5944

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/166376684255?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=pnL59Ii6Qjq&sssrc=4429486&ssuid=dltlllrnrym&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

Tested how exactly?!

On 09/10/2023 at 20:57, TimberValleyRailway said:

But if Value for money is your thing, you can't beat this:  https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/362635439406

Unipart Rail have a reputation for charging a lot of money to the various TOCs for supplying parts and spares, far in excess of what you could buy the equivalent for on the high street. A few years ago a simple toggle switch like that for a class 319 headlight was £180! The joys of needing the suppliers to be fully accredited and all the testing that was required to make sure components are fit for railway use. A pretty much identical switch was available in Maplins for less than a quid at the time.

The rather delightful Comet at Shuttleworth last month.

One for the Joy Division fans...

12 minutes ago, PhilJ W said:

I'm not sure if black squirrels should be reported but they do carry a virus which is deadly to our native red squirrel.

Bit late now, they've been in Letchworth for over a hundred years. Greys are relatively rare around here.

Couple of photos taken this afternoon of the black squirrel that has been feasting on the seeds from the sunflowers in our garden.

This landed in the school field opposite the house a few weeks ago. Luckily the casualty wasn't seriously injured and the air ambulance wasn't required. 

The helicopter has landed there once before in the time we've been in this house, but we were out for the day. This time it woke me up as I was trying to get a nap before nights! That was on the Friday, and on the following Monday it had to land again to collect someone else. 

1 minute ago, PaulRhB said:

While it’s a novelty and demand is high I don’t think that’s unreasonable considering what they’ve spent on it. It’s certainly more of a novelty, and in my opinion better looking, than the Haggis is these days. It won’t get the general public as worked up but with some savvy marketing it could be sold as a true Victorian steam experience especially with dining trains to run some premium services with it. They just need some appropriate coaches though! 😆

Is demand high though? The very first run on its first day in public service has a completely empty carriage at present, and only 18 tickets booked in total. The other three trains show 19, 12 and 8 tickets sold so far. Some of the midweek trips don't have a single ticket sold on them yet.

There's only one other train out on the days the T3 is running, and for 9 days it's half term. Families aren't going to pay for one round trip that doesn't stop anywhere, and especially not when it would be £115 for 2A+3C! A normal family return ticket is £47.

The loco doesn't owe anything at present, the overhaul was funded by grants and donations. It just seems a bit greedy of the railway to whack such a premium on what is, to the general public, a completely unknown loco.

I agree about the Victorian dining trains though! Shame they've only got Mk1s and the dining set is out of action after being vandalised a few months ago.

The loco has now commended loaded test runs! Looks and sounds excellent.

Just a shame they've priced the first runs way out of my budget, and probably that of many other people. £30 for one return trip from Swanage, but unlike when 60103 visited, the other services cannot be used by 563 ticket holders. So if you park at Norden it's an extra £17 return or £25 day rover per adult, meaning each ticket costs more than when 60103 visited. 

Lovely loco, fantastic achievement getting it steaming again for the first time in 75 years. But to command a higher fare than Flying Scotsman? Hmm...

1 hour ago, Vacuum said:

I am struck by the fact that there appear to have been no new posts on this thread for nearly six years.

 

Does this mean, as I assume to be the case, that most buyers of this excellent model can find nothing about which to complain? I know there were moans from some quarters about the model's haulage ability but I don't think these were entirely justified.

Probably yes, plus the fact Farish haven't released any more since the initial batch. They seemed to sell ok and didn't hang around on the shelves for years on end.

Is the drive shaft properly fitted been the loco and tender?

It appears the ashpan sprinkler was left running on 80136. It's fed from one of the feed side of one of the injectors, so if the fireman was using the other injector he wouldn't have noticed the feed to first one was still on. Hence why the loco has managed to use 2000 gallons of water in less than 6 miles!

On 11/08/2023 at 18:52, PM47079 said:

It's more to do with an extremely efficient spare parts situation. Being at the coal face so to speak, there are still plenty of failures to deal with, but instead of the BR way of designing new locos with parts specific to the loco class which then resulted in locos being used as Christmas trees. The GM fleet has a lot of locos types that share parts and as has been mentioned the parts availability is excellent enabling locos to be turned round days rather than weeks. Add to that the design of the 66 means you can remove the roof and side sections put them to one side and have excellent access to repair the loco.

Bit late to this, but nothing has changed. Class 387/1s and 387/2s, virtually identical EMUs, built a couple of years apart, have different components fitted in places! Windscreen wiper motors being the one that sticks in my mind, having had to change a couple. Different design, different mounting holes. Why?!

But then again, they're Bombardier products. I could give a nice long list of things that don't make any sense about how they were assembled. They have an obsession with hiding all the fixings in the passenger areas, so they look good. It means exam work isn't too bad on them, but repair/maintenance work is an absolute nightmare. For example...

The screen wash bottle is L-shaped and fits under both the power-brake controller and the DSD pedal, and it takes all shift to replace one due to the amount of stuff that needs to be removed and refitted. One of the bolts holding the covering panel on has to be slightly shorter than all the rest, as otherwise it goes through the side of the bottle.

Passenger door open buttons for the external doors, you wouldn't expect to need to take roof panels down to be able to change one!

Inter-coach door buttons can either be changed in two minutes or two hours, depending which one it is. Obviously it's the two hour one that regularly breaks.

Passenger information screen replacement? Good luck with that! Be easier to cut a hole in the roof and go in from above than the way they've been designed.

Ventilation fans for the toilets? Buried in the roof space with air con ducting in the way, yet there's loads of room to put them elsewhere. 

Simple things to change but access is a nightmare. A component that can be changed in 15 minutes needs the unit to be booked on depot for a day to allow it to be stripped down and put back together again afterwards. I'm sure it makes sense to somebody...

6 hours ago, Flanged Wheel said:

For those who like cruise ships (and I am afraid that I am not a fan although I can appreciate the ingenuity and engineering)…

 

 

Royal Caribbean’s Quantum of the Seas (whatever that may mean) alongside in Victoria Harbour, Vancouver Island. She is currently on the Alaska cruise circuit. 
 

Vancouver Island is an exceptionally beautiful and wild place. We spent ten days camping in various spots on the island (& in the neighbouring Gulf Islands). It wasn’t nearly enough time.

 

PS With many thanks to @J. S. Bach, I have corrected the link in my 7 September post so that the image now shows correctly.

Likewise. It looks like one of those massive skyscrapers that get built in the Middle East has fallen over.

On 16/09/2023 at 16:00, davepallant said:

Problem with bench testing going from DC to DCC.

Just been converting my Northern Rail 319 from DC to DCC. Brilliant that Farish has got the conversion down to a single DCC  decoder and I can see that moving to sound will be easy as well.

I ran the train on DC, so I knew it worked, and then waited for the Next18 decoder to arrive. You need to have both of the middle cars on the track to get them to move so installed the decoder, coupled them up and tried them. Nothing. Took the decoder out and refitted the bypass board and still nothing. Came on here to see if anyone had had a cimilar problem but nothing. It was only after stewing for a half hour or so trying various things that I realised there are two ways round to connect the two centre coaches. I reversed them and now they work fine. I can see its now obvious that the pantograph goes as near the centre as possible but with just two coaches on the track its easy to miss which way round the two centre coaches have to go!

Toilet end of TOSL next to pantograph end of MOS. Pan next to (toilet) pan!

If everyone could check behind their garden sheds and out buildings, that'd be grand. Very impressive to completely lose an $80m aircraft!

5 hours ago, adb968008 said:

Iirc wcrc has 44767, which if correct gives them three black 5’s… 44932 and 45110.

 

perhaps Rileys domination of the whl with 44871, 45407 and 45212 is coming to an end ?

Perhaps there maybe a regathering of all 6 back at Carnforth ? Who knows.

I doubt WCRC will send their locos up to Fort William - why knacker your own locos when you can hire someone else's? It's telling that there hasn't been a WCRC steam loco based at Fort William for many years.

On 13/09/2023 at 22:35, Chris M said:

It’s fair to say that when a layout isn’t running when the exhibition opens the owners are far more upset than the viewing public.

I agree, and a lot of issues/failures can't be helped. I think the vast majority of people accept that. Likewise if the operators are scrambling around trying to fix the fault, not a problem in my view. These things happen. It's when there's a lack of urgency or pride that irritates me. You're there to show off your layout, if you want to stand around chatting to your mates all day go to the pub!

I went to one exhibition where an hour before doors opening, there was still a substantial sized layout missing. 45 minutes before opening time they waltzed in to try and set up their layout. Come opening time the boards are up but no lights and more importantly no stock! Frankly that's not really good enough, especially as they didn't seem to be in any sort of rush to get things sorted. 

Everyone has something go wrong or makes mistakes now and again, it's just the way things go. In the past I've had to drive back to the club room the night before a show to pick up the controllers for the layout! But the layout was ready to go at 10am when doors opened, and that's what the paying public expect.

20 hours ago, rab said:

There's box madness, then there's  this:

 

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/276043382117

I see your complete plastic case and raise you this...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/144397776630?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=g4LuWR03S1q&sssrc=4429486&ssuid=dltlllrnrym&var=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

I know it's not eBay, but it is another auction site. This is quite an interesting concoction!

https://www.catawiki.com/en/l/74227041-zelfbouw-n-electric-locomotive-series-1500-ns

On 10/09/2023 at 17:56, wwrsimon said:

 

Good spot, thanks. The wheels on the orange/blue loco defintely look a lot more worn than the ones on the grey one!

 

Simon

I don't think that's what causing the height difference though. If you look carefully, the gap between the top of the bogie step and the bottom of the body is smaller on the loco on the right. It could be something like it's longer out of works and the springs are more worn than the other loco. The one on the left has definitely seen works attention recently - look at the new axle end covers and shoe beams.