daveyb

I think there a restriction on them going west over the Rockies at the moment. A trainmaster at Lethbridge told me he is not allowed to put them on westbound traffic, only north or eastbound. I saw a very clean one leading a very strange consist northbound at Red Deer AB today. It was leading two GEs, a SD60 in SOO white and three GPs in various CP reds and a fairly short mixed train of mostly hoppers but a few find. I'm guessing it was a stock move from works various.

After a brief internet search I couldn't find anything about the Hyson company (or the Desilux of London company). Were they a licensee of the Airchime name from the Nathan company, and its predecessors, in the US and Canada?

Far too tidy, no litter and the windows are obviously printed acetate stuck to the Bilteze office model: https://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=598813

UPS will invoice you for import taxes like FedEx did. UPS have also recently upped their prices to match Fedex, so your market is being squeezed further. Purolator use DHL as the Euro delivery agent, so they might be worth a look. USPS and Canada Post are just public corporation expensive. They are no different from the semi-private Royal Mail in their outlook, cost and capability.

I always thought the RNADs would be interesting to work in. I only worked Army ordnance depots... Big and modern with only rail loading in and out not to the sheds. Nesscliff and Upnor were interesting, too

... And above that 86250 seems to have no arrows at all and is missing a swallow in its slightly strange looking Inter-city livery. The flat yellow ends look a strange variation.

I'm not sure if it's been covered (I posted it i the Garden railways section too, please delete the thread if it has) but Kalmbach publishing will no longer be producing Garden Railways (GR) magazine in the US. GR was a very good copy that split from Model Railroader in the 80s under the editorship of Marc Horowitz and was a really good read and companion to Garden Rail in UK. I believe Marc and the editor of Garden Rail, Tag Gorton, were close associates over the years. The magazine market has changed significantly and the GR is no longer viable, which is a shame and I shall miss it. I have emailed Kalmbach customer service to see if their original CD ROM of back issues to 2016 is to be extended (an hopefully reformatted for download). We shall see...

I'm not sure if it's been covered (please delete the thread if it has) but Kalmbach publishing will no longer be producing Garden Railways (GR) magazine in the US. GR was a very good copy that split from Model Railroader in the 80s under the editorship of Marc Horowitz and was a really good read and companion to Garden Rail in UK. I believe Marc and the editor of Garden Rail, Tag Gorton, were close associates over the years. The magazine market has changed significantly and the GR is no longer viable, which is a shame and I shall miss it. I have emailed Kalmbach customer service to see if their original CD ROM of back issues to 2016 is to be extended (an hopefully reformatted for download). We shall see

I remember the CP SD40-2 that were used as B units with blanked cabs. There were a few kicking around Medicine Hat on the Lethbridge run in 99-02. Some of them have since been changed back to full control again (then refurbished into SD30 eco). Do the cow and calf units count as A & B units? Slugs have no engine so no controls are necessary. I must admit that I was initially talking about the the carboxy B units built that way rather than the hood units that were converted. I'm not sure I see the point of a cowl B unit...

So it's as I guessed, in the main. It would be really awkward having a loco you couldn't move stuck in the way, so if only enough to shunt it then the controls were a sensible and likely addition. Once you moved into hood or cowl units and the need for a uniform, streamline shape is overcome by the need for efficiency and flexibility, the need for Bs is gone.

What is it being used for in the picture?

I've not lived in Herts for some time but the Watford Junction to St.Albans Abbey was always a useful and even busy train at rush hours. When did it drop to parliamentary frequency? The talk of closure was lifted in the 80/90s when it was electrified. They are always talking about a light rail extension option into the town centres but that's never happening soon!

Are there controls in a B-Unit? I'm guessing yes as it may need to be moved in a yard or depot situation but possibly only a basic set-up? Most of them seem to have a window next to the central end door and I'd guess it was for these 1/2 cabs. There was a similar system in one end of 1962 stock on the London Underground so they could split trains and run a 1.5 set though I'm fairly sure it was only used in the depot. Sorry if it seem a daft question...

I don't think I be ever seen a pic of a Metro Cam with a 4 digit headcode box, either.

When I was on work experience at St. Pancras in '85, I was told that the 127s had only been allowed to use their built in taillights for the last 18 months of their life. The reason I was given was that the unions had not agreed the phasing out of the lamp lighters job, but he retired and they quickly and quietly forgot about it!

I agree that it would be that Pg54 is the same loco you posted and it does suggest a CLC product. I don't think it is the same loco as your Alamy stock link above. The generator is not visible on the link above the front of the cab. Unless we can find a further corroboration as to which location is correct... A whole other hunt. If you can still stand on the Port Moody location you may be able to match the skyline beyond against your earliest photo. It's a fascinating area.

Zooming in, beyond the two Mk4s is a Mk1... ECS on delivery from repair?

As it was mentioned further up, but a slight diversion, how did the Camping Coaches of old deal with sewerage? I guess that they had gas lighting and cooking as they were unlikely to have electricity run to them.

When this thread started (before the lockdown) I was thinking that activity on RMWeb was a little bit down on previous years. That has changed as people have had more time, as has the level of physical modelling so it's obvious modern life gets in the way. The days of paper magazines are numbered, I fear. Yesterday, Kalmbach announced they are ceasing production of Garden Railways magazine. Sad after all those years of some fantastic model railways in some amazing gardens. The comments that MR is no longer what it used to be are valid, but I suspect that dwindling advertising revenues are to blame... Fewer advertiser's as shop close down, fewer big box manufacturers, fewer people actually buying print. Online activity is surprisingly narrow minded. People assume that as you have the whole internet to look at, there will be more variety, but studies find the opposite; people can go to look at only what they specifically want to look at, and they don't get the exposure to the stuff alongside. Being a bit more settled now, my slow attempts to get back into modelling in general are coming along but will never be worthy of exhibition. I do wonder if we have become too critical. Please keep modelling and posting. I love seeing what talented people can achieve and post in a friendly forum.

There are a few drop ship options at border crossing towns, but the border is shut for frivolous mailing runs at the moment. The moment the border is mentioned it puts the shipping costs up. USPS is expensive and the others seem a lottery. I'm glad I'm not a route planner either. They go via some very strange hubs!

I said when I dug out my copy of Logging by Rail: The British Columbia Story by Robert D Turner, that I might be able to identify the loco. I have finally gone through the boxes and found the book but not the photo! The similar picture I was referring to (in post nearly 2 years ago) in the book is a different loco. Who knows? I may even have been looking at the same photo as pH when I said it was familiar. I suspect it may have been a Baldwin as suggested as they were commonly used in the area and would have been passed down to logging companies as the mainline work and even shunting became too heavy. Two documented examples that are similar and had a mainline past were Comox Logging Nos 7 & 16, both dating from 1910 and both starting with the Pacific Great Eastern before being transferred to logging subsidiary and sold to Comox in 1920. Both were initially preserved on static display but have now been either broken or moved in pieces.

Slightly off topic as we have led that way already... The Canadian National wet noodle is one of the greatest railway symbols/logos ever. It says everything and hasn't changed in around 55 years. Soo Line had a splendid livery around the same time, bold, novel, clear, it was a classic in design terms. They gave it up in the 90s for a dull, insipid plain red with modern lettering and then just faded into the CP pot. Another example of a long standing logo must be the London Transport roundel nearly 100 years of use and instantly recognisable despite the various political attempts to undermine it. I don't really see how the EWS livery can be described as a failure, it's simple, it's recognisable, it didn't get fussed with too much, and it's still there. The Railfreight grey was a nothing, and was soundly irrelevant as the sector system died a death. Loadhaul was much better. G & W is typically American, just garish and fussy but they want their corporate image to replace the bold Freightliner brand... They have paid for it!

I know it's off topic, but with your reasoning, I don't think the Humber Bridge would ever have been built... it's a huge road bridge from one dying industrial area to another dying industrial area and incomplete links at both ends. I agree with the rest of the post entirely!

If you used the ebay link to track it, it is next to useless. I ordered an item from Nevada which was tracked as far as Vancouver BC on 4 July where it apparently scanned 4 times. It hasn't changed since. I checked on the USPS site and on a third party tracking site called Hot-tracking.com and not only was it in Vancouver a day earlier, it moved to Calgary on 4 July and is listed for delivery tomorrow or Wednesday. Still hasn't moved according to ebay. I too despair of the ebay fleecing over shipping and have complained to them directly. That was a waste of time as you will well imagine. Some dealers specifically say they will not help with the shipping/customs charges as it is against ebay policy, but some will respond to an email. I had excellent dealing with a number of sellers where they agreed to take it directly to a shipper as a 'collected' item. I paid only US$18 to ship 6 HO hoppers from NYC to Alberta where as I have seen figures of over US$60 to ship one hopper from other ebay sites. Choose well and try to circumnavigate ebay!

But that is a regulation change, not an engineering change. They could be crew-less, or if we must have personnel, they could be on the station. Without stating current regs and thinking, why could train not be automated if the technology permits it. The ASLEF arguement in the article is flawed as it would be new project money that paid for re-signalling, not maintenance or current capital expenditure budgets. It may be purely provocative, but he is not wrong about being held to ransom. He is s Conservative, after all, so baiting and reducing union influence is a key policy.