roythebus1

How do you fit the underframes to the body? Do you make them narrower to sit between the MTK solebars? I'm still puzzling about that on my Cravens parcels car!

But he can't as there's no "wrong line" starters on either platform. there's also spring points shown on the right side of the diagram on the main line just beyond the starter! there also seems to be very little room to shunt in and out of the siding due to the spring points!

It was my visit to the Köln Messe in the early 1980s that started my interest with the DB and meeting a DB driver on the class 101 that was on display outside. We are still friends to this day, he's long since retired and has a large G scale American railway round the garden of his house. I had a few cab rides with him over the years, a nice one was Köln-Koblenz all stations along one side and back along the other side of the Rhine, another was to Hannover and back. He of course enjoyed similar cab visits here including the Waterloo & City line and a trip down the main to Alton. 

I've still got all my German rolling stock, sadly not used for about 20 years.

I've had remote uncoupling for years, called Kadee. Far cheaper than all these electronic gimmics. what surprise me is that everyone spends a fortune to have the latest super-duper detailed model then runs it unprototypical Peco track and uses great big tension lock couplings.

I done the Dortmund show many years ago when the fledgling Copenhagen fields appeared there. An excellent show in those days too. But lots of "proper" traction, loco-hauled S bahn etc. all changed now.

I wish someone could supply a decent jig to hold the wing rails in correct alignment with the crossing V!

But, with the advent of the British Finescale stuff rom Wayne, why bother hand-building?

It looks more like K's, but the pole pieces and magnet belong more to the Triang X04, so I'd go for Zenith.

At the risk of going slightly off-course again, I hear of similar rumblings with the London Buses franchises. they are all bar one let to the multi-nationals usually run by overseas governments while the UK government isn't allowed to do the same. From what I hear the operators are up in arms over the electric buses fiasco, the road layouts imposed on their buses by the addition of cycle lanes everywhere, all designed by people who have obviously never driven a bus, let alone ridden on one. As for the contracts, they are being re-written mid-term and the operators have simply had enough Several of them are reported to have walked out of meetings with TfL officials over the impossible conditions that have imposed. That is why we read of some services being "backed" by operators as it is impossible to run them for the costs originally agreed.

TfL seem determined to keep fining operators for problems that are basically of TfL's own doing.  Some of the top people from the operators have told TfL in no uncertain terms what they can do with their contracts using almost barrack-room language.

To agree with what The Stationmaster says in one of his replies above, I remember interest rates on my mortgage being around the 17% mark when I was a train driver. Luckily in 198 Thatcher, for all her faults (and I still hate the woman to this day) for some reason authorised the train drivers to have a record-breaking pay rise. That enabled me to get a decent house in Streatham. then 2 years later she engineered the flexible rostering strike which saw all 28,000 drivers threatened with the sack for trying to protect our terms and conditions. like the ASLEF strikes thee days, it was more about T&Cs rather than the money. But she got her way. Railways were privatised and the race to the top for drivers' wages started. Waterloo drivers found that with the advent of Eurotunnel they could make the short walk across the concourse and almost double their money driving to Paris once a day instead of Waterloo to the City of London and back 16 times in a day. I suppose it's a pity the other rail workers pay hasn't gone up at the same rate as drivers' pay.

As a volunteer guard on the IWSR in the 1980s, we had a group of the scouts on the train, all dressed in grey uniform jackets. Going along I looked out as per my duty and saw what appeared to be someone in a grey jacket and cap swinging round between the first coach and the loco, a Terrier. I pulled the handle to stop the train, then walked forward to meet the driver. Told him what I'd seen and he laughed. What I'd seen was his fireman swinging round the footplate to give the Westinghouse pump some impact maintenance to get it working,.

On 22/04/2024 at 23:45, JOHNMCDRAGON said:

I think I remember a case like that in the late sixties, maybe early seventies of a driver being killed leaning out trying to spy on a 'courting couple'.

That may have been the driver on  local service out of Liverpool Street, went outside of his cab to see the couple in the leading compartment. EMU stock.

8 minutes ago, Harlequin said:

@The Stationmaster

 

If "nationalistion" meant that most of the control of the railways was removed from DaFT and handed down to a new version of BR, run by railway professionals, wouldn't that be a Good Thing?

 

Maybe, but all the experiences railway professionals have long since gone from the railways. they are now run by accountants and box-tickers, nobody with any sensible idea of how to run a railway.

To add to the Swiss element, railways built to UIC spec have greater lineside clearances than UK railways, so less chance of losing your head when falling out of a window. I done some volunteer work on the metre gauge TTA in Belgium over the last 12 years. That has open-sided toastrack coaches with just safety chains. Some passengers chooses to sit on the step with their feet dangling over the edge. In the height of summer the lineside vegetation brushes the sides of the coaches. If passengers get injured, that's their problem, they have to have a sense of self-care over there. But on the TTA the line speed is 25km/h. <ahem>.

The original MRC's 00 layout, the Longridge, Brampton Sands and Calshot Railway had an odd track system designed by a Mr. Fleetwood-Shaw (known as sheetwood floor). It was the equivalent of laser-cut plywood sleeper bases, probably punched from thin ply, with rails held on every so often with some sort of clips. It wasn't fixed down except at the ends of baseboards. At one exhibition at the Central Hall in the late 1970s the BBC turned up to do some filming. the heat of their lights made the track expand so much it rose above platform level and made train operation impossible! Luckily it was the last showing of that layout. The replacement had track fixed securely.

I've not bought much ralway stuff on eBay, but was after a Bachy green class 20 a couple of years ago. Stroke of luck, someone had a decent undamaged D8000 body on there, so got that for a song. A few days later someone else had a good running chassis on there for not very much! Result, a remarkably cheapEE Type 1 for not very much

The cost of seat belts on trains per casualty was investigated in the Hidden Report. I can't remember the cost per life, but it was ££hundreds of millions of "investment" to save one life.

There was a delay report I saw many years ago at Victoria, something like "we regret the 0820 to orpington is delayed due to an avalanche in Switzerland". I asked at the time, who explained the Night Ferry from Paris was delayed awaiting a connection from Switzerland, so the Night Ferry meant it ran in the path of the inward 0820 to Orpington.

At the famous London transport Chiswick bus driver training school some instructors would tell the new drivers to turn left out of the gate and take the first available road on the left. along chiswick high road, the first turn on the left was signposted as a dead end; the second was no entry, the third was at traffic lights, which was the first available road. It caught out quite a few and tested their observation.

Usually on the last day the instructor would take them to Clapham Common,  a nice wide road. Back at Chiswick he'd say "well, you and you have failed". the horrified trainees knew they'd done no wrong...He'd say you both drove all along The Pavement at Clapham. Both denied it. then he'd get out the AtoZ where they found out The Pavement was the name of the main road at Clapham!!

You may find a bit of localised heat will free things, maybe run a hot soldering iron round the area for a couple of minutes. I do similar when I', dismantling old bus parts, but use a more industrial type blow lamp or oxy-acetylene!

One of the other major problems with today's new drivers is the absolute reliance on the dreaded satnav. "Oh but the satnav told me to go down there. Kerunch, 6'6 width. Bigger kerunch, 12 foot bridge with multiple injuries and possible fatalities.

When I had my own bus company in Mitcham I had a friend who wa a n H&S consultant to give a chat to new entrants, emphasising the dangers of low bridges. The following day got a call, one of my buses had tried to go under the low bridge on Southend Road Catford. the driver had been on the H&S course the previous day. He'd asked if the could divert to his mm's to collect his AtoZ and in his mind he was driving his car.

In BR days anything that had the right class of seating was used, regardless of type, colour or design.

Hornsey used to provide bankers at Farringdon Widened Lines to help goods trains up from the widened lines to Holborn Viaduct, and if required from Kings Cross Met/Widened Lines up Hotel Curve at Kings Cross. In later years if was the usual 350 shunter

Photo 1 above, the original Frank Dyer plan scaled down; photo 2 a view from the countryside, the late Ian wood with his back to the camera operating the main panel, my first Mrs Treasure Gould driving on the main line; photo 3 the original hidden loops, on the right the dead-end sidings that served the local lines; photo 4. The "Mighty Wurlitzer" control panel for the main layout. Other panels were for the goods yard, local lines hidden sidings, another for the branch station and the hidden loops panel. Photo 5 New Annington station looking towards the loops; photo 6 A very puzzled me wondering what to do next. Note  the extension to the loops included an incline up to the branch terminus. the line had been re-opened since the Beeching cuts as a useful diversionary route for freight and HSTs. Ex mrs fixing things on the right. Photo 7 under the country side boards, a very heavy box construction was used. also note the ex USAF rotary relays used for point switching. they too were very heavy and were replaced with Old Pullman slow-motion machines. Sadly they are no longer available and were the forerunner to the Fulgerex machines. The loops had a further extension outwards with another 6 loops if I remember correctly.

New Annington was indeed originally a steam-era layout. A double track main line with a double track branch. the main station based loosely on ECML London area. Local trains terminating from the city would run into a siding with a run-round loop, then cross over to the "towards London" local line to work back. Branch train could use the centre bay to reverse, loco uncouples, fresh loco runs in from the locos spur and takes train away up the branch. Fast trains go roundy-roundy. As it was about the tome Lima and others started producing "modern image" locos and stock and the layout builders were more into those than steam, it was never really run with steam, but diesel loco-hauled trains and DMUs.  bit later in its life the main platforms had to be extended to take 8 car HSTs and some track alterations made. eventually it gained OHLE which was designed so locos could run with pantographs actually touching the wires. Signalling was semi-automatic colour lights complete with route interlocking, so signals could not be cleared until a route was set. As trains passed the signals, they would return to danger and previous signal aspects would change automatically using relays and light-activated switches. All could be returned to danger individually. Drivers had to drive to the signals. It was very advanced for its era.

Nobody has noticed that it's highly unlikely to have a direct access to a turntable from a main line.

On 26/02/2024 at 12:36, Michael Hodgson said:

That would appear to be correct, as the track circuits are named on the diagram AH, BH, CH etc, and there is no such label against the black tracks, and no indicator lamps in those sections. 

The usual convention is that the track is shown in black if it isn't track-circuited, and adjacent sections alternately Green/ Brown on the Down line, Yellow/Blue on the Up, with Orange available if another colour is needed.

 

Other conventions are also available though - the GWR of course had to do things differently.

Did the GWR have wider lines on their signa box diagrams? Until 1891?