charge of the engine room and that as I had seen the engine room of the Bristol Queen as a 4 year old that would be more than sufficient

4 hours ago, TheQ said:

Many years ago I was in the control room R12 building on an R.A.F. R.A.D.A.R. station, when the Junior Officer I/C the shift knocked his muggatea into the main control panel of the Type 85 radar. Not surprisingly it tripped out. Some rapid button pushing and it came back on again.. strangely it all seemed well.

 

Next evening was a full power run, all twelve transmitters running into the aerial, ( 60MW), then all the various combinations of which transmitter up which horn or pair of horns ( 16 to choose from) and various other functions..

This did not go well, many switches and relays had glued together due to the 4 sugars he had in his tea. The whole thing tripped out several times and took some time to get running again after the control panel was replaced.

I am told reliably that the mate on the IOMSPC Freight Ferry Peveril spilt his coffee on thhe control panel as the ship approached the linkspan in Douglas and she rammed the linkspan as a result

What about for those balmy summer days out by the water a RC model of the Somerset & Dorset Railways SS Radstock

In 00 its quite a sensible size

5 hours ago, Reorte said:

Definitely, I should probably clarify that I'm not grumbling about those.

Are you a Baboon?

(Edit for Clarity, you dont mind Flashing Red Behinds)

9 hours ago, MrWolf said:

............................

 

Worse are the morons with no lights, dressed in black and hooded, paying no attention to any road rules. Perhaps they don't want to be seen for some reason?

 

.........................................

The reason why they dont want to be seen is that there are people waiting for organ donations 

But there is no shortage of Practitioners of the Solitary Vice on the roads whether they have four wheels, two wheels or shoes 

3 hours ago, 30801 said:

 

Meanwhile you can just walk into Halfords any buy yourself some illegal LED replacement bulbs.

 

https://www.halfords.com/motoring/bulbs/lucas-h7-477-led-headlight-bulb-twin-pack-201235.html

So why is a 'High Street' retailer selling something that cant be legally fitted to a vehicle used on public roads in the UK?

If you get Attendance Allowance this can significantly increase your entitlement to Pension Credit.

If you have any basic queries do PM me

I have done Ostend to Dover & Honk Kong to Macau by Jetfoil

Admittedly the weather was good but very nice on both occasions

AFAIK if you are 'contracted out' the 'Occupational Pension' has to be uprated in line with inflation up to 4% and anything over that is paid with the State Pension so increases come via your State not Private Pension.

If that makes sense..........

44 minutes ago, chiefpenguin said:

.......................

It looks like the dog has more intellegence than the owner as it seemed to be reluctant to go through the first barrier.

A harsh but fair comment

24 minutes ago, chiefpenguin said:

.............................

Some SUV's, much favoured by school run parents are not far short of the same bulk as a tradesmans Transit, so, to keep you happy they need to be banished too.

I think the issue over SUV's is that while we can all see the need for a Tradesman's Transit, who on earth needs a SUV in London unless you are a visiting upland sheep farmer?

On 14/02/2024 at 22:06, 30801 said:

Facebook just showed me this special genius.

 

Bring back The Inspectors of Lunatics, we need you 

I have seen photo's of Industrial Tender loco's on the NCB Lampton system.

The Derwent Valley Light Railway hired 0-6-0 Tender loco's from the LNER & the Mid Suffolk by then under LNER/BR ownership was operated with J15's 

26 minutes ago, hayfield said:

............................sadly 2 out of the 6 or 7 rented properties have younger visitors who just park where they want, even in the middle of a turning circle of blocking a driveway, sadly with it being an un-adopted road little can be done. ...............

Get on to the landlords/agents 

The requirement not to cause a nuasance to adjoining neighbours is standard in tenancy agrfeements

Also try the Local Authority, there may be issues around licensing

22 minutes ago, Nick C said:

 

 

That makes things rather impossible for self-employed tradespeople...

Well, its a business expense

2 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Bring back parking wardens. The selfish way people park nowadays they should create enough revenue to pay the wardens and even have a surplus to spend on other benefits to the residents.

Worth making the point that Traffic Wardens were 'Specials'

Clearly that would mean that they could issue 'points' to the real idiots or even arrest them.

Couple of things..........

A friend lives in a modern (no more than 10 year old house) with garage.

She and her ex husband had an Astra.

They JUST got it in the garage one day but there was no way they could get out except by climbing out of the windows, so I suggest that as a planning issue som eof the assumptions around cars and garages need looking at.

Then there is the van/bloat issue.  My suggestion is that there should be the option to impose restrictions on parking vehicles over a certain size.  Fair enough if a tradesman/delivery driver/whatever is working at a property but if you want to park a van on the road over the weekend, no, its a commercial vehicle so pay for somewhere to park it.  When I lived in Bristol the local paper made their delivery van drivers take the vehicles home rather than provide parking.    SUV's ditto

The experience in the State of Victoria (Australia) was interesting

As I understand it, when they started doing road blocks for drink driving and the 'average' driver could expect to be stopped every two years or so it had a major impact on driving standards because people realised that they were likley to be caught if they misbehaved.

I suspect that many of the poor parkers attitude extends to other areas of not only driving but life in general and towing their cars and giving them points might get a message over about their behaviour as well as being fairly 'low risk' in terms of not getting a car chase and possibly quite a productive use of police resources.

37 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

Get yourself a dash cam. I have just had to replace my car written off in a crash for cash scam. I will be fitting the new car with dash cam ASAP.

Nah what you want is this 

With voice actuated targeting  'White Audi at 3 o'clock'