McGomez

Hi Kallaroonian. Good to see your thread up and running again. I found a couple of pictures from 1981 which I know is not your time period but you never know. They aren´t great. The timing of pushing the camera button has shown up time and time again on my old pictures. This view must be familiar to TallTim. It is taken from the western entrance of the Wrestlers bridge looking towards the Red Lion Bridge. Hatfield station is beyond the bridge. The note on the back of the photo says that it is 55015 heading north on the 8th December 1981 at 14:03h. I have my doubts as it would have had white window surrounds at that time? and 40168 from the same spot, obviously. Interesting to note is the building nearest the bridge in the background. It is the offices of ADDO. I seem to remember a video of Tinsley hump yard and it was mentioned that the hole punching machinery was made by them?

Hi Ron. At least we have something in common…… we drink the same beer! Warn me just before you are going to do the load testing on the 4,5m new project so I can get some supplies in for summer! Fantastic modelling. Andy

Completely off topic but a near coincidence all the same. 70013 was the number called on the Spanish lottery last Thursday. Lucky for some. Unfortunately not me.

Another happy overseas customer of The Hereford Model Centre. Ordered my 105 last Thursday 7 days transit to the South East of Spain and cheap postage. Recommended.

Hi Mark. Yep. Another ex-pat. There seem to be a hell of a lot of us on here. I´m with you on your thoughts of Hatfield. Things haven´t improved with age either. I used to live over towards the De Havilland site so I can simpathise with you when you say the Poly was a long way from the station. You could still hear the Deltics roaring through the station even from where I lived at night though! Maybe the sound carried along the old Hatfield – St. Albans line which ran parallel to our road? According to my sister the Town Centre revamp is being looked at once again after the last plan fell through! I was back home last week coincidently and saw on the front of the local newspaper that it was the 10th anniversary of the Hatfield crash. Back on RM3 I replied to your previous thread. I used to work at a place by the railway at Welham Green called Davall Gears. There used to be a siding worked by a private shunter called “London John†before the station was built. The siding was there when I worked there (1982-87) but it was out of use. I think somebody mentioned that you can still see the siding curving into the distribucion warehouse if you zoom in on Google Earth. The key elements sound good to me. You could maybe incorporate the Lone Star factory as a backdrop on the multi track section between Hatfield and WGC. The place in Potters Bar adjacent to the golf course is more or less from where the photo was taken that Bachmann used of their class 105 before they had made their pre-production model I believe? I can still remember the sidings in place at Hatfield goods yard with one continuing under the Red Lion bridge and somewhere I have a picture of me as a toddler with the lattice footbridge in the background. If I find it I´ll send it to you. Looking forward to your updates. Andy

Hi Kallaroonian. As a product of Hatfield (Hurts), I am looking forward to seeing this project grow. I have never delved into the history of Hatfield station even though I lived there until I was 25. It depends on your timescale but the Wrestlers bridge collapsed in 1966 if this site is to be believed. http://www.sabre-roa...restlers_bridge It was replaced by a footbridge which is still there. The St Albans line did curve off before the Wrestlers bridge, just after passing under what I´ve always called the Red Lion bridge. There are a couple of pictures of the North end of the station during the sixties in the Middleton book, Branchline from Dunstable to Hatfield.

I´m going to wait for the Loadhaul version from the 2nd batch.