Ben B

Those are some wonderful pictures! I'm local to the KWVR, it's remarkable how some locations have barely changed, whilst others are very different; tree growth especially. What's also remarkable is the mix of smaller, more colourful locomotives too, most of which have moved on or been retired now.

I'd never realised watching it as a child, that it's the same crash over and over again! They must have only had the budget for one set of models to wreck.

I know we have a very entertaining thread or two on spotting prototype railways in film and tv programmes, but what about model railways in film and TV? I had a bit of time on my hands today whilst waiting for the Sunday Lunch to cook, so thought I'd start a topic and add a few clips/links. I don't mean the likes of the Model Railway Challenge, but when model railways crop up in other progs and films as special effects. In the pre-CGI days the occasional inclusion of recognisable model railway equipment (particularly in lower-budget fare) seems to be quite common, and of course Gerry Anderson must have helped keep Airfix/Kitmaster in business in the 60's. Of course older films tend to use higher-end (presumably Basset-Lowke?) models, like Hitchcocks "The Lady Vanishes", but then there are some later films which use more commercial products... I got thinking about this earlier in the year when watching an entertaining if slightly hokey disaster film from the 1960's, "The Day The Earth Caught Fire". At one point the lead is on a bus travelling through the fog over Battersea Bridge, with trains passing by out of the window, and I could have sworn I saw some Dapol water towers. Sure enough, as this link to some Behind The Scenes pics (just about) show, the set was done with commercial 00 gauge bits! http://www.thepropgallery.com/day-the-earth-caught-fire-behind-the-scenes-photographs (Sorry, having trouble inserting the relevant pic directly). The curved set is an interesting technique for showing the view out of a bus window. The excellent 80's BBC tv series "Edge of Darkness" about nuclear skulduggery features of course the home-made class 31; a bit of full-size kitbashing with a wooden body built over three diesel shunters at the Middleton Railway because apparently BR wouldn't co-operate. But the scenes in the secret underground nuclear reactor in the mountains were done using miniatures, and rear-projection for a view through the window of an underground office. It's not really visible on-screen, but the excellent book on the history of the BBC Model Unit shows some behind the scenes pictures; the cavern and reactor pool were built from a pond liner, and a Triang Dock Shunter (in Transcontinental yellow livery) is posed in the background on the set. I cannot find any pics online right now, but there may be some out there. 80's Cold War Spy parody/spoof "Top Secret" has an infiltration-planning scene, which starts with rocks and sticks standing in for buildings, and progresses to an elaborate 00 scale castle complete with what appears to be a Hornby 9f and continental stock whizzing past: The rather arty 2012 version of "Anna Karenina" features a scene with a child playing with a model railway, which transitions to a real view of a real train. The model railway is a disguised Castle-class (I think) which would fit in with the 'real' shots being modified GWR locomotives in the re-dressed shed at Swindon, standing in for Moscow. A search on YouTube hasn't turned up any shots of the model, but there are a few clips of the real trains. And a relatively more modern one, but an affectionate nod to the old films which the music video is referencing, "Walk Away" by Franz Ferdinand, which briefly has some nice model work in it Anyone else got anything to add, to get it going?

I thought I'd post some pics of my personal favourite bit of Triang tooling, the DMU. The DMU in it's natural habitat, a childs train set... in this case, the set belonging to my youngest foster-daughter. Apologies for the unfinished state of it, we're building it as a collaborative project. This also explains the randomly-placed overscale livestock and occasional My Little Pony attacking the line Godzilla-like. I started railway modelling with Hornby Thomas stock, but my dads' venerable Triang DMU made an acceptable Daisy, as well as being my first piece of non-Thomas stock. I absolutely loved it, and ran it to death; some of the gearing and a wheel finally gave up the ghost when I was about 10, and the motor bogie dismantled itself. It was an identical model to the one on the right, which was bought from a scrap bin at the Shipley show a few years ago, as a parts donor so I could repair my Dad's old model. The problem is whilst his DMU runs on modern track, the one on the right, above, has ridiculously thick flanges and bumps along on the railchairs, so may be an earlier issue. So I bought another, this time a 2-car with non-prototypical headcode box on the dome, which an article in an old MRE informs me was the very tail-end of production by Hornby before they retired the tooling. I'd guess Hornby binned this tooling in the great scrap clearout a few years ago, which would be a shame... the DMU would surely have been a candidate for re-issue this anniversary year. Anyway this unit was bought to cannibalise, for about £20... and runs beautifully (if with the traditional Triang smell and growl!). Far too nice to dismantle. Anyway, Younger Child wants a stock roster which reflects her favourite line, the KWVR, so despite the headcode being wrong compared to their 101, this has become an important part of her roster now. So I bought another example online to canibalise, which turned up as this odditiy. Again, according to the MRE article by Pat Hammond, Hornby did turn the DMU out in blue in the 70's, but with different yellow ends to this one. I'd guess this is a repaint from the issued version. And once again I decided it was too nice to dismantle! I'm a sucker for BR blue, and gives me something indestructible to run on her layout when we're playing (she's 8, and pretty good with looking after models, but I still wouldn't want to use modern stock just in case). Another oldy, the good old clockwork tank loco. Probably most other layouts don't have a dragon swooping overhead either; maybe with the blue 101 we can say it's a Cambrian Coast scene, and therefore accurate for Snowdonia

I got my copy of the Wales book in the post this week... very, very dangerous books these. Every page a modellable prototype! I ended up getting the whole set of these books over the last 12 months, Gordon Edgar is to be praised for these very accessible and interesting volumes as they're fantastic glimpses into this vanished world. The thing which has surprised me is that even into the 90's and early 2000's there were still quite a few industrial locomotives in use; I only wish I'd realised at the time and sought a few out to photograph myself.

I feel like I'm missing out with my job... I don't need to do Skype etc for my work. I'd be tempted to make it a bit theatrical out of mischief, lots of bookshelves, flickering firelight, leather armchair, smoking jacket; basically looking as if the caller was conversing with Noel Coward reading the Book At Bedtime Has anyone thought of taking a shot of their model railway and digitally inserting it behind themselves, so it looks like they're commuting from a Triang station?

Would you mind sharing some details about that rather nice converted Matchbox diesel shunter please, the one in the last pic?

Mine had a go at a Lego Double Fairlie… until it became a spaceship/flying car/science lab. Still, I suppose that's the point of Lego Is that rather nice 03 an Ace Trains product please?

"Railhead" by Philip Reeve is a good book, I tried it before passing it onto my eldest. Interestingly he lays the groundwork for the concept in a "Mortal Engines" book, where he mentions a train controlled by a reprogrammed human brain inside it.

A very atmospheric underground line there, prior to the Olympics rebuilding. I used to use it to visit a mate who lived there, it was like transfering to a branch line

Crossley Evans is a fascinating place; still linked to the mainline but for various political reasons between the local council, Network Rail and so on, hasn't seen a train in a long time. There are still about 5 shunters there, blending in with the scrap piles. Something that might fit with your model are the two R&H 88's which are in use as buffer stops, rusty, overgrown, and battered; I've got a photo somewhere, I can try and dig it out if you like? Might be a use for one of those old unpowered Knightwing kits and some scenic materials

I had a Lima 0 gauge diesel from eBay a couple of years ago, which the seller had packaged very well, but My Hermes left it outside the front door... which wouldn't have been too bad, were it not torrentially raining. And they hadn't left it actually IN a puddle. Bravo. Luckily once I'd used a hair-drier on the mechanism it worked about as well as Lima 0 ever did, but still... Quite often I find My Hermes deliveries sat on top of my bins down the alleyway beside the house, which means the delivery driver has either climbed a 7-foot gate and trespassed, or tossed the parcel over and hoped it would land on the bins. To be honest though I've had good experience in general with Ebay purchases lately, and decent packaging. It think the record being some Kato track I bought the other week which was in its own packaging, wrapped in about 10 layers of bubble wrap, in foam pellets, in a shoebox, in a plastic wrapping.

Keighley and Worth Valley was used for the railway scenes. Saltaire was used for some town shots, it was odd spotting an old workplace suitably disguised And we saw the start of Half A Sixpence too, that was a bloody odd journey... bit surprised to spot the VoR.

One with a zoom lens from my drive in front of the house, one standing on a chair in my back garden

If I'm not too bothered about matching specific colours (br blue, midland crimson etc) and just want 'general' colours, I go for citadel (games workshop) acrylics personally

Impressive bit of mass production, but I don't envy how big a filing/sanding job you've got there. Not tempted to leave it in Bertie Basset/ Liquorice Allsorts livery instead?

Having posted some pics a few weeks ago of the KWVR's cut-cab 08 "Ashburnham", it put in a surprise appearance a couple of weeks ago on the Valley. This was when the line were clearing the work site at the under-replacement "Bridge 11" and retrieving equipment for the lockdown... Height comparison with 20031 And lest I be accused of being selfish and going out to take photographs when I should have been staying at home, the shots were taken from my front and back gardens

I reckon a tinplate hst would look brilliant! Particularly in original blue/grey/yellow. I wonder if the more rounded shapes would be easier or harder to produce than a regular carriage?

Found these whilst hunting for some Keighley and Worth Valley Railway pics for the Class 25 and 31 prototype threads. Got a load of model locomotives from different eras, but want to run them all together? Preparations for the Small Engines gala back in 2017. Bachmann 25, Kernow Beattie Well Tank, DJM Austerity, but would need to scratchbuild the experimental/prototype EE shunter "Vulcan". Not the greatest shot, but I was out for a walk near Damems and the convoy slightly caught me by surprise. And a couple from when the railway went pleasantly eccentric with the loco roster on the last couple of days of the 2019 gala. Back at Damems again, and we have the forthcoming 2MT from Hornby, and a custom repainted Railroad 31... ...though this is my favourite, but would need a lot of scratchbuilding. S160 "Big Jim" with BR double-arrows no less, piloting the visiting Prototype High Speed Train with correct livery, and older Virgin, Mk3's. There's even a Class 50 on the rear!

Some shots of Keighley and Worth Valley Railway resident 25059 over the last few years. Lovely loco, sadly out of use at the moment; it was suffering some mechanical faults I think, but then got badly damaged when Haworth Shed flooded a couple of months ago. With a visiting Class 33 at Oxenhope at the 2014 diesel gala. Near Oxenhope, again 2014 gala. Between Ingrow and Keighley, again, 2014 gala. And a final 2014 gala shot, this time the token arty monochrome at Keighley Last two, the loco running with visiting Mk.3's from the prototype HST set, seen at Damems in 2019.

Some visiting class 31 action from the Keighley and Worth Valley... this would have been the 2014 diesel gala but I cannot remember which line it was visiting from. Leaving Oxenhope on the Friday I think (we had our middle-foster daughter off school with a broken leg, and took her up to Oxenhope for a picnic to watch the trains). It looked good in the experimental livery... but not nearly as good (in my opinion) as; Visiting from the Chinnor line for the 2019 gala. Seen as tail-end-Charlie on the very distinctive convoy; Class 50, class 47, prototype HST and carriages, and the 31. Bingley Station. Near Damems. I really took to this loco, having not really been a fan of 31's before, and would still quite like a model of it at some point. One final oddity; March 2010 at Ribblehead/Blea Moor I'm afraid I don't have any details on the working, as these were the days before RTT (not that there's internet signal up there anyway), I was just out for a walk one weekday and it tootled past out of the gloom.

The TV adverts aren't helping... our eldest pretty much screams abuse at the screen now. "Oh look, kids enjoying themselves with their mates! Can't do that!", "What a beautiful place... you can't flipping visit!", "Hey look a party, no ones social distancing!" Or my personal favourite she hollered at the screen last week; "Ooh a nice cruise liner... sign up for our medieval plague ship experience!"

Is that YEC shunter still at the end of the siding at Skinigrove? I was intrigued reading about it in Gordon Edgars book, it seems a right veteran loco being ex-Workington...

I do respect such people as a rule; I have living family who have served in the past, and some who are serving at the moment. And if I have caused you or anybody else offence, then I sincerely apologise, it was not my intention. My issue on the day was that there seemed to be a number of older people who were making loud comments in the queue, particularly about us younger shoppers, and our buying habits, and commenting about the positives of rationing, and so on when they were youngsters. Whilst I appreciate these are unusual times, I'm a regular shopper in that Morrisons, and you don't see people in there normally wearing quite so much regalia, especially in March... I admit it's my interpretation, but there did seem to be a certain amount of people out to make a point on the day. To get this back on-track, as a pleasant surprise I took delivery of some model-making bits and pieces about an hour ago. I wasn't expecting it, being an eBay sale won a little whilst ago, as I thought the seller wouldn't have posted until after the lockdown was lifted (and wouldn't have blamed them for waiting until it was safer to go to a post office). Cheered me up a bit

It's something of a legacy from about 10 years ago, the general atmosphere on my street... we had a lot of antisocial behaviour hereabouts from a group of kids who thought nothing of deliberately kicking footballs into windows, posting dog-muck through letterboxes, and climbing into back gardens to nick things. It ended about 5 years ago when they got old enough to spread their madness elsewhere in town, but the results were that a lot of neighbours invested heavily in CCTV and are still afraid to open their doors when you knock. Even before this mess, going across to some of the homes to collect a mis-delivered parcel would result in conversations through letterboxes along the lines of "my husband will bring it to you when he gets back from work, please go away"... if you were lucky, someone might open a door on the chain on the third or fourth attempt at knocking. So you can imagine the atmosphere of paranoia when you might think anyone at the door might be some sort of plague-bearer...