PLD

The only problem I can foresee in replacing the thread with a gallery album is that there is no function (that I’m aware of) in the Galleries to go to the first new / unviewed image in the way you can go directly to the first unread post in a thread. I presume the gallery is sorted on upload date but even so, when the gallery grows to a few hundred images, I wouldn’t be keen on trawling through them all to find new ones…

Just had another 'autopilot ' example at the supermarket...

"do you want any cash back?" the checkout girl asked

So tempted to say "Yes £50 please!"

but actually said "just the change from the £10 note I've just handed you..."

Friend to serving girl in cafe: "I'll have a black coffee please"

serving girl: "would you like milk or cream with that?"

...56 mph - 90 kph, which is the usual out-of-town single carriageway road limit in Europe, but is not a speed anyone is required to drive at in the UK!

Tramways: Add 'Kew Bridge' by members of the Thames Valley Area group of the TLRS

Also about 10 years ago there was a Trolleybus layout 'Walford Arches' (I think) on the circuit. I understand the builder died but I believe the layout still exists.

A few of Blackpool Tram combinations I dug out for a similar thread on another group...

Refurbished Brush railcoach 626 and un-refurbished 632, both carrying the 1970s livery style in 2010. Ironically it is the refurbished 626 which has since left the tramway for preservation at Birkenhead...

First and last of the Centenary class 641 and 648.

Refurbished Balloon 723 and un-refurbished Balloon 703, both carrying the 1980s livery style in 2008.

Twin-car sets 682+672 and 685+675 at Fleetwood Ferry; 685/675 are overtaking 682/672 parked up for a meal break while on private hire. Unusually both are trailer-car leading.

Millennium Class rebuilt Balloons also showing the two variations in layout of the bus inspired 'Metro' livery as applied to the trams.

The entire fleet of Jubilee class (and the only two O-P-O double deck trams in the world!) in contrasting Advertising liveries...

Finally bonus prize is three trams which were originally of the same class...

Rebuilt Balloon 713, restored Balloon 700 and Millennium class 724

I left out the top hat bearings as being too fiddly to get into place, and this doesn't seem to have caused any problems: the bogies run very smoothly just in the holes in the axle boxes.

My only worry with doing that is that the extra rolling resistance may not be significant on one coach but by the time you get a rake of six or seven together it adds up and some locos may start to struggle...

Aside from bogie woes, the next challenge will be to paint the underframe and build an interior. Are seats necessary? The coach won't be lit, so I'm not sure, though I see that P&D Marsh sell some white metal compartment seats which sound useful.

As other have said, you need to put in at least the partitions in a corridor coach... as for the white metal seating again the worry is how much weight will that add to a ful rake of coaches? I use the plastic seating that Colin Ashby used to produce. I've seen someone else with something very similar recently (can't remember who - maybe someone else can?) It comes in about 6 inch lengths for you to cut up to suit.

Otherwise looking good!

Paul

This is a list of other tram & tramway related content elsewhere on RM Web such as members’ blogs workbench threads and photo galleries…

Workbench and layout Threads/Blogs

The Grime St blog: Leeds Tramway Layout

A DLR Train: Scratch building a Docklands Light Railway unit.

Mr Simons Workbench: Scratch building a 7mm scale tram

Galleries

Crich Tramway Museum: General photos from the National Tramway Museum

Edinburgh Tram: The first of the new trams for the Scottish Capital on display

Great Northern Steam Fair – Beamish: Includes the trams as well as other transport

Irish Railway Images: - Includes photos of the Hill of Howth Tramway and the Fintona Horse Tram

Seashore Trolley Museum: This US Tramway museum includes several UK trams in it’s fleet

Skipsea Tram: The body of a Hull Tram car used as a holiday home at Skipsea on the East Yorkshire Coast.

60s & 70s Photos: Includes photos of the Great Orme Tramway

The Tramways Forum in the previous version of RM Web

I’m sure there will be more that I have missed. If you have content you want adding to this list or you find anything else of interest please sent a PM.

The next big thing to do is the overbridge, my plan for that is to do a modern kind of tram way, the kind you get through sheffield etc, i think this would add a little more interest than just your basic road.

 

The problem with this idea is sourcing the parts and trams etc, my knowledge on trams is weak to say the least so if any one acan help that would be great.

The only UK outline modern tram available ready to run is the Manchester Bombardier M5000. See this thread in the Tramways group for information on sources etc. If you are looking specifically for Sheffield Supertram, there isn't anything currently available but a few options for modeling it were discussed in this thread.

Paul

Welcome to the Trams & Tramway Modelling Group!

The intention is to build on the content of the Tramways special interest forum and encourage more modellers to think about tramways as a modelling subject. The hope is that a one-stop dedicated group may also encourage a few more who are only interested in trams and not other railways, so are not currently members of RMWeb to join in.

An early aim is to provide a list of links to other tram/tramway related content elsewhere on RMWeb that could be easily overlooked, but we will leave it to the Author to decide whether they want content moved into the group structure or to leave content where it is and provide a link from here.

So now it’s over to you…

Well some body tried to make use of the busway yesterday...

http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Home/You-could-waste-away-waiting-for-guided-bus.htm

Thanks PLD for the info and the picture of the loco at Crich. I passed there on Monday morning! If I had known this was there I would have gone in. However I now only live about an hours drive away from Crich so I will go and have a look shortly.

 

Hopefully they may some history as well.

Certianly worth a try, but if you want to visit their archives write/e-mail to book an appointment at least a couple of months in advance - they're not known for the speediness in responding...

Another link showing a similar type of loco to "Ruth" except that it uses a pantograph instead of trolley pick ups. This one is preserved in Scotland.

 

http://www.srpsmuseum.org.uk/10014.htm

 

Don

That is one of the two Fairfield's shipyard locos, as I mentioned in post #6... One of the other shipyards also had a similar loco.

Picture below is another variation on the theme - the single trolley pole on the Blackpool Tramway freight loco which was originally used to haul coal wagons between the rail connection in fleetwood and the yard at Thornton Gate, then when that traffic ended was used by the p-way department and is now preserved at Crich.

Indeed the Loco was a standard EE product, but one of those standard designs where no two were actually built the same!! There were quite a number built for overhead power collection - most famously the Blackpool Tramway freight loco and the ones operated by the Govan shipyards over the Glasgow Corpotation Tramways. The unusual thing about 'Ruth' and the Bedfordshire Brickworks was the twin wire overhead as per trolleybuses (note the two trolleypoles) rather than using the running rails as the return. Probably a practical arrangement given how well a nice sticky coating of clay would act as an isulator...

With reference to the map - I'm sure I've seen a version somewhere with the 2'6" gauge forming a complete circuit around the clay pit. Given the 'abandoned' line shown on the plan above across the lower end of the pit, would that have been an eairlier arrangement?

One of the layouts at the local exhibition has 5 penguins hidden around the layout (on the platform, in a tree, by a pond etc...) with a lolly for anyone who can find all 5 penguins.

 

Makes you study all the detail of the layout more and spot things you might not have other wise.

 

J

Erm, shouldn't it have been an apropriately named chocolate biscuit you won???

Slightly left-field but I think meets the criteria:

Great Orme Tramway cars 6 and 7 at the Upper Section passing loop...

Here's a question, Can an accurate model of a real place have cliches? Or is it the sole preserve of freelance layouts?

 

Cheers

 

Jim

You should avoid the topographical errors which are often the result of copying features from other layouts or lack of thought/observation of the prototype, and hopefully won't have the 'humorous' business names, but you can still park the bus on the bridge, have the frozen running man on the platform etc, and still run that 12 coach express into the country branch line terminus...

For me its that "Every layout must have one" feature regardless of how common the subject was in real life - the every US layout has a grain silo from the thread on the old forum being the classic...

I'm modelling the UP mainline in Nebraska. I'll have a hard time justifying NOT putting one in.

Perfect example of what I meant in the second paragraph:

That can come from ... ... ... ... copying of a feature from another layout resulting in what was perfectly accurate and apropriate on the original model appearing inapropriately on 2 dozen other layouts!

The grain silo is apropriate (almost essential) for your region of the US, however that doesn't excuse seemingly 95% of US based layouts having one regardless of where in the US they are supposedly set...

Paul

The term cliché itself raises an interesting discussion point… What exactly is it?

For me its that "Every layout must have one" feature regardless of how common the subject was in real life - the every US layout has a grain silo from the thread on the old forum being the classic...

That can come from lack of thought at the design stage or could also include the model-of-a-model copying of a feature from another layout resulting in what was perfectly accurate and apropriate on the original model appearing inapropriately on 2 dozen other layouts!

I don't think an entire layout genre such as the GWR BLT or Diesel Depot can be called a cliche (every one could be an excelent individual model) except possibly the (very few really) copies-of-copies-of-other-layouts with the identikit buildings and the same track layout etc...

Similar (probably not identical) thread, a few months ago.

And identical thread Modelling Cliches on the previous forum...

Hello, this is a mystery which has befuddled me for a while, why are preserved railways unpopular as Layout subjects? I mean modeling a fictitious preserved line opens up a huge range for a modeller

There's a huge difference between modelling a real preserved railway and creating a fictional preserved line.

 

Modelling a real location on a real preserved line (with the locos and stock that are actually operated there) is just as much a challenge as doing the same with any other railway line anywhere in the world.

 

....

 

Unfortunately, the words "fictional preserved line" have a rather different image associated with them. The image that appears in my head when I hear "fictional preserved line" is that of: Pick from whatever you like off the shelf RTR, don't weather it ("Because the society keeps it clean"), and match it with a short train of any coaching stock you want, also unweathered. Operate said line in an unprototypical way, on an unprototypical track layout. In other words, it's a train set. It gets better though - the people I've encountered who claim to have a "fictional model of a preserved railway" are using "It's a preserved line" to try to explain away faux-pas that real preserved lines couldn't even dream of getting away with. One example I've seen had several 66s running "in" and "out" of the preserved line on freight (and without stopping), and a variety of DMUs operated by several different TOCs, up to and including long distance types, running right into the societies main platform - including operating through services, apparently, as they'd come and go from both sides. That isn't a model of a fictional preserved railway, it's a train set, with all the trains the owner likes on it. (And described as a train set, it really is a great one. But a model of a fictional preserved line it isn't.

My thoughts are similar to Bloodnok's: certainly as far a standard gauge lines are concerned, the 'fictional preserved line' is all too often an excuse to run an unlikely collection of R-T-R stock, and frequently through some improbable scenery... Narrow gauge modellers tend to fare a little bit better at the 'fictional preserved line' theme (perhaps the need to build all the stock leads to a little more thought at the design stage??) and I can think of a couple of resonable efforts at 'preserved tramways'

Models of 'prototype preserved lines' do tend to fare a little better - there was a decent model of Gothland as preserved a few years ago and one of Alton on the Mid Hants Railway. Again It is an area where Narrow gauge modellers often outshine the standard gauge modellers - several fine examples I can think of based on NG lines, particularly the Ffestiniog and Talyllyn, in the preservation era.

Horses for Courses: - Austerities are in keeping with the character of small 'Light Railway' type lines such as Kent and East Sussex and industrial based lines such as Middleton Railway, but for the longer 'Mainline' and 'Country Branchline' you need something more...