roythebus1

Surely you can find a Mold in Flint?

Absolutely. Much the same can be stated about the misuse of that word, yes. Absolutely.

Some nice pics there. I had a visit to my ex wife's family who live in the railway town of Tiruchrappali (Trichy). I took over 30 rolls of film, the developers lost about 18 of them! As I was a BR driver at the time we got cheap or free travel over there, I had a couple of footplate rides out of Trichy out towards the coast on the metre gauge lines, and a cab ride on the Nilgri Hills line. I really must try and scan my pics of the trip, I've already put a few on here somewhere.

I once had to secondman a train of engines from Rugby to Crewe, can't remember the CONsist, but it was an electric loco pulling another 4 or 5 dead electric locos. I had to ride on the back engine in case of a breakaway and apply the handbrake. As it was winter it was rather a cold journey. I can't remember either what the TOPS list described it as .

Shunting locos were known as dobbins because they replaced the horse in many places for shunting. Jocko was the man who rode the horse, the jockey. As for Jinty, I refer you to the answers given by the Rt Hon friends above. American railroad depot, pronounced deepoh, not as the French Depot. Meanwhile let's not get started on "control". The driver is in conTROL of the train. The controller is in CONtrol.

Sorry but they simply don't look right with those bellows type corridor connections. The Mk1 coaches are coupled very close using the centre buffing late under the corridor connection. why I've used is the former AB Swain Mk1 closed up buffers, they are the correct type as the prototype buffers have a removable collar which is removed when using the buckeye coupler. Buffers are extended at the outer end of the rake when coupled to a loco. Have you tried the Kean System close-couplings? I'm currently doing a Mk2 set with them and I can get coupling to less than 1mm gap between corridor connections and the design of the close-couple system means the coaches go round very sharp radius corners without buffer locking. It seems a shame to go to the trouble of detailing these old coaches which I must admit are very good for their age, then spoiling the effect with a huge gap between the coaches.

You my want to consider the new point kits mentioned at the top of the page by Wayne Kinney, they'll save you the expense of buying track gauges and a lot of time! and all the parts are ready-machined and cast for you.

Tomparryharry mentions the million £ business. I ran my own £1m almost single handed in the 1990s in the form of a vintage bus company which developed into something I never envisaged. It grew from the depression of the T*****r years of "loadsamoney", then got clobbered by the selling off of the railways (I was a major provider of rail replacement buses for Connex), and local council cuts in public transport. I was somewhat surprised to learn one of my local steam railways was only just turning over £1m in the mid 2000's, and has only recently achieved a turnover of nearly double that. But railway enthusiasts have an unlimited supply of rose-tinted glasses and want to preserve everything now, not tomorrow later, but NOW. This leads to all sorts of cash flow problems and needs good management to sort it out. I volunteered he same local steam railway, being a former BR driver I thought my knowledge (albeit limited when it comes to steam locos) would be useful. But no, poor management with a degree of ambidextrous incoordination and some acidic comments from a one or two people put me off going back there. I met with volunteer coorindinators who told me that those making the acidic comments were those with vested interests in certain projects, essential people. But if they're deterring people like me from going there, so be it. I have better things to do.I don't mind railway banter, I've had years of it, but when comments are directed against someone in direct earshot that is something different. I'd suggest there's a lot of this sort of thing that goes on with most preserved railway, and indeed most organisations regardless. I know someone who lives quite near the WSR and is a volunteer on there who also has connections with my local line but haven't met with that person for a while to discuss matters. It's a great shame that these organisations are steeped in internal politics.

But I learnt fluent if not limited German from such magazines; "Achtung Spitfeuer Aarghhh!" and "hande hoch".

I had one of the Battlespace turbo machine and tested it on The Model Railway Club's test track which had 3' radius curves. the antique controllers were capable of delivering 24v. The turbo on that voltage literally took of on the very high speed entry to th first curve. It ended up at the far end of the Lower Hall, much to the consternation of the serious modellers.

Pete Hendy would be the ideal man for the job and I remember reading elsewhere that he's being kept on as some sort of advisor anyway. I've known Pete through the preserved bus hobby since about 1969, so he must be due for retirement soon as he's a couple if years younger than me! Back in the early 1970s he was London's only independent bus conductor, working for Pioneer Coaches on their 235 route up and down Richmond Hill in his gap year. He said then he was going for a job on London Transport, I thought maybe conducting or driving, but no, he got a job as secretary to the head honcho at the time. Little did we know that many years later he would be that head of the organisation! He's been in transport all his life so ought to know it inside out. He still has his PSV driving licence too.

As the title says, does anyone supply cast buffers for the various Airfix wagons? I've got a few that have lost buffers and I don't really want to use new kits just for the buffers. I've done a couple of conversions, a Hornby Dublo breakdown van body on the meat van chassis looks good. when Wrenn took over the HD range, they hd a lot of red breakdown vans so sold them off very cheap, about 2/9d each. I've also done a K's white metal p/way open wagon on a meat van chassis. It certainly runs better and the chassis is square, unlike the Ks offering!

what buffers did you use on that? I've got a few cattle wagons and other airfix wagons that have lost buffers.

When I was house hunting on the Romney Marsh in 2002 I looked at a house at New Beach between Dymchurch and Hythe, an 8 bedroom house. It looked very 1970s build and inside were no1 but 2 carriages parallel to each other with about 12' between them. They were totally enclosed by the brickwork. At 90 degrees across the far end was a mezzanine floor with more living space. Ic couldn't get a mortgage so that purchase never went ahead.

Thank goodness you're not into jigsaw puzzles that are marked for 3-4 years!

Depends how complex the plan is I suppose. what have you got in mind, how big will the layout be?

Have a look on the British Film Archive, it seems to have everything listed in there.

I was there on that day, standing near the footbridge when the test train came in. the tube car sounded its whistle to signal to the drivers, and the doors open and closed as well! I'd run out of cine film and ordinary film by then and couldn't afford any more.

Wheelchair accessibility is probably the answer.

Have a look at the later variants of the BR class 47 fleet, the 73/0, 73/1 to name a few. All had variants that required additional driver training. The same still applies, do the "sitting around" drivers have the traction knowledge What I find amazing is the lack of coupling standardisation and signalling equipment. Back in the day it was possible to couple most things to most things with a great big hook, maybe put some air or vacuum pipes up, ding ding and away.

There's a photo doing the rounds on a private railway staff FB group that shows one unit where the yaw damper (I think it's called) detached from the body underside, with what appears to be the bogie frame fractured. The item is a lengthways shock absorber. I have a relative who is a railway fleet engineer and he says they have been aware of this problem for over 6 weeks. If there's any Lost Boys on here (Phil b?) you can see the picture on that group.

Yes, a couple of years ago we drove through Belgium to view a property. One town we went through was unusual, loads of filling stations one side of the road with prices at Luxembourg prices, the other side plain Belgian style houses. The border ran down the edge of the road for about 2km. Edited to add: Just looked it up, Rombach-Moutelange on the N4. One side for cheap diesel, the other side for decent Belgian beer.

A bit late joining this conversation, but the UK government does just that. How many TOCs are foreign owned? Arriva Trains DB; C2C-Trenitalia; Abellio NS..all foreign railways where the majority shareholder is a foreign government. So in effect we are already subsidising foreign railways.

It happens sometimes. Back in early 1975 as a secondment at Rugby we were sitting in the shunters bunk on the up side and suddenly saw a load of cows crossing the line, chased by men in red-stained overalls. They's escaped from the abattoir on the down side. I phoned the signalman to block all lanes but he'd just cleared the road for an up express from Birmingham. Luckily no cows or people were injured and the cows were clear of the up line as the train went through.