Rugd1022

Working 6G67 into Small Heath yesterday, including the run round at Tyseley...

4 hours ago, luckymucklebackit said:

If you get a distress call from this ship, would you think it was a wind up?

Sister ship to the Voight Kampf...?

😉

From the archive of the Birmingham Post & Mail, a locally registered Rover P5B Saloon in Perry Barr in the early '70s...

Photo by Malcolm Keeley / Derek Potter : Hassops Road, Beeches Estate, Great Barr, 1957...

Street Life - Randy Crawford

Some interesting non railway stuff in and around Birmingham...

Photo by Andrew Harthill : tail end of a Royal working at Brum Snow Hill in 1962, at the sharp end is green liveried D1002 'Western Explorer'...

14 hours ago, monkeysarefun said:

 

 

I took a quick shot of the  moon on Friday night (or was it Thursday?) while taking the rubbish out to the bin. Its only a hand-held snap though so its not the sharpest. I've also noticed that pictures posted here  lose a bit of clarity compared to the originals. 

 

That's given me an idea for a TV show... I shall be straight on the blower to Gerry Anderson Inc.!

Some of those craters must be several miles wide.

2 hours ago, 97406 said:

 

I love the picture at the end with them cleaning the rail! 🙂

They had to do that as nothing had run on the Rugby - Market Harborough - Peterborough line since June '66, and filming took place in March and April of '67.

19 hours ago, 97406 said:

Just spotted this thread and I enjoyed this over the Christmas break with D318 as the star….

 

Mentioned on page two of the thread way back in December 2011! Great film though and well worth repeat viewings....

I Will - White Album Fabs...

12 hours ago, Smiffy2 said:

This is what I am doing at the moment - making or modding guitars. This one (it's actually a Canadian Stratocaster copy with an alder body) was £40 from the St Raphael Hospice shop. I've replaced the neck, electrics and pickups/pickguard and put new locking tuners on it, so about another £50. You thought Mdl Rlws were expensive fun...
Trouble is I seem to have wired the output jack the wrong way round - pure chimp - and I'll have to redo that tomorrow. But it looks nice...

 

Lovely that.

I've been eyeing some up of the old Vox Teardrops and Phantoms on Reverb recently, I still bitterly regret selling my 1967 Teardrop Starstream MkXII with the built in effects a few years ago. Need to get back on the horse and start playing again. Strangely, despite having stump fingers I find 12 strings easier to play than six strings. My first guitar was a black Epiphone 330 with ivory binding etc which looked and sounded pretty good, then I chopped it in for a cheap Squire Tele copy which was ok until I found the Vox Starstream.

3 minutes ago, Sidecar Racer said:

 

 They did indeed .

 

The 'Gurney bubble', so called because Dan Gurney couldn't wear a helmet and shut the door as he was too tall (even with the seat altered!). Me being just 5'3'' I wouldn't need one - I've sat in a few replicas in recent years and felt very comfortable in them.

Season Of The Witch - Donovan

1 hour ago, PhilJ W said:

I now have the finance to cover a replacement car so I should be mobile soon.

Here you go Phil, dirt cheap, never raced or rallied.... honest... 😁

On 15/01/2024 at 09:43, westerner said:

A couple more from the Drake archive.

 

 

 

 

Lovely stuff - even the period 'GB' plate on the back of the Landrover looks bang on!

10 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

The reason for most of the less attractive traits in most hobbies seems to originate from people thinking their choices should be the choices of everyone else and that their conception of what the hobby should be is an absolute.

 

As other have indicated, the hobby of model trains is a broad one, extending from my current position of just playing trains on the floor (thankfully no carpet to worry about) with Unitrack through a wide spectrum to fine gauge scratch building. There is also a point where we could question when does the hobby become engineering as some build large scale live steam locomotives (noting most aspects of model trains beyond an oval of track need some degree of engineering with regards wiring). And there is the linked but to me separate hobby of collecting. To me it doesn't matter where people land on that spectrum, if people enjoy their hobby then great. Do what you enjoy and like, like and enjoy what you do. If you get satisfaction from the hobby, however you practice it, then what does it matter what anyone else thinks? Equally, why should anyone try telling others what the hobby is?

 

This is not a model train thing. The photography world has lots of camera enthusiasts pushing their own pet ideas on how we should all be taking photographs (must go full frame blah blah blah), most sports seem to have participants that seem to know the answers to everything and what everyone else should be doing in the sport, music fans who seem to consider themselves empowered to tell the world what constitutes good music worthy of being listened to etc. This is why when I am doing something new or shopping and need information I tend to avoid asking real enthusiasts as rather than getting a normal sort of answer ('yeah, that's a decent xxxxx, it works well enough and will do what you need, if you like the design and are happy with the price it'll be fine') it often ends up in some sort of sermon on the evils of listening to music through any medium other than vinyl and such like.

 

Do what you like and just enjoy the hobby. Message boards are all about discussion and sharing opinions, and that's great (I'm as opinionated as anyone, probably more so) but if nobody else shares your ideas of the hobby then it doesn't matter. Nobody can determine what the hobby should or shouldn't be as an absolute, they can of course share their opinions on what they think it should be (and we might agree) but it's just an opinion.

It's exactly the same on the car forums I frequent, Pistonheads being a prime example. What started out as a TVR forum twenty five years ago is now much, much wider in scope with numerous sections well outside of the core motoring theme and almost every corner of it has more than its fair share of negativity, oneupmanship and downright patronising 'thread captains', a situation which has grown worse over the last couple of years. Oddly enough though, just about the only areas which haven't been swamped (so far) with this barrage of negativity are the classic cars and model railways threads. The F1, football, news, current affairs and politics threads in particular are filled with anger from posters on both sides of any given 'debate', life is way too short for any of that malarkey.

I know we have our moments in here but it's nothing like Pistonheads thankfully.... or Mumsnet!

2 hours ago, DaveF said:

3 photos on the Midland line from Nottingham to Lincoln and 2 others from the Midland.

 

 

Burton Joyce Class 120 Lincoln to Crewe 8th Aug 77 C3426  The timetable said Crewe!

 

 

Bulcote Class 120 Lincoln to Crewe March 78 C3761  east of Burton Joyce

 

 

Staythorpe fly ash loading sidings Staythorpe power station Oct 72 J3124

 

 

Eckington and Renishaw MR old main line June 69 J1743

 

 

Harringworth viaduct May 69 J1665

 

David

I drove over Harringworth viaduct last week in the dark, it's quite a spooky place at night, even more so when it's foggy as you feel like you're floating across the valley.

You can't really tell from down below, but the parapet walls are splayed outwards slightly, with metal brackets bolted to the inner sides to stop them from splaying out any further.

I'd make a start by revisiting a much beloved location with family connections...

1) Straight in at number one pop pickers - Old Oak Common on 17th March 1906, the day the new shed opened and the day my maternal great grandfather (fireman) and two of his brothers (both engine cleaners) transferred there from Westbourne Park, imagine the pristine interior of that vast roundhouse with four turntables, filled with Mr. G.J.Churchward's finest etc. Lovely. Seventy seven years later I found myself working there.

2) All of the London termini during that period after nationalisation when there was a fascinating mix of Big Four and experimental new BR liveries - David Jenkinson's wonderful  book 'The Big Four In Colour' gave us a tantalising glimpse into what it was like, but imagine seeing so much more of it in glorious real life colour.

3 ) Paddington station in early 1965 - WR steam is all but gone and it's now wall to wall Diesel-Hydraulics in maroon and green livery, plus of course of D1015 'Western Champion' still carrying its one off golden ochre paint job,the three eight car Blue Pullman sets, D0280 'Falcon' in two tone green, a batch of new two tone green Brush Type 4s and the ubiquitous 350hp shunt engines.

3) Waterloo station in the first half of 1967, with the end of SR steam edging ever nearer and the Bullied Pacific's 'last fling' in the more than capable hands of so many of Nine Elm's footplate crews.... with The Kinks' 'Waterloo Sunset' wafting out of a little transistor radio, naturally.

4 ) Crewe station in 1970 / 71, watching the Class 50s backing onto the Anglo - Scottish expresses, endless AC Electrics and 24s, 25s and 40s on all sorts of traffic. My very first visit to Crewe with my Nan was just like this, we were on the way to visit relatives near Stockport and changed trains there.

3 hours ago, papagolfjuliet said:

More 'Hadleigh': a brief glimpse of a 40 at speed, followed by a Deltic and an 03 at York. How Hadleigh manages to arrive from London on a southbound train is a mystery for the ages.

 

I binge watched 'Hadleigh' on DVD early last year and really enjoyed it - in a couple of episodes he drives round in a RHD Monterverdi 375 Coupe, one of just six built.

On 11/01/2024 at 20:37, big jim said:

 

Apart from vegetation the general view hasn’t changed that much in 50 years

 

it has if you look the other way though, the old cement works at greaves sidings is now (surprise surprise) a big housing estate

 

 

Footage around Greaves Sidings in the '80s - note the glimpse of the GWR Toad brake van at 32secs, the bottom half of which is still there today, rotting away...

Not a film or TV series but this is great - George Fame does a spot of overtime as a Signalman in 1968...

Higher Than The Sun - Primal Scream

Green Onions - Booker T & The MGs