Neal Ball

I wonder if it became an issue when cars were being loaded and needed the consistent height. Horse drawn vehicles, might have been easier to bounce up a slight difference in height. Im guessing, but is it a case of “different times”?

Lovely photo - clearly I need to delve into the history of the 517 class.

Definitely, perhaps @AY Mod could do that…. Or the person who started the thread. @papagolfjuliet

Excellent news, I wish Dapol well with these projects - 517 and some Toplight carriages will do very nicely thank you. Perhaps we could persuade Dapol to announce the Saint class 4-6-0 soon.... 😎

That would be very nice Nick. Of course I would settle for the 61xx in steam.... and maybe something on the Broad gauge - perhaps in a few years eh! Nice set of photos John thank you - for both sets.

Thanks John, Last year of course the Saint was in steam and I had a cab ride on it, which was great. Previously it had been at the Severn valley, but they were in drought conditions so no steam was running that day. This year, it will be nice to see Pendennis Castle in steam somewhere. Just found the loco roster for Didcot. Let’s hope it’s not the class 31! https://didcotrailwaycentre.org.uk/article.php/93/locomotive-roster Thanks again, Neal.

Lovely loco John. I am hoping it’s at Didcot when we get over in the summer.

He showed me a photo and dimensionally it was the same size, but half the height. Of course anything is better than the puny speaker Accurascale supplied. I shrugged my shoulders and put to down to facebook - 🤣

Some more photos from yesterdays running session: Anthony Manor seen approaching Henley-on-Thames with the c23 clerestory 3rd carriage: Plus two photos of Grange class 4-6-0 6860 on the approaches to Henley-on-Thames. I couldn't decide which one I prefer: Both speakers are the same size squeezed into the small Collett tender. I am of the view that the bigger size speaker will offer the better sound. When I posted the image of the Manor and its new speaker onto Facebook, someone said I should have gone for a slimmer version from Roads and Rails..... interesting thought, it would have been easier to get in, but I still cant get my head round the logic..... Anyway, I am happy with my large Youchoos speaker.

It was only right that my Grange loco was hauling todays train of two sunshine carriages and the C23 clerestory carriage. My Manor class loco was waiting to take over and take the carriages away from Henley-on-Thames.

On the day that 6880 Betton Grange was launched to its supporters, I finished off the C23 Clerestory all 3rd carriage.. Thanks to Tony @brumtb for both this carriage and the body kit for the County tank. All the door furniture is now on and we even have some passengers gazing out of the windows. Essentially at this point in their life, this would have been a strengthening carriage to add extra 3rd class seats. With 10 compartments at (say) 4 across - this carriage would have 80 extra passengers. I'm sure on busy Regatta days, it would have been standing room only - so we could easily be talking about 150... 5 across, plus 5 standing... probably more.

Thanks Rob. Probably the hardest part is getting enough weight into the loco. If your 2-4-2T is a normal white metal kit then you will be fine. It looks as if the leading bogie needs more weight adding to it, so that’s going to be a plasticard box made up with lead shot added. The idea being to stop the leading wheel riding up on the double slips!

Thanks Nick - I’m very pleased with it - it’s taken a lot to get here!

Quick update! The loco has just brought 6 carriages effortlessly into Henley-on-Thames 😎

Thanks, fettling seems to be an on-going project which is why the loco was sidelined for a bit. The coal is mainly geoscenics which I bought as a coal load bundle years ago at Warley. Locos and wagons get the same coal now.

A very momentous day today! My County tank 4-4-2T brought its first train into Henley-on-Thames today. Given at one point, it struggled to pull its own weight, I am very pleased to get this far! Work this morning included adjusting the rear of the loco which had settled at 2mm too low, then adding a Kadee coupling box onto the rear post truck. Whereupon it could bring three carriages into platform 2. Needless to say, I am very pleased with the progress. I now need to reinstall the stay-alive, which I removed a while ago as it was so bulky when I was taking the loco body off etc. Then fit some crew and coal. Probably the last job will be some springing on that rear Pony truck.

Thanks Andy. No 2237 was a Reading based engine until about 1934 when it was sent for scrap. There are a couple of photos of County tanks at Henley-on-Thames on local services. Strangely I have not found any photos of the County 4-4-0 locos at Henley, but I suppose the County tank, together with Pannier tanks might have been sufficient in the 1920's and early 1930's until the 61xx were introduced. At the same time you started to see Hall class 4-6-0 locos as well. Thanks again,

Today has seen the final bits of glazing added to the clerestory carriage, hopefully tomorrow I can turn my attention to the door furniture etc. While that was drying, I went back to the County tank. Today's jobs were the weight and sorting out the pick-ups, whereupon it ran very nicely. The rear pony truck needs springing I think - it hangs too much! I've added a pick-up to it as well, but at the moment its hindering the wheel rotation - more fettling needed. Anyway, a couple of quick iPhone photos:

At the same time, the a23 Clerestory is being glazed. The carriage is seen drying - At the same time I test fitted a door handle and grab handle.

Manor news! My Manor loco has had its coal load applied - it is still just as loud 😎 and I have used a little bit of weathering powder to try and reduce the shine form the LED lights. Seen here with the e153 Composite Brake 3rd

Good luck Andy, let us know how you get on. As ever with something like this, I relied on the advice from John at Youchoos to determine the maximum I could do. Regards, Neal.

Evening all, thank you for the comments - we’ve been in Benidorm for the day! It’s very Marmite, but if you stick to the old town then it’s very good. A return coach trip for €12 each isn’t too bad and we met up with some friends from the UK. ( it’s 1 1/2 hours drive from here or 2 hours by coach ) bargain at €12? To answer your questions and comments as below: Thanks Andy, I will try the tat shops here and see how I get on. (Our Chinese tat shops sell everything) Thanks Clive, I looked at removing the loco body, but decided against. I merely snipped the cables in the tender marked LS. You would hope that Accurascale do a louder sound, perhaps @McC could advise, Yes the loco is lovely and yes the factory fitted sound is underwhelming. Thanks for this, good luck with the 7F. Both of the original speakers have been removed (tender) and isolated (smokebox). I should add that wiring in this way has invalidated the Accurascale warranty 🙁🙁 Agreed. The size of speaker I chose, didn’t allow that to be an option. I pushed it for size and sound! I’m very happy with the sound project now, it’s made a big difference. No, I’m using the Accurascale sound project, Hope that Helps guys. Note my comment earlier guys; by doing this change it has invalidated the Accurascale warranty. 🙁 let’s hope Accurascale upgrade the sound project to be louder on the next batch of Manors. Plus of course any future steam loco must be LOUDER 😎

That’s going to be a nice addition Rich. I assume there would be two fellas inside, peering through the windows? I can’t have been nice inside there.

The video doesn’t really do the sound justice. From sounding like a whisper (so much so, that the radio often drowns it out!), it’s now very loud. Someone commented on Facebook that I should have used a thin speaker from Road and Rails, but I think the depth of the enclosure is also making a difference. As you know, I always work on the basis of squeezing the biggest possible speaker into the space. I was very surprised at how small the Accurascale speaker was. Next week, I will look to see if we can buy metal glaze here and give it a go.

It’s been a long time to get to this stage - I can’t believe the original sound is so low - far lower than the videos show. But now it’s a decent sound to rival my Youchoos fitted sound Castle class locos. I don’t mind low sound, as long as I can turn it up, but the original Manor project is at max….. so it’s obviously a speaker issue. Accurascale should have spec a bigger / beefier speaker. Leaving that aside, it’s a lovely loco and runs very well. Im looking forward to their 57xx.