Porkscratching

His chum Goering had a posh train too as I recall.. Not to mention a massive, no expense spared, model railway at home..

I bet he smoked Capstan full strength..

Blimey 6ft gauge tube trains now...

Shurely real snow is fireproof to begin with?

Fair enough, thanks for the warning, I've not actually used florists wire myself so good call, I'll give it a miss for the scaff project.

I was talking to a bloke a few years ago whose dad collects old police vehicles, aparrently he owned a police Jag and it was the very one which drove one of the real Kray Bros to the nick when their collars were felt for the last time. I've walked past Walcot Stores many times in the 80s as a mate used to live off Kennington Rd.

Some of my "rellys" in the late 19th /early 20th cent were Germans who settled in the east end of London, there was nearby apparently a very specific "German" church (not sure if it was the mob you refer to tho) but my lot all got married and the like in the local C of E church of St George in the East, so maybe most immigrants went "English" by choice.

I remember back in the day, lots of buildings in London shored up with big wooden beams as well as dodgy old bits of scaff that'd obviously been there for many years, likely bomb damage originally ... Wish with hindsight I'd had a camera and taken pics of general stuff like that. There was some great urban grot around late 70s early 80s.

Thought it was Surrey ??.. They could likely have a small war about that...

If you buy one from Richardson's (south of the river) you'll get a bit of a shock... but you will get a free shirt afterwards, apparently...

Don't be daft it's in London, I see it myself, many time...

Kray Bros (Auto Sales Division) Ltd...

I'm sure I've got some 7mm scale handrail as you suggest (somewhere!).. tubing for the joints would be perfect, I have got a couple of buckets of real life old fashioned obsolete scaff fittings at a yard I do some work for so I'll dig these out and take some reference pics. A look on 'tinternet also reveals florist wire as mentioned before, available in straight lengths and pretty much the right gauge, so if I can't find the brass I've got in stock I might grab a pack of those.

The two rescue feral kittens whilst quite at ease with the dogs (when "tamed" a bit) never actually played with them, the other, now elderly, cat however was well up for a game and was often seen rolling about on the floor with the girl dog particularly. .. they're a bit past that kind of exertion these days tho, and currently snoozing by the fire...

Wasn't the Xmas tree craze introduced over here largely thanks to Queen Vic and (the German) Prince Albert?

Some good suggestions there gents and much appreciated 👍 We've even got an old piano but I think I'd be in dead trouble if I surreptitiously nicked a couple of the wires! I'll be looking for something sub 1mm but might need to stretch reality a bit and make them slightly over scale as .6 is very skinny and might not show up very well, it's going to be a back scene on't top of a retaining wall type low relief building. I'll have to research some "period" scaff to get the construction of it looking right. I do know a chap who used to be a scaffolder so be worth running it past him too.

Didn't end well for Rod Hull did it...?

Does he end up Spanking the Monkey?

I'm going to be going more the 1960s 70s rusty type stuff, I've had hands on the real thing occasionally over the years, and recognise the gear you describe well ! Soldered brass would be a nice job certainly, to be truly to 1/76 it'd likely be very thin and possibly a bit of artistic license may be needed as regards the gauge, real scaff is a tad under 2ins OD so somewhat under 1mm in brass rod.

Re the @ikcdab question.. The two kittens here, rescued by myself at different times, were introduced to the dogs by the cage method, so each could get used to the other just being around, without any chasing or teeth on fur business occurring! It did help that there was an old, rather easy going cat also in the household to oversee the whole thing too. The upshot being they all accepted each other in a reasonable time frame and co-exist perfectly well. A whippet may be very inclined to chase smaller furry things though, so may have to be told forcefully "NO" a few times!

I'm wanting to apply scaff to a couple of 3 or 4 storey card buildings and wondering what others may have done, and what base materials have been successful. There's a few oo gauge or 1/76 "scaffolding" items available but they look fairly limited in scope. I'd be looking to scratch build it rather than a ready to plonk solution, and just looking for some ideas really ..

Ditto x 3.. any trains running on the floor would be ambushed and derailed in seconds, plus the dogs would be on the scene promptly to despatch any survivors ...

Adding a small percentage of petrol into the diesel was another dodge for very cold conditions.

Seem to remember they used to light a small fire under lorries in extreme cold even in Britain...

I still drive around in a LR series 2, this has no heater at all, and being a proper old geezer I always have the drivers side window open a bit whatever the weather!... a good de icer for the windscreen is to lob a bottle of very hot water over it, with a couple of repetitions it de mists the inside too.. 😁