Hal Nail

Thought provoking piece i read on here somewhere that most people don't concentrate for more than the 5 seconds it takes to partially digest the headlines. They certainly wouldn't listen to the politicians speaking so will have taken in "meet 3 families for christmas" and if that suits them wont give it any further thought. Listened to my neighbour bellow down the phone a friend to clarify the rules and the gist of it seemed to be "i don't understand any of it but tracey from 37 did XYZ last week and she said she was fine so i think thats ok". And shes the brighter of the two - the other one religiously wears a hat to stop it getting in her ears.

Depends what you start with. If you are concentrating on Z, N, TT, H0, 009, OO, O-16.5 or S then it does no harm to let your attention wander...

A common misconception is that cyclists are all hellbent on being catapulted over the handlebars into the tarmac. I assume this is why most people react to hearing a bike by randomly launching themselves sideways straight into its path.

It's not the sellers fault people have bid that much. Needless to say there are several more Heljan wagons listed now and I'm not surprised given the box shifters had them at under £50 towards the end.

Just beware something that comes up in every thread on 7mm v 4mm is that you can't just divide by 4 and multiply by 7 when scaling up track plans. O gauge points and clearance where the lines diverge need proportionally longer. It's not a compromise I like personally but one way to save space is to have double tracks entering from the fiddle yard as if the first point of the run round loop is off scene.

Southampton safe, Portsmouth prohibited. Same as always!

Good to see you kept that 8 wheel tender. Looks huge with a Hall!

Yes I've got a few ixos on the go (although they cost a lot more than £7!) Not the same variety as those RTI cabs tho

Funnily enough I started typing christ that's ugly earlier but decided it was a bit rude! Wish we had a resource like this in 7mm but I do keep an eye out for alternative rear ends to graft onto the available cabs for variety.

The box is a clue!

Might be a bit late but I dont think all of the Russell diagrams are strictly to scale, so doing it from photos and referencing to related era stock may be just as reliable. I'm looking to do a k41 (might be 40) full brake and think I will scale of from my similar era B set based on the similar guards doors, window sizes etc.

Now someone on a thread here had contacted Heljans ceo and got a reply. There was some chat about when it is appropriate to escalate so directly - this seems like one of them.

Given the impact Covid has had and the fact all the new stuff is taking c3 years anyway, some time after that list in 2023 wouldn't be entirely surprising.

Yes, in an industry as notoriously profitable as railways, looking at finances can only be construed as greed.

In the context of eBay sales being delivered, the chances are that if someone receives a delivery and knows it was tracked, they are less likely to claim it wasnt delivered (and risk being copped for fraud) than if there was nothing at all. So it probably has some benefit, given it only costs about a pound more for a small 2nd class parcel.

Ideally I would pop the smoke box door off but having read the above, would rather do so without taking the body apart to push from behind. Has anyone tried? Is it firmly glued on?

News item tonight featuring a London venue owner claiming moving to tier 3 will just drive "people like these" (gestures at customers) to meet in their homes. Given it's only supposed to be households meeting anyway, that's hardly a problem. The interview was conducted in front of a closed perspex pod with 6 young girls crammed in. Not sure if they think that's outside or a bubble but sums up why its still spreading so fast really.

Could I possibly be cheeky and have a look at your lists for 6503 and 6319 please?

My enthusiasm for research is considerably reduced given I havent got the answer I was hoping for!

Haven't done a lot of modelling recently but have been spending a lot of time and money on photos, trying to find a suitable black mogul (with steam pipes) for my '58/59 Cornish layout (the one I haven't started). After several false dawns it's become obvious there wasn't one. I had similar problems with prairies, a number of which turned out to be green early crest rather than black. I'm thinking of sliding the clock forward a couple of years to 56/57 and will bend the rules a bit re maroon stock. I bought a couple of pairs of wagons off ebay - an unstarted Peco mink plus pig iron and two built but not painted Slaters - a vanwide and a meat wagon. I hand painted the vanwide as both my bauxite aerosols refused to work and that has already gone (before we got any sun for a decent photo). The mink has been built and finished with different brake gear and buffers based on a photo. The transfers were an absolute sod - they all separated and I ended up positioning every digit and letter. I've since picked up another meat van so will finish off and sell the first and then build my own.

Isn't everyone? Where people differ is what they regard as looking right. I suspect, a bit like colour perception, recognising shapes is not a precise science!

I've now bought a high res scan of 5336 in 1958 and the loco looks green and although heavily pixelated, you can just about see lining on the tender and a late crest. Yet there are numerous photos of this loco in 1964 with a large early crest tender - the colour completely obscured! Could a green loco have been paired with a black tender late on? I've never seen a clear photo of this happening? Edit: I've answered my own question by finding a photo of 6301 with the loco lined green and a plain black tender in 1959

Whole rash of ABS 7mm GWR kits up now at just £99 each. They've been unavailable for a long time and were only going for 35-40 ish recently. Or theres a quite nicely made up one at £50 and I'd though that was a bit steep!

I havent got round to measuring yet but would be interesting to see how the tender wheelbase compares to a 57xx. Edit: the tender is longer than a mogul! Hope you dont mind me asking a related question here but if I wanted to add a simple decoder without sound (but potentially stay alive if people do recommend it) would that be a simple job on this loco? Only intended to be an interim step.

Thank you and freshly outshopped I gather so reasonable to assume it was still black a year later!