DavidB-AU

Somebody please state the wheel arrangement in both UIC and Whyte notation. 😁

Had grouping not happened it would have been because nationalisation proceeded in 1919. Grouping only happened as a compromise to full nationalisation. The interesting thought exercise is what designs from around 1920-21 could have been taken forward into mass production as "standards" for the whole country. EDIT: The only other way to avoid grouping is the war didn't happen (unlikely), was much smaller/shorter or Britain remained largely on the sidelines (perhaps simply supplying munitions to France). In which case there was likely to be some consolidation of pre-grouping companies anyway. There was a proposal to merge the LNWR, MR and L&Y in 1909. The war simply made things happen a lot faster. If you look at the Board of Trade Railway Returns 1912 (I think the last complete list before the war), the most profitable company was the NBR with operating expenses being 55% of revenue. CR was 56%, TVR was 57%, LBSCR as 60%, L&Y and SECR were 62%, GWR was 63%, GER, LNWR, LSWR, MR and NER were 64%, GNR was 65% and GCR was 66% (it had been the most profitable at 49% before construction of the London extension). After that is a very big gap and 100+ companies making very little (if any) profit and were open to a merger, takeover or closure. When you look at return on capital, surprisingly TVR came out on top and unsurprisingly GCR was the worst. The companies above average were TVR, GNR, GWR, LNWR, LSWR, LBSCR, MR and NER. So without war-inspired grouping, instead of the Big Four there would likely have been consolidation down to the Big Somewhere Between Eight and Fifteen without any government encouragement. This was already happening in the USA - the number of Class I railroads peaked in 1911.

CLARKSON!!!

A solution to cab heating?

I was told that joke while visiting Canada. How do you tell the difference between a black bear and a brown bear? Climb a tree. A black bear will climb up after you. A brown bear will shake the tree until you fall out.

I've got an idea for a movie! https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-21/snakes-on-a-plane-disrupts-virgin-flight/104631330

Two Queen songs for the price of one?

Could I suggest having a look at Ian Futers' Newcastle Haymarket and add one platform. That could give you much the same operational capacity but with considerably simpler trackwork.

Canadians with guns are still Canadians - the friendliest, nicest, most polite people you can ever meet. It's Canadians with hockey sticks you need to worry about. They turn into homicidal maniacs!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scunthorpe_problem

There's no V in Caernarfon either. Now let's all enjoy that great Welsh film F for Vendetta. (With apologies to Graeme Garden.)

The most famous being the "universal greeblie" which was the axle box cover from the Hasegawa Leopold rail gun. It appears on almost every Star Wars miniature made by Industrial Light & Magic. Off the shelf military aircraft and vehicle kits were bashed together for Star Wars in much the same way Airfix kits were used for Thunderbirds.

An interesting "might have been" is a Mk 4 NTA to operate with a standard class 91 and DVT as a 125mph alternative to the class 325, and the proposal to convert surplus Mk 3 sleepers for carrying mail.