Il Grifone

Definitely! I was trying to get a set in each colour, but they switched to the wretched animals before I managed that.

The baggage car certainly has an Italian air about it. I particularly liked the splendid Gr. 691 Pacific.

The coach bodies look like they could possibly be Hamblings to me and look like they are supposed to be LMS Stanier, though maybe a trifle short. The other bits came from something else, but I wouldn't like to say what, beyond agreeing that the couplings indeed appear to be Fleischmann.

Does anyone else remember the tiny plastic US trains that came in toilet rolls (Izal IIRC - I inflicted the hard toilet paper on the rest of the family! ) You could collect a whole train - locomotive, tender (much rarer than the loco!), box car (common - you needed two for the suggested complete train, gondola, tank car, and caboose in various colours. The family must have been relieved when they switched to some dreadful flat animals. I soon lost interest in these! I don't know what happened to them - parents threw them out I suspect - things were given to just disappearing!

I had one in my youth. It didn't suvive.... I did run the trailer cars (not the power car it was 6 volt) on my Dublo (shortage of coaches - hard to obtain due to the Korean War) , so the wheels (zinc alloy IIRC!) couldn't have been that bad The motor was also used in the Palitoy S gauge Prairie - rubbish there too! (the reason mine doesn't run!) A friend never returned my Trackmaster N2 after I loaned it, but I have got a replacement and 2 Kirdon* bodies which are projects for fitting to Tri-ang or Hornby chassis. * I think they are Kirdon rather than Trackmaster or Tri-ang (not that there is any great difference!). I know Kirdon were selling off the bodies in the mid-fifties (3/6d IIRC) and they are bereft of any transfers. (This AFAIK is the only difference in the bodies - Trackmaster 'BRITISH RAILWAYS' ,Tri-ang 'cycling lion' and I think Kirdon didn't bother. Unlike the Gaiety version. which is the same as the underscale Dublo one, these are about a centimetre longer.

Interesting. I for one would have been a customer for these in the fifties, but I never saw them. Perhaps they had already disappeared from the market? There were several short-lived products in the early fifties - Ever-Ready undergound set, Palitoy S gauge, etc. This came up as a link: https://www.ebay.co.uk Why?? No 'Rocket' ever got to this state. Neither the original - scrapped/rebuilt before delivery to the Liverpool and Manchester - in a very different form - opinions differ as to how much of the Rainhill locomotive was left - nor any of the various replicas. The seller has a large quantity of similar horrors. Real scrapped locos were off to somewhere like Woodham's ASAP.

With my luck, my Tardis would start an alternative timeline where Apple failed miserably....

That applies to lots of things!

My G.P.5 is part way through receiving an Airfix motor in her tender. My Farish King has part of the drive mechanism U/J missing. I was going to make a replacement part, but may stick a motor in the locomotive instead. It's finding the time to do it.... for example tomorrow I have to waste all day with a trek into London to visit H.M. Passport office. A short appointment, but hours of travel. (At least it's free with my bus pass!) Is it the long version of the Märklin skate? It's probably shorting to the point blades. My 3 rail Tri-ang DMU has the short version and never gave any problems.

I would have thought Australian and American stock would be roughly the same size, but Japanese would be smaller, especially on 3' 62 gauge (don't quote me on that!). 00 scale US stock should be available but it is rather a minority scale over there so not easy to find. As their 00 scale uses 19mm gauge regauging will be necessary.

Being in a permanent state of impecunity, I have very few items with NEM coupling pockets, but any out of spec. would get their marching orders! My personal preferences (probably listed already) are: EM - (Late 20s GWR) -3 links or screw as appropriate, On hold due to lack of space (and the eyesight isn't what it was!*) H0 - US (ATSF/UP) Kadees no 5 preferred H0 - (DSB) Lima Continental Loop - Ugly but it works (the height situation is critical Lima is different from everybody else! H0 (1/80) - (FS) Rivarossi version of above. (different height -uncouples magnetically with delay) 00 - BR (c1960) Peco The Dublo version couples perfectly but is chunkier (toy - 15" curves) with too much slop Anything else e.g. (vintage/collectibles) Leave well alone apart from adjustment. Talgo strictly means an articulated train with two wheeled vehicles articulated onto the adjoining one. I've even seen one - there used to be a direct link to Spain when we lived in Turin. Our American friends hi-jacked the term for bogie** mounted couplings. *I recall that when I was in school, one of my teachers said that short=sighted peaople were lucky as they wouldn't need glasses for close work. I can testify that this is nonsense as I need glasses both close and distant (I was told I was borderline for the Italian driving licence - all I can say is that the requirement is too slack. (A specified letter chart at three metres - no car number plate at 20 metres nonsense - It was 25 yards when I took the British test and I was surprised how easy it was - I had been a bit worried! **https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bogie They were bogies before they were trucks! I liked that the photo captioned 'bogie' appears to be something from across the pond and hence a 'truck''. As children, we called the wooden carts 'bogies' and I didn't live in Scotland though I am part Scottish. Waffled on as usual - Sorry!

Found it in the end! Farish locomotives do run once/if you can persuade them to start! A real feast of old goodies! A Dinky lorry lurking in the background, a Liliput tractor nearly gets hit by the train and assorted Master Model figures. I asume you weren't supposed to notice the shot of the Queen Mary in the middle of the commercial for the Queen Elizabeth! (Not that most of the viewers would have been in a financial position to avail themselves of her services!)

Wrenn was the common one (easily recognised by the enormous sleepers - "Scaled to match the rail!"), but there was Peco and Welkut as well. (Peco was rather good - I can't speak for Welkut). Rail fixings are best described as delicate'. Peco did supply 1/2" spikes to fix their track with! IIRC Wrenn favoured tiny screws.... Wrenn clipped the rail to the sleeper base every few inches with a rail joiner like device. When I tried to curve some, the rail parted company with the sleepers. At around 6/- a yard (3 rail steel) I wasn't impressed! It was necessary to cut the sleeper webs to curve the track - no mollycddling like today when it's already done for us. (Well Ok for gentle curves. Set track type curves need a bit more. (I always cut the lot, as there is surfeit of sleepers. As supplied it's about right for H0 U.S. mainline practice (their main market of course). I would have thought 2 degrees F was a bit chilly even for Cardiff. I lived in Bristol (Just over the river) in my youth and never had anything like that. Only 34.2 degrees C? I've got a picture I took in Sardinia of the thermometer reading 45 degrees C!

I can't say I've had this problem myself, but the Tri-ang wheels tend to head binwards to be replaced by Hornby wheels*, though these would be prone to the same problem. This certainly neatly bypasses the problem and as an added bonus saves having to fiddle with the quartering. * Other makes are available, but usually need bushing as most axles are 1/8" diameter, whereas Hornby are 9/64". (Romford/Markits can supply a 9/64" axle.)

Who's been a naughty boy then? Lewis in the remains of his bed! Yet again!

Very interesting Thanks! I see reading this quote: "If you have access to a re-magnitiser, then it's not a really big deal. There was an article in the September 1972 issue of Model Railroader by Ben King about how to build a re-magnetiser from old television filter chokes. " I remember the article. The trouble was that, even in 1972, TVs had long stopped using filter chokes. Large wound components are 1. heavy and 2. expensive! - both criteria for their abolition.

I didn't think there were any of these left. (I do have the Woolies version which never had a tender - Must see what i can cobble up.) She appeared at the very end of the Lone Star production, when I think they realised they had launched a non-starter and were cutting their losses. I have the British goods set, though the box has gone - water damage due to flooding and various bits from the American range. I seem to recall (the belts have long since perished) that there were two speeds 'stop' and 'bat out of hell'! IIRC the box cars were available in UP, NH, KCS, B&M, and ATSF liveries, but I only recall seeing UP locomotives - certainly the 0-8-0, but the F series (F7? - I've never checked) is usually UP yellow likewise the passenger cars (obviously copied from Tri-ang, like most of the Lone-Star range) there was a coach and a vista-dome, (Memory (in particular mine) is not reliable of course. Lucky the shack fell off the tender! it saved you the trouble! Hopefully the green* paint is acrylic and meths will shift it. *Strange colour - U.S. steam freight locomotives, like Ford's Model T, were available in any colour you like, as long as it is black!

No one should get too excited about the Imminent arrival of the Danish Ferry. She does have a name though - 'Prinsesse Astrid' (after my daughter). I did look into the cost of etched portholes - and immediately dropped that idea... I was thinking about three parallel tracks each capable of taking three coaches or the equivalent length in wagons. (European coaches come in 'long' and 'very long'!) This means three feet at least, plus another foot or so for the gauntletted track on the access bridge.

Ours love sitting in a box and then methodically tearing little bits off and scattering them all over the floor!

That's the trouble - ships tend to come in Large, Very Large and Extra Large! (I'm thinking of building a Danish train ferry, but the ship is going to have to be 5-6 feet long (and way undersized at that!)) 1/76 is really only a railway modelling scale. 1/72 and 1/80 are noticeably larger and smaller (probably acceptable for a ship), but other ship scales are way out. I work on a basis of less than about 3% out of scale is not really noticeable. Perhaps this revels my slack standards!

The rivets succomb to a screwdriver from inside the coach quite easily. (Lift the bits that have been bent over - with care they come away without damage to the coach body, Of course you then need five new bogies. Margate in their wisdom widened the top sideframe to fill the gap which would have been OK had they then not stretched the springs upwards too! Or fit the smaller wheels to the whole set. (I forget what I did with my Tri-ang DMU which I converted for Dublo 3 rail. IIRC the motor bogie at least has Dublo wheels as follows. I've fitted Dublo wheels to Tri-ang motor bogies. Just ream them out to fit the plastic axle. They are perfect for code 100 track*. (preferably the early zinc alloy ones. The later sintered iron variety are not so good. They were subcontracted out to a company who knew nothing about the correct profile of railway wheels and made them all-square. * I think the wheel standards were the only thing Lines Bros. adopted from their take over of Dublo.

Scalescenes do a few ships in their print it yourself range to 4mm scale. They are easily altered for other scales on your computer of course.

The ride height is too high anyway, so lowering it shouldn't be a problem as long as things work OK. The buffer centre line should be a tad under 14mm (prototype is 3' 5½" but up to 2½" is allowed for wheel wear).

You may find these useful: http://www.hornbyguide.com/service_sheet_details.asp?sheetid=324 http://www.hornbyguide.com/service_sheet_details.asp?sheetid=193 The part missing is R.3456 (easy to remember!) However, I am not impressed by these pickups made from bits of wire* and would make a proper one from a piece of PCB board (preferably fibreglass rather than paxolin) and a thin strip of phosphor bronze. *One of the Hornby Dublo ideas Tri-ang should not have copied!

My H & M Powermaster has the Vari-Wave slider which seems to even tame a 'Smokey Joe' - I have one in all over blue plastic*. I wonder if feeding the controller from the 110v side of the transformer I have would improve things still further or just be a waste of effort. * A carpy 3 pole motor of obscure origins and low gearing is going to make slow running a bit lumpy whatever you do. I don't think there is any asbestos inside a Powermaster, but it is not impossible seeing their age and I don't intend to dismantle mine to find out. I suppose I should build myself a nice transistor feedback device, but one I built ages ago worked well enough but the motors tended to overheat with the nasty high frequency chopper waveform. My poor little Rivarossi N scale U.S. 0-4-0 was particularly allergic. One of these - the tender version. She must beat even GWR no.101 as most modelled obscure prototype - I believe there were four of them. https://www.google.com/search All the Nellie variants I have use an X.04 with 14:1 (IIRC) reduction gearing, The Far Eastern efforts undoubtedly costs a fraction of the price of this beast which would explain its demise.