roythebus1

Yes, you're right there! The wagon handbrake is the wrong way round as well. There was a picture on other groups of an early District Railway train showing catch points on the "wrong" track , background items not quite right. I eventually sussed it was the wrong way round and had been since the picture was published in 1906! It was taken at South Harrow.

I've already replaced a troublesome home-made double slip (Templot based) and Wayne's double slip kit fitted perfectly. But that was on the straight. The single slip is curved on both roads! I've got a tracing so will transfer that to Templot and have a look.

It's firmly stuck down, i'll make a tracing of it. I'm almost certain it's a B8, most pointwork is on this layout. It was all originally built to DOOGAF as that seemed to be the done thing16 years ago, I got fed up with pushing BtoBs out to 14.8 so opted for 16.2 gauge instead. That's ok on turnouts with a bit of tweaking, but not on k crossings. There's a 4 track double junction on the curve to rebuild as well and maybe move it nearer the station, but that's across a board joint.

28mm/30mm, gauge widening for sharp corners? :)

Personally I find Templot better than all of them, at least I get realistic curves. But then it's no good for set track.

Just catching up on this thread again, L E Carroll and SW Stevens-Stratten were 2 separate people. when I joined the MRC in about 1964 Lewis Carroll was the providor of Southern rolling stock for the MRC's Longridge, Brampton sands and Calshot 00 gauge layout. He also made a number of the station buildings for the payout. He disappeared from the MRC in the late 1960s. SW Stevens-Stratten (aka Steve) was editor of the Model Railway Constructor and later Vintage Roadscene. I knew Stve quite well through the vintage vehicle movement. I went for an interview with him in 1968 as a writer for the MRC. some bloke called CJ Leigh got the job.<waves had at Chris> :) I still think a better terminal plan is that used at Wimbledon and Richmond on the District Line, almost identical plans to allow arrivals and departures from 3 out of 4 platforms.

This thread has been a bit quiet just lately, has Wayne extended the range recently? New additions? How are sales doing? I'm looking at replacing a hand-built single slip on my layout, the problem is that it's on a curve of possible 60" or 72" radius, I can't remember, I lost the Templot plan for it many years ago. ISTR it's either a B6 or B8, 00 gauge. the slip road is on the outside of the curve and is almost straight. Would one of Wayne's curve to that sort of radius?

I've just fitted one of the coaches with wizard proper size buffers and corridor connections, it certainly improves the look of them. I'm also doing much the same with a Hornby/Airfix B set. Close couplings, replace buffer beams and fit new buffers. I just don't like the scale 3 foot gap between coaches that tension locks give. The corridor connections on my LMS coaches are moulded on the ends and were carefully cut off with a grinding disc.

Very helpful, thanks. I'm going to do the buffer beams but not bother too much about the rest of the underframe, it looks like too much work. Interesting that the short buffer heads are 18" diameter.

Thanks, that's what I'll get on and do. I've got some rectangle shank buffers in stock from Phoenix Models last week. I've also got a fe various Siphons to do/finish and a Lima GYC to finish, flush glazed many years ago, decent bogies and ABS buffers, now with Keen KK and Kadees. I may just get round to finishing the roundy roundy bit of the layout to run them on!

Helpfully Rails of Sheffield show the engineering samples of the new Rapido B set, the buffer beams are flat, not curved at both ends. Large round head on the outer ends is the answer, I forgot to see if they are the square shank type!! But at Rapido's prices, Ill stick with the Airfix/Hornby at £20 the pair, my pension won't stretch to any new stock.

That's what I would assume, but then the outer buffer beams would have to be modified as they are rounded.

Ha, from what I read elsewhere, can't remember where, they had short buffers and short coupling between coaches and longer buffers at the outer ends. So far I've not touched the buffer beams or buffers. The close coupling units with Kent magnet couplers mean I can get 1mm gap when pulling and they will go through a rather nasty reverse curve on my layout without buffer locking when being pushed.

Thanks, I'll have a look at those. Not sure about cutting the headstocks off though. there doesn't seem to be a lot of information about those coaches on here.

I've just dug out my Hornby B set and done a close-coupling conversion using a Kean KK unit at each end with Kent magnet couplings in the NEM boxes. I've read that the prototype were close-coupled with short buffers, with long buffers at the brake ends. Does anyone have any idea what the right buffers would be for the brake van ends?

The colour pictures I've seen of them look brown, but maroon fades to brown after a few years. My GS bus i painted BS maroon, which appears to be a totally different colour when a fresh panel was painted from the same tin of BS maroon paint!

There's something wrong with that motor bogie, the wheels should sit central to the axle boxes regardless of wheel diameter. It's possible an MTK sideframe grafted onto a Triang motor bogie, the whole thing sits wrong.

Class 73s all have buckeye couplings and air brakes so should be able to pull the Mersey stock.

On my Mainline coaches the gangways are a clip fit. On the GW super saloons I had to file the Kean NEM adaptor down to a T shape as I've had to do on most conversions otherwise the wheels foul on curves. No need to cut the floor away though.

The ETH voltage is also standard across the UIC railways.

You can't preserve everything. The Southern 4DD group found that out, luckily they now have 2 motor coaches under their control, but they are never likely to run anywhre except behind an air-braked loco. I'm also in the bus preservation world where there's always a cry of "oh look, there's a RT <insert other bus type> in a forest in the Azores, let's bring it back and restore it. Why? there's already over 200 of them in preservation. Oh look a Routemaster in eastern Europe. Let's bring it back and restore it. why? There's still over 1000 of them in existence. I own 2 quite rare BEA half-deck coaches, I've been financing their restoration for the last 50 years. One has been completed and got a Certificate of Initial fitness, the other is still in bits in the workshop. I also have a GS bus that I bought back in 1969. That too has the certificate of Initial Fitness to run in fare-paying service. The first in preservation, but it started a trend as there's now over 30 preserved out of a class of 84. Should I let mine go for scrap if nobody wants to take it on? I feel for those who want to restore "modern" buses and rail traction. Once the electronics go pop you're stuck. when the GRP panels get broken, it's a bit of a task to make new bits. Not so difficult with olde stock made from timber and metal, make a new bit. But there is a limit to the funds and people with skills to make those bits.

That's a lot of voltage drop fro 25kv to 11kv! My point is that if you have 2 locos that provide single-phase ac ETH, the 2 alternators will not be in phase. I wasn't trained on locos and REPS on the suvvern, just EMU stock but had the basics of what could and couldn't be done when coupling up. Worked on ac electrics at Rugby and diesels out of Kings Cross as secondman. and the Underground.

I cant remember if I had to cut the floors, I'll have a look later. I've just done about a dozen various KK conversions recently. My Mainline LMS coaches have separate corridor connections. I'm not happy with the small buffers on them, presumably Comet/Wizard do a replacement for them? I find a Dremel with a cutting disc saves a lot of hard work when fitting the Kean coupler units. with the Kent magnetic couplings I can get very close coupling by careful adjustment of the coupling lengths. But then I don't use curves under 2' radius and try to avoid reverse curves. I really must build a short test track to test these properly. The Kean couple units could do with some modifications in the manufacture, narrowing the baseplate would save a lot of work cutting floors out or filing the units to fit between solebars, and a T shape on the NEM adaptor would save a lot of time finding out that it fouls the wheels on most stock.

We had the original generator 47s at Kings Cross in 1977, they were "quite quick". :) 47 401 etc. Opened up a bit at FP to keep out of the way of Deltics.

I suppose if you get one of each you could have the giraffe ducking out of the way when the sniper pops up? :). I had a Battle Space turbo car as well. on the MRC's test tracks it went so fast it launched itself across the club room! the vintage controllers they had at the time gave out about 24v.