mike morley

Magnets can withstand far, far more heat than is generally realised without losing their magnetism. Electric motors can get too hot to touch without their magnets being affected. In the not-too-distant past the motors in some Bachmann locos got so hot the tops of the fireboxes melted, yet the quality of running was unaffected. Round Tuits, on the other hand . . .

I've got a 4" engineers square, which is just a bit too big to be really useful, and have been nagging myself for years to get a smaller one without ever getting a Round Tuit. I also use steel rulers in combination with Blu-Tak. A fairly thin, easily readable 6-inch Rabone ruler is used only for measuring. A somewhat thicker, not-so-easily read 6-inch Toff ruler is used mostly as a straight-edge for cutting and scribing. I have got a 12-inch ruler but rarely use it. Anything used as a straight-edge should be checked regularly to make sure it is still straight. I was quite surprised to discover just how quickly the edge wears to a distinctly concave shape.

In the past I've used bits of plywood and hardboard to solder on and suffered all the problems mentioned above. I've also had problems when doing jobs where even briefly sustained pressure with the soldering iron was required (laminating coupling/connecting rods being the most obvious example) and resulted in a dark brown, sometimes almost black, slightly furry stain of scorched material embedding itself on the surface of whatever I was soldering. It is a pig to scrape off and having wasted an hour or so doing so once too often I invested in a quarter-inch thick, eight-inch square slab of paxolin from Eileen's Emporium a few months ago and realised the moment I used it for the first time that I ought to have bought one years ago.

The one-time CAMRA member in me is convinced that back in the Victorian era (and beyond) beer production was fairly localised and that far more would have been brewed in the vicinity than was imported from elsewhere. I think you'd do better staying with researching the inward traffic of the raw materials required for brewing than with importing of the finished product.

From past experience I can assure you that researching breweries of the past is surprisingly difficult. It is one of those situations where you really need to know the answer before you can ask the question. If you've got even a vague idea of what the brewery was it is quite easy to confirm, but if you are starting from scratch it is extremely difficult

Tut tut tut! Try Purple Moose or Cader Ales. Much, much closer to you is Monty's. Support your local brewery!

I would advise having a bit of practice first, especially if using a new can. When full, some rattle-cans can chuck out such vast quantities of paint it can swamp fine and, in extreme cases, not-so-fine detail. Cocktail sticks have numerous modelling uses - holding laminated coupling rods in place while they're being soldered up, mixing and applying epoxy adhesive, adding the slice of lime to the stiff gin and tonic you'll need after a ballasting session . . .

I gave my track a quick, light waft with a can of red primer, promptly followed by an even quicker, lighter waft of grey primer. Has the same effect with the added benefit that it does not end up completely uniform.

I use Copydex. If you either make a hash of it or later decide to change the alignment of that piece of track, it is possible to lift it and re-lay it without destroying it. It also results in quieter running than PVA.

Ballasting is One of Those Jobs and I'm afraid there is no alternative to having your brains trickle out through your ears as the task erodes your will to live. Some recommend the Little and Often approach. Others go for get-into-a-rhythm-and-keep-at-it endurance approach. I personally prefer the latter, but the best approach is whichever suits you. Another thing to which there is no alternative is having a lot of your first (and probably the second, and - if you are unlucky - a fair bit of the third) attempt fall off when you up-end the baseboards. When that happens, you resist the urge to slash your wrists (I find alcohol helps) and start again. The key word here, I think, is perseverance.

I'm with Don on this one. The final say about route was with the customer, not the RCH, and the more in-depth histories of most railways mention head offices urging station agents and masters to persuade customers to send their wares by routes that would bring most profit to the company.

Back in posting 773 I suggested that LNWR trains were diverted via the Cambrian after a blockage on the North Coast line. I still haven't found my source of information, but in the process of searching for it I learned that at for a period LNWR trains from Caernarvon terminated at Portmadoc instead of Afon Wen to improve connection times. It's not clear when the arrangement started or ended, but it was going on during the early years of WW1.

Is this the extremely modellable little goods shed from Duffryn Ardudwy? I'd glimpsed it from a passing train in 2007 and thought "That would make a good model" so went back the following year in search of it. I visited every station between Llanaber and Llandecwyn before finally tracking it down and seven years on they've all merged into a blur and I'm no longer entirely sure where it was. One thing I did find curious was its location - right in the throat of the goods yard, where having a wagon parked by it for loading or unloading would completely block access to the rest of the yard.

I am reliably informed that Peter K rarely built any of his kits so was not in a position to write any instructions. That might also explain why none of the many errors and shortcomings with his kits were ever addressed or corrected.

Peter K loco kits deserve their poor reputation but his Cambrian carriage kits are rather better, if extremely basic. Their only serious shortcoming is the six-wheeled underframe, which in using the same parts for 00, EM and P4 is both simple and clever in concept but falls flat on its face in the execution. The problem is the guides for the sliding assembly for the centre wheels, which fold down from the carriage floor. They are not only much too high but they are also far too wide and if built as intended they result in a 4mm scale see-saw. The height problem comes to light quite early in the build, when it is still rectifiable, but once you've dealt with that the width problem becomes apparent and by then you've passed the point of being able to do something about it without causing as many problems as you are trying to solve. I've only built the all 3rd so far and used the Brassmasters Cleminson underframe (a superb piece of kit! Capable of sub-2' radii in EM and probably 18", if not less, in 00) Still to be built is the Lavatory 3rd and when I eventually get a Round Tuit I have already decided to challenge myself to make the original Peter K chassis work.

Wasnt there an occasion when the LNWR North Coast line was blocked (landslip?) and so many of their trains had to be re-routed via Afon Wen and the Cambrian that LNWR engines had to work right through because Oswestry simply didnt have enough engines? It might have been a one-off, isolated incident but it provides a great excuse for modellers licence.

There used to be a website called Keykits that was shared by IKB and (I think) ABS, but when Kay Butler of IKB retired the site closed.

I've done a bit of Googling and in 1872 a factory was set up in Penrhyndeudraeth to make guncotton (nitrocellulose; an explosive mixture of nitric acid and cotton) which Cookes took over and changed to manufacturing gunpowder during the Great War. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that explosives traffic originated from Penrhydeudraeth?

Gunpowder traffic originated from Penrhyndeudraeth.

ABS kits are amongst the best, IMHO. These two are both from ABS. The one on the right is as designed, the one on the left is the same kit altered to represent the ex-Helston road van that ended up on the Kerry branch. The kit might have been designed with the conversion in mind and makes it what must be one of the easiest kit-bashes on the planet. The Barry Railway iron mink that appears in almost every photograph ever taken of Pentrefan is also an ABS kit and there are many more in the range that would be appropriate. Also recommended are 5&9 kits (Although they won't be at ExpoEM) They arent quite as sophisticated as ABS kits, although they don't lag all that far behind, and they are such remarkably good value for money that making a complete hash of one won't cause a financial crisis. The danger is that you might find yourself in the same position I have in that you find yourself liking them so much you end up with rather more LBSCR wagons on your layout than is plausable on a layout set in Mid Wales! I got around that problem by converting a Stroudley open to a Welshpool-based private owner wagon and using the body of a Craven covered van as the extension of the goods shed.

Hmm . . . That might work, but I wouldnt be at all surprised if it caused more problems than it solved. I think it would also be a case of tackling the symptoms, rather than the ailment. I'd say the better route would be to explore the potential of Don's suggestion re the 3mm rail.

It doesnt look quite as emaciated in real life as it does in the picture, but I know what you mean. As it happens, while I was threading it I was wondering what 3mm scale rail was available! I let my 3mm Society membership lapse. It might be time to consider re-joining . . .

Prompted by both my own and Don's comments I had another look at the 2mmFS rail, couldnt find the test piece I made originally so started another. I suspect most people buy C&L track as ready-made flexi track. I use EMGS rail so buy C&L trackbases and thread them on - a laborious job, on a par with ballasting for boredom levels. Anyone who has done the same will be aware that C&L's trackbases are slightly - and the word slightly has to be emphasised - inconsistent in nature and that while some will thread on quite easily, others will be right pigs and will fight you every inch of the way. I reckon the original test piece I made used the "easy" bases and, as previously stated, they didnt grip the rail too well. This time I began with the other type and their grip on the 2mm rail was perfectly acceptable. The resulting track was obviously more delicate than normal 4mm scale flexitrack and cleaning it would certainly call for some care, but it would not be the impossible task I originally predicted. Now for the bad news. Encouraged by that, I put together two-thirds of a length (stopping when I found I'd only got "easy" bases left) put a wagon on the track and . . . Ah! The flanges give each chair a gentle kiss. You might be able to get away with in 18.83, thanks Scalefour's finer flanges, but in 18.2 or 16.5 the combination of 2mmFS rail and C&L bases is a non-starter. With regard to using 2mmFS rail and chairs, I agree with Don and do not think it would look right. EMGS rail in the background, 2mmFS rail in the foreground

Re the flat-bottomed/bullhead thing, a lot of the minor branches all over Britain started off with cheap-and-cheerful flimsy, flatbottomed rail spiked directly to the sleepers and, if they lasted long enough, subsequently upgraded to "proper" bullheaded track. The Dinas Mawddwy branch is a good example of this. However, some branches - the Tanat Valley being the best example - had an intermediate stage where the where the main running lines and any passing loops were laid with chaired, bullheaded track while the sidings retained the spiked, flat-bottomed track. I'm not 100% certain, but I think the Tanat Valley spent the longest period of it's working life in that intermediate stage. I'm rubbish at building pointwork - I can just about scrape through with copperclad but C&L causes me serious grief and lots of rejects - so I set Pentrefan as an "intemediate" branch because it meant I only had to build one C&L point with the other two being Peco Code 60 (Z Gauge) rail on copperclad sleepers. A sector plate dealt with the rest of the pointwork! For my next project I've obtained some 2mm Society Code40 bullhead rail in the hope of reproducing the lightweight chaired track that a lot of the lesser lines had. I've not yet put it to the test to confirm it but my initial impression is that it will be too flimsy, with the C&L chairs grip on the rail being so slight that track cleaning, for instance, would be impossible. Jamie B, a fellow Cambrian modeller and former member of RMweb, did some experimenting with Peco Streamline sleeper spacing and the results were amazing, even with Code100!

The Glyn Valley coach on the Talyllyn isn't the most enjoyable ride, either. It is also so noisy conversation is almost impossible.