Flying Pig

It's still too low. I was saved from buying the first issue, as it sold out while I was dithering. If the next one doesn't sell so quickly, I may be in danger again. Another £100 would put it safely out of reach - please reconsider, Hornby.

Surely this only works on the Circle Line?

Loose shunting at Tinsley in 1990:

Hi Bill It's not the slip in the throat that bothers me. That's an improvement on the original as regards eliminating reverse curves, the only potential issue being the tight radius of rtr slips, which of course doesn't apply if you're building your own track. I've sketched your plan below (on the right), next to a version of standard Minories that also uses a slip (and has an additional crossover, of which more later). Most of the track below the dashed line is the same on both. Above the line you have changed the access to platforms 2 and 3, and added a trailing crossover A. (Sorry for the small size of the image - I don't have access to decent drawing software at the moment.) So my points: - rearranging access to platform 3 has allowed arrival into that platform simultaneously with departure from platform 2, which Minories does not (I confess I hadn't noticed this when I posted before); - however, unlike Minories, an arrival into platform 2 blocks departures from platform 1; - the extra crossover A through the tandem adds nothing, as departures from platform 3 still block the whole throat just as if they were going via the slip; - so on balance, your layout actually has about the same operational flexibility as Minories, but uses more points and is at least one ordinary point plus a tandem point longer. If you want simultaneous operation of platforms 2 and 3 in Minories, a better way to achieve it IMO is just to add an extra trailing crossover (B in my sketch) as this doesn't affect any of the other movements already possible and may be slightly more compact.

1) Additional unnecessary points to build; 2) Two to three more point lengths in the throat; 3) Less operational flexibility than Minories (a train arriving in the middle platform blocks one departing from the rightmost platform). A good illustration of why CJF was unable to improve on his original idea

There's a fair amount on Wikipedia about the Horwich 2-10-0 and it does seem to have been a serious project. The Flamme Type 36 which inspired it appears to have had a divided drive with the inside cylinders set well forward, as well as a degree of articulation in the coupled wheelbase (which the Horwich sketch seems to have omitted in favour of a more compact wheelbase). More on both engines in this excerpt.

This is a really nice idea and well worth someone with access to planning software or templates working out in detail. It reminds me very much of Lymebrook Yard, one of my favourite N gauge layouts, which note is not a full double circuit, but compensates for that by using streamline points.

I like this. For practicality I would put a bridge over the right hand end of the yard and take the goods loop right round the back of the layout, thus avoiding the need for a curved point at setrack radii.

People who think that a small urban layout needs to be a square box with houses along the back should be made to look at Hedges Hill until the penny drops. It's a superbly composed scene.

Just some old layout... Still the best evocation of its time and place that I've seen.

Quite a lot off topic, really, as it has little to do with the OP and is likely to spawn a long discussion. Perhaps better raised as its own thread in the Transition Diesel Liveries forum?

In the absence of continuous track circuiting, how did this work with sidings converted to loops? The back of the train would not pass the box, so the signalman could not see the lamp and confirm it to be complete.

This is what the LMS built when able to dictate the scale of operations: http://www.steve-banks.org/prototype-and-traffic/143-lms-coal-the-40t-hoppers

Nicely done, but you seem to have fallen into one of the Heffalump traps associated with 16t minerals. I'm treading on dangerous ground myself here, but I believe that until the rebodying programme started around 1970, any wagons without top flaps were from batches built before about 1947 and this would appear to be what your model represents. It clearly isn't a rebodied wagon as it has bottom doors (and thus also independent brakes) and the livery is much too early. As far as I know the top flap was introduced on batches built about 1948/49. These wagons differed from the later BR standard design in retaining the bottom doors and independent brakes. I think they are the basis for the Airfix kit. Happy to be corrected on the above.

I never run my trains in stock - it's difficult to clean off and if hot enough can even damage the mouldings. I'm reminded of the advice the late great Spike Milligan gave in a slightly different context:

I'm very impressed with the tone of the horns - they have none of the buzziness that afflicts so many models even in larger scales.

This argument cropped up on the Farish 40 thread as these models are also fitted with speakers as standard. However, only one model actually has DCC onboard (with sound) and it is clearly advertised as such and sold at a commensurately higher price. The other 40s are £5-10 pounds more expensive than comparable models such as recent 37s and 55s on the retail sites I've looked at, though it isn't possible to say how much of this is due to the speaker. In the 2018 Farish announcements, Bachmann advise that they are updating the chassis of a number of recent models to also have speakers as standard, so it looks like company policy in N gauge at least. It makes sense from their point of view to rationalise the range.

To be fair, when you exhume a thread after this amount of time, it's very hard to differentiate actual content from irony staining.

That's not extreme: this is extreme.

Thanks for your support, but I'm sure I said precisely the opposite As for Webb's patent radial boxes, my somewhat cynical guess is that the unique features were of interest mostly to patent lawyers and just sufficient to avoid paying royalties to someone else.

That's certainly how the Bachman Radial Tank works (minus any side control), but a full size radial 'truck'* isn't really a truck at all. Rather, the axleboxes are allowed to move sideways in specially shaped hornguides fixed to the mainframes that cause the wheels to steer just as if they were mounted on a Bissell truck, so the axle hence remains 'radial' to the track curvature. The Cartazzi axleboxes used on Gresley Pacifics are radial boxes with side control provided by inclined planes on top where the loco's weight is supported, but radial axles were very widely used in tank engines with a leading and/or trailing axle (0-4-2T, 2-4-2T, 0-6-2T etc) and I don't know what, if any, side control most designs employed. * Look up 'radial truck' on Wikipedia and you'll find a description of a bogie with multiple steering axles that isn't quite the same thing.

Lambton58's appreciation and thanks are duly seconded. I can't remember when I've enjoyed a show more. I'm currently sitting with a glazed look and making chuff chuff noises, like a less handsome Mr Toad. Sadly (or perhaps fortunately), the cloisters of Pig Hall wouldn't run to live steam, even if the coffers would.

I wouldn't have expected the same for the LMS group, but we will shortly have models of passenger tanks from the Lanky, LNWR and Midland, all in Bachmann boxes.

I have the very early Mainline LMS black Scots Guardsman and it certainly has no reverser in the cab (neither did the Jubilee), nor was it glazed as bought.

'...as a refusal often offends.'