CloggyDog

Sorry Jinty, but D3432 has the later pressed bonnet doors without the long straps. The twin-box one you have cover the number ranges 13000/D3000-13244/D3244 (but don't forget to remove all the vertical bonnet door grabs, as none of this number range had those either new or later) Cross-reference that series against the BR Loco Database (which is sortable by depot) and Robert might well be your mum / dad's brother. Tondu got 13188/9/90 (renumbered D3188-90 in the late-50s) from new in Nov 55 and didn't lose them until the depot closed. Looks like those are the only 3 of the strap-hinge/double box examples that were NEW to South or Mid Wales, but there may have been other transfers in, you'll need to trawl through the rest to see.

First page of the instructions lists the suggested motor/gearbox/drive - medium (14 x ??) Mashima can, slim 30:1 RU gearbox and delrin chain drive, all of which can be had from Branchlines. Personally, I found the instructions (as with all the Judith Edge kits I've built) to be comprehensive, logically sequenced and well written. In what way do you find them 'useless'??

Ivan, I recently emailed them with an order for assorted DR decals (including the ones I for my hilfszug repaint) and got an emailed invoice back within 48 hours. My email was in English, but quoted the item numbers and prices from the pdf lists on his website - these were confirmed on the invoice.. Looks like he prefers payment in Euros and via IBAN. There is an additional postage charge for Ausland (not unexpected). I use Transferwise (other companies are available) to make foreign currency transactions at much less that my bank like to charge... With that success, I'll work out what plates I need for my assorted steam and diesel fleet- the 18 201 plates are a complete set, so that should be easy. HTH

Not aware of a full interior kit, but a cast w/m handbrake stand is out there, I picked up a pack containing a pair at a show within the last... 5 or 6 years or so (and wish i could remember who! 51L/Wizard do one with a windey handle, but not a handwheel, which mine are). The rest of the interior comprises bench seats (with storage below), padded ducket sides, desk, central brake standard, stove and (piped) a vacuum gauge and emergency handle. A useful reference is the Eric Gent book on BR Brake Vans and Ballast Brakes published by the HMRS. This also has chapter and verse on the detail variations (lamp irons, handrails, steps, etc). A real bargain at just £4!! Interestingly, the recent Hornby re-tooled BR 20 brake does contain much of the interior detail - I picked up a couple via Amazon for about £6.50 a pop a wee while back. I've done one burnt-out brake myself (hence the brake stand) with a second (commissioned) under build, both using the old Kitmaster/Airfix/Dapol kit. I bought a Dapol one at Stevenage on Saturday, which had a LOT of flash, I guess the tooling is finally showing it's age! Edit - here's a 7mm one with a nice scratchbuilt interior, which might give a few pointers

There is the Britannia Pacific Models 'RTR' 1/558 brake tender. Sadly it's a scale 3' too long and rides on roller-bearing 8'9" Gresleys... something of a disappointment that costs £50. Better to scratchbuild, as Clive continues to amply demonstrate

One of those would be me, pm sent. Mine will become 20, the Reading Signal Works shunter

BR did use smaller numbers on blue 08s for the most part. Standard loco numbers were 8" high, but 08s (and other shunters) used 6" high. The exception being some ScR depots/workshops which used 10" numbers on mainline locos and 8" for 08s for a period.

A space saving trick I've used a couple of times is to chop the point in half (at a point between the switch blade hinges and the vee) and just use the vee end. The fiddlestick would just plug into whichever road you want to access using standard rail joiners. In OO I made use of a couple of Peco points that had disconnected switchblades. in O, I made the vee end up from C&L components. Saved having to file up the switchblades and arrange an operating mechanism. Hidden under a suitable scenic break, you'd gain some useable inches on each road. DSC_0457 by Alan Monk, on Flickr

The maps.nls.uk site has now added the 1:1250 (50in to the mile) maps, which show the track layout nicely. http://maps.nls.uk/view/102910321 shows the junction and short headshunt http://maps.nls.uk/view/102910324 shows the yard itself. Both maps date from the early 1960s.

I dunno 'bout that, but I'll be keeping an eye on DCC Supplies 'Dapol Demics' page just in case they get some broken 08s in as the basis for one of the snowplough conversions

Having now de-numbered my 08202 and with the rods removed for stripping and repainting yellow, I'm considering what it's eventual identity will be. I'm strongly drawn to recreating one of 2 from my childhood spotting days of the late-70s/early-80s... either 08256 or 08261, both of Colchester (CR) depot. 08256 had oval buffers fitted at some point in the mid-late 1970s and carried them until withdrawn in Feb 1984 08256_-_Colchester_-_22_January_1984 by Steven Hughes, on Flickr And this would be a cracking little train to recreate: 08261 was notable for the left-side cab clearly showing it's former 13331 identity Class08_08261_Stratford_shed_24_April_1984 by DMC1947, on Flickr

If you have a double-exhauster-box version numbered 13244/D3244/08176 or lower, you ought to remove all the small vertical bonnet door grabs and make good - the early ones didn't have them. 08176: 08176 LAMBTON CW (2) 17-10-85 by vincentminto, on Flickr 08177: 08177 Hull Botanic Gardens Depot Sept 1985 by M Harris, on Flickr Good grief, I wasn't going to do anything to this one! Well maybe I'd add the guard irons and replace the skinny vacuum hoses and bags ... and line the balance weights up to be opposite the crank throws and ... Any more suggestions? David

Depends how much modelling you're prepared to do, Jeff. The main difference is the bonnet doors - all the moulded long rivetted straps need to be shaved off and the doors smoothed, then overlay a 10 thou piece on each door to raise the centre and leave the c0.5 mm lip around the edges of each door. The door grabs remain though. The post-TOPS 08202 would be the starting point, as it has no right-hand exhauster box, like 401. 401's left side has only the exhauster box and battery box, so again the Dapol 08202 is the closest match. And based on the pic in your post, 401 also has replacement Oleo buffers at the bonnet end, so those would need sourcing and fitting. Or you can join the rest of us in waiting to see if Dapol will develop the model to cover the later variations.

I concur with all on your list PT and the additions later in that thread - bonnet doors, cab doors, cab side windows, footplate edge, left boxes, right boxes, cab end (lights, angle irons), bonnet end (lights), buffers, hi-level pipes. I also looked at what type of front right box (original style, later style, plus at least 2 rare variations), hand grabs on the long doors on non-r/h box locos, ladder supports still present, wiper motor bulges, wipers. I've also got some notes on liveries, but mostly related to green/tops (as that's an interest of mine) or blue variations. One of the key factors will be to date the info, so there may be multiple lines for the same loco to try and plot when changes happen. Links/ref to photos would also be a boon to future modellers!

Paul, I started such an undertaking about 10 (or more) years ago, using the bare bones from the various shunter books and overlaid with (at the time) info gleaned from published (book/magazine) photos. Since widened to include online shots. Even the murky ones might hold that useful item of info, so all need to be looked at. And the non-Gronk subject pics, but where there is one behind or adjacent to the subject loco... Even then, for some of the non-standard batches (Crossley or Blackstone-engined, or those with non-EE electricals) photos are very few and very far between - the smaller batches I've assumed that what's shown in the works photo would apply to the batch, at least as built. Many of those small batches were scrapped in their entirety in the late-1960s. I've returned to it a few times and I guess I've about 2/3rd of the 1,193 350s recorded with some detail - problem is some changed quite substantially over the years (substantial in terms of box type/arrangement) - I think in the end I was looking for close on over a dozen detail differences and, of course, if a new one detail difference emerged, I'd have to go back through the already recorded locos looking for that new change... It's still theoretically a WIP, but very much time dependant on time and time is the one thing I am limited on (work, other interests, etc) Perhaps it's the sort of thing to open out to a wider pool of researchers - a dozen people each looking for/at 100 locos has got to be better than 1 looking at 1193! And as an edit to my earlier post, I should have studied my own data a little more carefully, as there were plenty of 90v machines converted to dual or air braking, though wholesale conversion excluded the first 300 as a general rule - the only DB/AB ones below about 08300 are those sold into industry and then it's the odd few examples through to about 08390. 08390 upwards it's more common, but not universal. Perhaps somewhere between 300-400 were dual/air-braked under BR. There were around 200 with the 110v electrical system, around 20% of the total build, though I'm not aware of any external way of telling them apart from the 90v brethren (aside from some tiny signage maybe)? We know there were 1022 EE-engined 350s - 990 '08's + 26 '09's + 6 '13' pairs. 32 08s never made it to TOPS, while a further handful (9 or 10) were allocated a TOPS number but never carried it. There were 161 with Lister-Blackstone lumps, of which 146 were '10s' with GEC electricals and 15 with BTH. And there were the Crossley-engined batch of 10.

My understanding is as follows: First few hundred (to 13244/D3244/08176) had the box on both sides, each containing a vacuum exhauster. Vacuum only Later lots had a beefier vacuum exhauster fitted, so only need one, mounted in the left-hand side box. right side box dispensed with, front 3 bonnet doors taken down to footplate level.. Apparently there were issues with a single exhauster (reliability, etc). Vacuum only Late locos (from D3728/08561) reverted to 2 boxes, again each with (the beefier) exhauster. Vacuum only. One should also note that the first few hundred 350s had a 90v electrical system, the later ones 110v. The changeover occurred during the single box builds. From the late-60s/early-70s when air-braking became more common, a decision was taken to dual-brake the 110v examples, some later conversions had the vacuum brake system removed completely, leaving them air-only, which leads to a real mish-mash of boxes and contents! A dual-braked conversion usually had the air compressor and kit located in a new cupboard on the left side, behind the battery box and covering the lower 2 filters. This was was irrespective of whether the loco had 1 or 2 front boxes. The air-braked conversions used one or both of the front boxes, replacing the vacuum gear with air - a noticable 'tell' is the right-side front box was different in pattern, with unequal grilled doors mounted on a wider/more protruding panel. The whole thing isn't helped one bit by 5 different works building 350s in overlapping lots, so you have Darlington continuing to build long hinged and flat bonnet doors after Derby and Crewe switched to the short-hinged pressed sheet and Darlington being the first to build 110v examples, but then reverted to 90v.

Best bet is to wiki 'Class 13' for the basic gen, then flickr image serch for 'Class 13', D4500/1/2 and 13001/2/3 - should give you all you need. They differed quite a bit between the 3 individual examples, especially as time marched on. In any event, the Dapol 08 is the early-configuration 08, whereas the 13s were converted from late configuration 08s, so you'd be creating a lot of extra work for yourself - new bonnet doors, new cab doors as well as the new buffer beams, cut-down slave cab, etc. If/as/when Dapol do the later configuration 08, I am rather tempted to do a 13.

Mods to the hopper doors, IIRC. Other than the prominent lettering, I'm not sure there was an easily visible/noticable change? Appears to be all-welded hoppers only, There were other variations: Calicinated Coke - load needed to be kept dry, so the side raves were replaced with solid sheet and an off-centre fixed tarpaulin bar fitted. 22 conversions, all from the vac-piped 152-1 batch, diagram 1/158 Sand hopper - 1/150s (and one 1/151) with most/all of the raves removed and supports cut away to leave a low hopper wagon. 45 conversions, only lasted a few years in use Vacuum-braked - single wagon B449190. 1/152-2 body, roller bearings, push brakes. Extended/additional outer hopper chutes. Not 100% sure where the vac cylinder was squeezed in - doesn't appear to be under the end slope as per 21t hops??. Letterered for PENSNETT, TOPS pool 7071, TOPS code HCV. I do /have a copy of a photo of this beast, but cannot share here due to copywrite. The MRC Datafile (Aug 1983 issue) is the primary source of info. and there's some useful stuff on the em70s site: http://www.emgauge70s.co.uk/project_cokehops.html

You'd be surprised at how many shorty box cars lasted into the 50s and 60s - nothing as short as a 28ft-er, but plenty of 36ft cars. In 1950, including the sizeable CN/CP fleets (which were commonly seen south of the border) there were over 67,000 sub-40ft cars registered for interchange service (8% of the total boxcar fleet) with significant numbers from the L&N, SAL, ACL, NC&StL*, SOU and D&H all fielding 1000+ (CN and CP combined had almost 50,000 36ft cars) *The NC&StL can were actually modern rebuilds - new steel bodies on old chassis Even 10 years later, there were still a few thousand in use, primarily the remaining CN/CP cars and the NC&StL rebuilds. Resin kits can be had (certainly in H0) for quite a few of the 36ft cars and it's always fun to drop one or two into a consist (as it is with 50ft-ers!).

All in H0: Altlas HH660 (NYC), P2k S1 (PRR), 2 x Atlas S2 (both stripped down to become 1 NKP & 1 NYC) 3 x RS3, all MDC/Roundhouse chassis with: original hoods/Hobbycraft cabs on the 2 NYC Phase 1 units and Stewart Phase 3 shell for the NKP unit. I've previously had Atlas RS1 (ATSF), Atlas RSD4 (ATSF), Lima C420 (freelance), P2k FA1s and FA2s and a RSD15 (PRR), all of which have now been sold on.

I have a Solari slat here on my desk - it's been a part of the office 'furniture' for as long as I've been here/can remember (27.5 years) 24.5" x 2" overall dimensions There are 5 hinge slots 9/32" x 3/32" and 1/16" from the long edge, the outer ones inset 13/32" in from the end and then spaced (from the left, black side, slots at the bottom) 5 9/16" - 5 9/16" - 7 1/16" and 5 9/16" (all distance to centre of slot) One side (hinge slots at the bottom) has 'STATIONS ON REQUEST' white on black, the reverse (hinge slots at the top) is 'PULLMAN' white on blue, with a 3/16" lower black band. Lettering on both sides in 1 3/8" high with the bottom of the lettering 5/8" from the slat edge.

Quite right, apologies! I even did an image search recently (one of my regular searches, just in case a decent colour pic of it in black/TOPS pops up) and it went blue in the mid-70s and lasted thus until finally withdrawn in 1983.

Read somewhere recently (possibly in the pdf linked to further back in the thread) that 08s were overhauled at approx 10 year intervals, with mileage factored in. And it's possible that, certainly in the late-60s, some works (Crewe in particular) would leave a still-decent paint job alone, especially for intermediate or unscheduled overhauls.. We know that 08105 lasted in it's original black livery until withdrawn and we've had links to photos of early green examples (with 'cycling ferret') receiving TOPS numbers in the 70s (so that's 20 years between paint jobs) and a large number of later green locos getting TOPS numbers circa 15-20 years after delivery, so the 10 year cycle might well be an under-estimate. As with most things, but especially 08s with their myriad of detail differences, do an image search of your chosen machine. There is a very useful Green/TOPS group on Flickr with hundreds of good dated photos - plenty of 08s to choose from there!

Jinty - a cross-referencing of the two posts quoted above should give you some ideas, combined with an image search on Google and/or Flickr. One other thing to be mindful of is that certain batches of 08 had no exhauster box (the front, twin-grilled box) on the right-hand side (looking along the bonnet forward from the cab). The blue pre-TOPS (D3045?) should have exhauster boxes on both side of the bonnet, so that would be good for D3000-3244 Those without the right-side exhauster box (I think) include the Derby batch D3245-97, Darlington's D3298-3336 and D3454-72 batches, all with long hinges - these should all be doable from the blue/TOPS 08202 release.

Which doesn't square with a post on the Dapol forum by 'Richard Dapol' on 15 June which states: (my italics/bold) If that has altered, then it seems a very short-sighted decision, especially if (as implied elsewhere on the Dapol forum) the tooling already incorporates facility to alter those details...