Flying Pig

55 minutes ago, mow said:

Have had a Siberian Lesser Whitethroat, feeding in the garden from late October til early February. It was trapped, ringed, and recorded in January and DNA testing pointed to a blythi rather than halimodendri subspecies. 

 

 

 

What a fantastic garden visitor.

On 26/02/2024 at 12:23, Will Crompton said:

Yes, according to the discussion under the picture on Flickr -  "Level X-ing at junction of Old Middlesbrough Road with Harcourt Road viewed from Middlesbrough Road over bridge." It seems to tally with former lines visible on Rail Map.

 

https://railmaponline.com/UKIEMap.php

 

Also the houses visible in the left background seem to be those visible on Google Maps abutting Leven Street and Alan Street.

About in the middle of this 1938 6-inch survey.  The scrapyard doesn't appear on any of the large scale maps available at NLS and seems to occupy the site of the brick and tile works.

The line is the branch to Eston, which appears from the relevant 1-inch sheets on the NLS site to have been closed beyond this point by the time of the photo.  It looks like a classic rationalised situation with the former down branch still in existence beyond the level crossing, the up branch forming the middle road in the photo and the rightmost line part of the entry to the extensive sidings shown on the 1947 map which would be behind the photographer if they still existed.  Points from the down branch under the full wagons converted to hand operation at some time (possibly quite early as passenger services ceased in 1929).

14 hours ago, Les1952 said:

I'll dismantle the bogie tomorrow and see if I can remove the guards at the front.  Hopefully that should work.  It would be nice to operate it on Bregstadt occasionally- it isn't as inappropriate as some of the European "preserved" stuff that might appear, and looks quite good on a rake of 6-wheel Umbauwagen.

 

It is a bit of a showcase queen at the moment- only really bought because 60004 was the only A4 I photographed in BR service.  I also saw it TWICE working tender first on goods trains!

 

I'll post how I get on.  At least mentioning it has bumped the thread more into the collective consciousness.....

 

Les

 

Have you seen the following post and subsequent ones (apologies if you have but there seems to be a cats cradle of threads and links on this topic)?

https://community.hornbyhobbies.com/topic/35136-bogie-modification/?do=findComment&comment=373875

Before cutting bits off your precious loco, make sure the bogie pivot is moving freely in the slot in the bracket.

4 hours ago, GordonC said:

 

haven't we already had HTO/HTV 21t hoppers????

 

Not from Accurascale (they have done the 24.5t hoppers).  Hornby released a new tool model of the original unfitted LNER design, but haven't reissued it recently afaik.  BR fitted and unfitted wagons with welded bodies have never been available rtr and neither have the rebodies from the 1970s.  Plenty of variation to have a go at.

2 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Yes I do. It's Geoff Ashdown's own drawing rather so I think it's OK to post it. 

Can you remember anything of his explanation? I still suspect the sheer bu**eration of building a reliable double slip was the real reason as also for the interlaced points in the goods yard.  

Thanks - that's probably the one I saw on the layout.

Unfortunately, I can't really remember anything of what Geoff said.

1 hour ago, CaptainBiggles said:

That said (and this is what I love about this thread - the debate!), my query stands: Minories has 2 roads at the RH, 3 at the LH. The bottom half of Tower Pier (as drawn) has 2 RH / 4 LH. Reversing it would tessalate it much more neatly, no?

Yes, it would fit more neatly into the rectangular space, but is that what is wanted?  Perhaps implying that the layout fans out beyond what we can see is better?    As I've already said, one of the strong points about this layout is the way it implies its context beyond the rather small box in which it is built.

1 hour ago, CaptainBiggles said:

Noting that the top half is essentially a straight Minories, if it were to retain the natural kink of CJF's original

It isn't quite, as platform 2 is departure only.  The layout of the station is a bit quirky with the main arrival platform (with loco release) 'wrong side' and we would probably have torn it to bits if it had been posted on here.  But Geoff had created a lot of lore concerning the history and operation of the station that made sense of it - he explained it to me at an exhibition and only I wish that I could remember the details of what he said.

@Pacific231G do you have a picture of the diagram of routes connecting to Tower Pier that you could post here, please?   

13 minutes ago, teletougos said:

Beyond a certain point, it all comes down to faith

On the small number of occasions I saw Tower Pier, I was as impressed by Geoff's interactions with the public as by the excellence of his layout.  The personal qualities recalled in his obituary were certainly on display. 

It's very pleasing to hear the layout is in safe hands, since it is in my view one of the greats.

9 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

If anyone's interested I'll happily post a few more of my images of Tower Pier

Please do.  I agree it is a very fine layout and I do hope it won't be lost.  It's a layout that benefits from being well integrated into its railway surroundings, which gives even almost vestigial trackwork like the goods roads much more presence and interest.  A great use of limited space and always well presented when I saw it.

9 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Where is it cached by Google ?

I googled "Geoff Ashdown tower pier" and got a lot of images linked to various RMweb threads, so it hasn't been reposted elsewhere afaik.

A perhaps useful repost, originally posted by @Pacific231G on this thread, now lost from the forum but still for some reason cached by Google.  The signal diagram for Tower Pier:

On 19/02/2024 at 19:41, Nearholmer said:

Terminus-circuit-terminus is the ultimate model railway configuration IMO, it’s very satisfying to operate, and if it isn’t heresy in this thread I’d say that the best use Minories could be put to would be as the city terminus on such a layout.

You might like this ;)

1 hour ago, aac said:

Because minories plans are not generally based on large stations, constricted as we are by space limitations, a simple rule in creating your design could be described as "Tracks IN to all platforms, and  platforms OUT to all tracks." Hope that helps.

 

aac

You don't have to.  For one person operation and a less intense operating regime, separating the arrival and departure platforms and having to shunt before departure may be seen as increasing the play value.  That requires just a single trailing crossover with the conventional double track approach, but the OP has complicated things by imagining two separate single lines.

You could start with the layout as posted, remove one of the crossovers (duplication achieves nothing here) and run the approach as double track with the junction imagined off scene (perhaps some splitting distants on the starters to suggest it).

3 minutes ago, Caledonian said:

Looks splendid, pity about the B Set hanging on the back. Look forward to something more appropriate 😁

I was more concerned by the South Western coos at the start.

6 hours ago, Nearholmer said:

I know it doesn’t address the topic, but if people already have engines, or camping stoves, it’s not difficult to replace the tablets (which frankly aren’t much good anyway) with wadding and meths, and its not hard to make, if you can’t buy, a wick burner. Messing about with liquid meths and matches isn’t the sort of activity you’d really want to entrust to an unsupervised 14yo though, which is where the tablets do come in useful - they are about the safest way imaginable of burning something to rehearse heat.

Yeah, 14 year olds get funny ideas.  Good thing I was 12 when my Mamod arrived.

1 hour ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

Didn't someone do the Kerr Stuart Victory Class that the Alexandra Docks and Brecon & Merthyr had?

 

 

Jason

Planet Industrials in 00 (and Minerva in 0).

14 minutes ago, BVMR21 said:

Taff Vale Railway O1 could be interesting to see, given it would be the only Welsh pregrouping loco done in 00 gauge ready to run...
You've got Swindonised variants as well as the possibility for one in NCB condition.

info about the preserved 01 here and it is notable how dreary GW livery is compared to the TVR and Hetton schemes.

Alternatively an 02 is also preserved and operational on the Worth Valley.  It too worked for the NCB in County Durham as Lambton No. 52. I don't think we've had an rtr Lambton engine yet - a major omission in my opinion.

Lambton Hetton & Joicey Colliery Railway 52 by Nick Baxter, on Flickr

39 minutes ago, Hobby said:

 

I agree with that, and someone on FB has already made some lower quadrants. It's more something that Peco would do of the major manufacturers but hasn't done yet though I'm sure they said they would. I just need upper quadrants! Some people on FB have used N scale ones (Dapol?) but they don't look very good in my eyes, same as using Metcalf N which some people seem quite happy with.

Maybe try Wizard Models who have the MSE signal parts.  It might be possible to reduce the etchings to 1:120 if there was enough interest.

42 minutes ago, Les1952 said:

Deltic bogie securing chains

They're actually part of the handbrake linkage.  Which doesn't make them less of a nuisance on the model of course.

TBH I don't think Minories is giving you anything here, though this isn't quite Minories as it has two crossovers of the same hand, rather than one of each. That means trains to or from the top branch can't use the bottom platform at all, but trains to or from the bottom branch have an unnecessary duplicate route to the top platform. 

A simple pair of crossovers would be more flexible.

46 minutes ago, AY Mod said:

There were always key points on journeys that you made sure you were hanging out of by the window for these moments.

 

Seventies and Eighties

• Down the WCML on any excursion to the south coast and waiting at Mitre Bridge Junction to see if you'd got a 33 next.
• Approaching Colton Junction from Church Fenton to spot the first Deltic of the day.
• Coming off the curve at Didcot to see the first HSTs of the day.

Wouldn't that be Chaloners Whin (now known as Tesco)?  The Selby Diversion didn't open until after the end of the world in January 1982.

13 minutes ago, Captain Kernow said:

Why does it matter whether it's called a train set or a model railway? Why is this important to some folk?

 

We've got to have boundaries, or how would we know which side we were on?  Stands to reason.

2 minutes ago, The Johnster said:

 

The very antithesis of my views, which are that operation is the core element of a layout and every last drop should be wrung out of the trackplan.  We are trying to emulate real operation to the best of our ability on our layouts (well, I am, different viewpoints and philosophies are available), and the real place had a busy goods yard that was shunted quite a lot.  Passenger trains in fixed rakes are boring in comparison, and if anything had to go into 'essentially scenic' mode it would be passenger stock doing nothing, positioned in a platform road in the background!

When that involves unprototypical shunting methods or complicated mechanisms in a small scale, compromise may be the better option.  There is already a lot of compromise in model goods yards, almost certainly including your own, and it is a matter of individual taste where the line is drawn. 

If you look at the station as a whole, there is plenty of scope for operation and I doubt it would detract much from the enjoyment of the layout if you left the goods shed and its surrounding track as essentially scenic.  You could park a couple of wagons in the headshunt beyond the shed to give an impression of its operation and just stick to shunting the reception sidings.