Ravenser

I suspect that what they are actually going to do is send smoke signals to one side that they're going to pull the plug on the project, and give off the record briefings from anoymous sources to friendly journalists indicating that actually they're really supporting it to please the other side. All these things are entirely deniable after the event, ("Ah but I never said that - it was just some journalist's story") which is the whole object. If the present Government put up a bill, they will vote against it , to cause political damage while deploying more briefings to signal that actually they'd build the thing if they got into power (thus signalling "We won't let the Tories build HS2 so if you want it you've got to put us in office") I wouldn't expect them to take any position which couldn't be denied on the subject till they publish their election manifesto If elected at the next election, they will then spend the next 5 years giving the green light to HS2 without anything actually happening on the ground , thus keeping both sides of the argument happy We've been here before - nuclear power stations, aircraft carriers, Thameslink 2000, Crossrail, Heathrow 3rd runway etc etc

If they do locally (it's not a huge branch), and I can find a decent match for Brunswick Green, I could be back in business. Thanks for the tip

There's a local car bits shop that does. But I know from looking in the past that he has Humbrol enamels and Revell enamels and acrylicsa and that's your lots - unless I were to go down the cellulose route - which I can't

I'm feeling annoyed. As mentioned I've started work on a Baby Deltic - a Silver Fox kit I picked up cheap secondhand at a show in January. It really should have been a "quick win": just paint the body, hack and assemble some RTR components I already have and there we are - a new Type 2. I want it in 2 tone green (as it will spend most of it's time working with steam stock) and it will become D5901 - which became an RTC Derby loco, allowing me maximum excuses if it appears on a north Midland layout in the blue period. I primed it with a coat of Tamiya detail primer , and brush painted the light Sherwood green along the lower bodysides. Three coats that took. Then I went to prepaint the warning panels and found that my pre 1985 yellow had dried up. I had plenty of tins of post 85 yellow, but nothing before. Sudden grinding halt to progress while I waited for a show on Saturday where Precision were in attendance. Couple of coats of yellow, then this morning , before my blood test at the hospital , I dug out the spray can of Railmatch Brunswick green . I masked up the loco laboriously , I shook the can (perhaps not long enough - it's supposed to have 2 mins agitation) I sprayed, or tried to. At first nothing came out , then I inverted the can and it sprayed. The result was a loco drenched in thick paint with blotches . I hastily wiped the lot off with thinners and kitchen roll, removed the lower masking and went off to the hospital. When I came back I gave it another go. Remasked lower area, shook the can for over 2 mins , went out to spray. Nothing came out. Well a very little mist. Then the button wouldn't depress - removed it , tried again and the can died with a faint gurgle. (It was an old can, but I'd hoped I'd get more than 2 locos out of it) I have now cleaned it all off with white spirit on kitchen towel and cotton bud. This has taken most of the primer off the sides as well , even though the primer must have been sprayed a fortnight ago. When I removed the masking ,parts of the Sherwood Green lower strip on both sides debonded. And I've chipped a buffer head, which will have to be patched I'm having a minor operation on Friday. I may not be able to drive for a fortnight . The nearest model shop is in the same town as the hospital - but not the same part of it - it's not walkable from the station or the hospital . Couldn't have got a can today - it's their day off. Don't think I can get one when I have my stitches out - I'll be dependent on public transport. I can't phone them and ask them to send me a can - Royal Mail have banned sending paint and spray cans in the post (Go to Jail. Go Directly to Jail. Do not pass Go . Do not collect £200, or a can of Railmatch Brunswick Green) I could walk to Halfords and try to get a spray can of a suitable green. But that would be cellulose, and you can't spray cellulose over enamel (meaning the yellow warning panel and the Sherwood Green band) So instead of being able to finish the Baby Deltic during my convalescence , I'm snookered. Drat. Double Drat. Triple Drat....... I suppose I'll have to finish an NRX and some Midland suburbans and start a 31 instead.

In our case there would have been plenty of movements under the sequence - it wasn't any kind of question of "one train every half hour" , nor was it a rural branchline. With junctions at each end of the station , you needed a sequence to avoid conflicting movements conflicting . But the edict was "You can't use a sequence - just run trains round on a circle". And the whole point of putting in some freight sidings for shunting was to have something going on one corner continuously . But no - "We never shunted on the last layout" It's interesting that the moment a sequence or prototypical operation is mentioned, people assume that it means the layout being motionless and devoid of trains for long periods Personally I'm happy to admire a model of the railway, one element of which is the trains , rather than focusing exclusively on the stock or even the locomotives, so I may be less likely to complain than most about trains that run on less than Central Line headways . Both the club project and my own layout largely revolve/revolved around multiple units , so for the loco-centric they might not have been of interest anyway. But a lot of the network doisn't see many locos these days, and I'd argue it's a blinkered approach simply to ignore such railways - in real or model form - as of no interest to anyone

Jeremy C "Little Johnny wants to see the trains run" . While it is widely assumed (i) that any decent layout will be an exhibition layout (ii) that a crucial element of exhibitions is to recruit children into the hobby and (iii) that the spectators, having paid £4 on the door, "own" the exhibitors, who had better "behave" and jump the correct height when told, prototypical operation will always be two very dirty words In the context of a club project I remember being instructed to remove sidings from a layout plan because "You can't shunt at an exhibition" (evidence at every exhibition notwithstanding), and when it was discovered that we'd developed an operating sequence and were proposing to use something similar in public we were told firmly that we were not allowed to run any kind of sequence in public , and must stick to sending a train out from the fiddle yard for a complete lap of the layout, followed by another train on a similar basis.... Assuming that similar attitudes exist in other clubs , any kind of prototypical operation will continue to be uncommon

This is one of those posts that could go on the layout blog (here http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/343-blacklade-artamon-square/ ) but as it amounts to a note-to-self of stock construction jobs that need doing, it's more logical to put it on my workbench thread . So here it is... I had the layout up for an extended play a couple of weeks back. Things came out of boxes that had spent an awful long time in them . For the first time I actually got round to trying to run a Civil Engineer's train - and found that 2 brakes , a Zander, a Grampus, a Dogfish and a Walrus (all the non-airbraked stuff) were too long for the run-round loop . Pity - they looked rather nice - so the Zander will have to stay in it's boxfile I also found or was reminded that Hornby 31s are a touch track-sensitive, and as the track in question (in several senses) is the crossover at the end of Pl 2 , forming one end of the run-round loop, and as 31 174 has been doing duty on anything that requires running round (the two parcels , the oil and now the CE train) this is a problem . An alternative loco is required for this duty - and a quick trial on the tension-lock fitted Seacows (also never before run in anger) showed that my old Airfix 31 is quite happy taking the crossover even when the blades are 98% across (It's sat modestly hidden at the back). It also runs perfectly well, with inbuilt analogue sound . I already needed another 31 so I could play with a 2 coach loco-hauled substitute set , so detailing up a spare Airfix 31 and fitting Kadees was already high on the "to-do" list. It now becomes an urgent priority It's also painfully obvious that the Hornby Dutch Shark needs weathering, so perhaps I need to finish off the olive green Cambrian kit one, which really ought to be used in a mid 80s CE rake I made the melancholy discovery that my elderly W Yorks 155 may run okay but the wretched black box on the underframe now fouls the newly installed cosmetic point motors on the back road. The 158 just clips them too but keeps going - demonstrated by the appearance of bright metal on the bumps on the casting. A bit of resiting and an emery board and a paint brush has sorted this out as far as the 158 is concerned, but the 155 needs it's chassis sorting out. I have a pack of NNK (ex MTK) underframe castings for a 153..... Fortunately what Dapol tooled up was evidently based very closely on a built up MTK kit, and with a bit of ingenuity it should be possible to use the castings on the powered car for weight, and fret out the plastic on the trailer to build up various boxes without any difference between the cars being obvious . A heavy rework of the W Yorks 155 to make the best of a bad job now rises right up the DMU agenda. On the other hand thoughts of sticking a decoder in the Regional 155 that has never run and has been sat at the bottom of a pile of stock for over a decade have now receded I even got to try running the layout in steam mode for the first time: Now I know this is full of ghastly anachronisms . Nothing can be done about the station signage - that was always a reason why any "steam period" was not going to be a serious exercise, and would simply be a case of giving my out of period items an occasional airing and a raison d'etre But it does show progress and problems,,,, Set 1 (ex LNW) is up and running. Set 3 (Grouping non-gangway) is also up and running , though the coaches need weathering . After I found the Hornby Thomposon non-gangwayed stock is delayed till next year, I thought laterally , and acquired a carmine Gresley CL instead of a maroon Thompson CL Set 2 is still progressing, slowly. But we have a motive power crisis. I have 2 serviceable kettles, and one's an O4/1 and totally unsuitable for suburban passenger working. I have no serviceable green diesels (you can't readily DCC an ex Hornby Dublo Class 20). I ended up using 31 174 and a blue Bachmann 20 just to run trains and check that the coaches ran and a Minories style shuttle could be operated. Really , I need 4 locos to run 2 or 3 trains Someone put a decoder in my secondhand whitemetal N5. I got the 4 digit address programmed then the whole thing started shorting. A check with the multimeter showed a dead short across one pair of driving wheels . It went back in its box pending detailed examination (I suspect it may work fine when the body's removed....) I bought a Fowler 2-6-4T as "secondhand new" at Ally Pally. It needs a decoder hardwiring (when I pluck up courage to get the body off) and more seriously , somehow I have to fit Kadees So I've dug out the resin Silver Fox Baby Deltic kit I bought cheap second-hand at St Albans , and started painting. Then I found my warning yellow had dried up. Now I've got some replacement from Precision at Shenfield (but I dread to think how many coats will be needed - Precision have poor covering power and yellow's a problem at the best of times ) So - finish Set 2 . Two Type 2s to be done (D5901 first - as the RTC Derby loco it only needs a slight stretch to have her survive into the 80s in the Midlands , or indeed to be preserved, then 31 408 ) Finish the NRX conversion . Finish the Cambrian Shark . All of those are existing commitments It becomes a question whether the 128 kit or a heavy upgrade of the W Yorks 155 is next cab off the rank behind that lot. I have no steam age parcels stock . A 51' Gresley full brake (Kirk kit) would be a fairly quick win , and I have 2 old 12T vans with no obvious use which could be done with new chassis and Kadees for parcels tail traffic... That should keep me quiet

A large part of the range has been duplicated either by modern high spec RTR or by etched brass kits . I remember trying to do a count against the listings in Robert Forsythe's book , and I think only something like 30 out of 100 odd kits hadn't been duplicated by a more modern alternative (Eg the Sentinel shunter - of which I built two - has been replaced by the Model Rail RTR commission model) "An absolute catastrophe for the British model railway scene" is a little overstated And I think the moulds for whitemetal are rubber - it might make more sense to buy the masters , if they still exist, and produce new moulds

Without supporting reference I admit I'm a bit sceptical of this . Significantly altering the loading gauge would be a huge operation involving complete rebuilding of every bridge and platform - which is why it's not an option in Britain While I'm not an expert on French railways , the fact is that the SNCF Reseau Nord /former Chemin de Fer Nord are certainly to the same/very similar loading gauge as the rest of the SNCF today. And I've never come across any suggestion that it was ever different , or that there was a huge interwar rebuilding programme to change the loading gauge. More specifically I do have quite a substantial book on the Grande Ceinture and nowhere in that does it suggest that there was any difference in loading gauge between the Nord and the other French companies - since the whole point of the Ceinture was to exchange freight trains between the various lines out of Paris, a significant difference in loading gauge on one , restricting the vehicles it could take , would have been an important operational issue , and I'd expect it to be mentioned . Even more compelling is the fact that for many years the Grande Ceinture was operated by 0-6-2+2-6-0 du Bousquet articulated locos, built from 1910 to an existing Nord design . These things , in the photos, are visibly big, and the width across the side tanks, the height of the cab and the two long tubes mounted on top of a large boiler all look well in excess of anything the British loading gauge could accomodate. But evidently the Nord before World War 1 could take them very happily http://www.aqpl43.dsl.pipex.com/MUSEUM/LOCOLOCO/bousquet/bousquet.htm Finally it seems inherently unlikely that the Nord was built to a significantly smaller loading gauge than other French railways, since as I understand it, all French railways were built by the state , and engineered by the same small pool of government engineers trained in the same Grande Ecole , but then leased to private railway companies to operate. (This certainly applies for the 1840s when the Nord main line - and the PLM and P-O main lines -were built). I'm struggling to see why main lines built at the same time by the same small group of people for the same ultimate boss, as part of a national programme would be to radically different loading gauges. Especially when the French state , with it's tradition of rigid centralised uniformity, was involved.... A programme of modest clearance adjustment in a limited number of tight spots seems possible , but a wholesale rebuilding from something like the British loading gauge to Berne gauge across Northern France doesn't, so I'd be grateful for some specific references. (While obviously quite a large area of Northern France needed reconstruction after WW1, and any loading gauges might have been addressed at the time, the mainline from Gare du Nord to Calais was not in the area of the fighting, except for brief periods around Amiens) In the absence of specifc details to the contrary, I'd still say that the loading gauge from Calais to Paris was always substantially larger than in Britain, although as built it may not have been exactly the same as the current Berne gauge [but we're some way away now from the original enquiry about whether big LNER steam and Bulleid Pacifics could be mixed at any location]

The GC London Extension was certainly built to a "Continental" loading gauge , larger than the British norm , and this is frequently referred to in accounts of the London Extension. This must mean that Watkin was serious about the idea of through Manchester-Paris trains - though whether he had fully thought out the implications across London is another matter The Chemin de fer du Nord was built to a much larger loading gauge than is normally used in Britain - as can be seen any day of the week at Paris Gare du Nord. The Eurostars are significantly smaller than other stock and "standard" TGVs run to Calais, Dunkirk and Boulogne over conventional tracks . Corails and other standard SNCF coaches were used freely on the old conventional Nord mainline without any restriction that I'm aware of

What exactly would have been permitted down the Widened Lines as far as Farringdon? If you assume that the GC operated through trains onto the Southern companies via Baker St /Farringdon, and that you were modelling Ludgate Hill on the basis that it didn't shut in 1929, and that through trains off the GC changed engines there what could be assumed to get down the Widened Lines as far as Ludgate Hill without bending credibility too far? I know N1s went through Snow Hill and I think J50s as well - but were N2s banned on weight grounds - though they certainly worked into Moorgate? Could a Director be got down the Snow Hill route ? Or a Jersey Lilly? (Directors are at least available RTR). A3s were used on the GC in the late 30s but I presume would be an absolute no-no on the Widened Lines , even with a touch of modeller's licence. What about B1? L1? A5?? J11? (B1s are cleared for the W Highland so I think have a fairly good RA ) Ludgate Hill as an LNER/SR interchange station would have some potential - the spam cans could work in from the south, and although an A4 is too much , some kind of LNER main line loco could be possible under such a scenario. The GC London Extension was desperate for traffic so under Sam Fay the GC was active in developing cross country expresses - a couple of main line trains to the South Coast via Snow Hill would be plausible if the connections had existed...

Dreadful thought - presumably it would have been Farringdon , as a joint GC/Met/SER operation...

The sirens have sounded the final all clear, the blackout and the blitz are things of the past - and about 40 years after it should have , Blacklade has finally acquired station lights and station signs. I'm even intending to sort out the "bomb damage" behind the station facade and actually finish off the station building. Not before time, either... In short over the last couple of weeks I've had a big burst of detailing on the layout, and it's made a huge difference. Not, I must admit, to my accumulated stocks of whitemetal detailing bits and sheets of printed signage . Those have only sustained a modest dent. I had a new unused sheet of Tiny Signs modern BR posters (close inspection suggests they are actually mostly of 1975-80 vintage: there's two posters for the new GN Electrics in there and another one advertising the Rainhill 150 commemorations , as well as lots of posters of HSTs). I've used 3 - I have 32 left... And so on down through the box of scenic bits. It's frightening just how much stuff you accumulate - "I'm sure it'll come in useful for a layout and it's only a couple of quid" Admittedly Blacklade is a pretty small layout, and I've tried to be sparing. With the boxfile I never really got round to adding more than a couple of items and I was surprised by how effective restraint was. It struck me then that it is all too easy to pile in the detail items just because you have them and feel you ought to use them . The result being something unnaturally busy, where the funeral is queuing behind the wedding and trying to avoid entanglement with the travelling fair : a "quintessence" as defined by Charles Lamb - "an apple pie made all of quinces" In fact reality is pretty quiet and sparse. I go past our local church quite regularly: I might see signs of a wedding once or twice a year. On a Sunday morning or evening you might see people going into or leaving a service, two or three or four of them at a time. But do you want to run the Sunday train service? Come to that, if there's a wedding on , it must be Saturday, so the freight trains won't be running.... Stations are not crowded places . I used to use Market Rasen from time to time - in fact it contributed a little to Blacklade , in terms of short platforms and vanished trainshed. There is a 2 hourly service in each direction. Get there 10 minutes before the train - you might be the only person there, there might be one or two others. 4 or 5 minutes to go - there's half a dozen waiting on one platform . The train comes - a bustle of activity - 8-10 people get on , 8-10 more get off. 5 minutes after the train's gone the station's deserted ... For at least 45 minutes of every hour, the only sign of life in the place is the cawing of the rooks in the trees behind Okay, a three platform terminus with services on three routes will be busier than that . But even my local station , with it's commuter service, is pretty deserted for long periods . It may be full of people before the morning commuter trains depart - but 5 minutes after one's gone there's only one or two people there, if that. Go in the afternoon, or the evening , and unless a train's just arrived, the place is almost deserted - just one or two hanging about under the platform canopy with nothing to do Blacklade is supposed to be a dreary run-down hulk of a station with a train service that is poor for a town of it's size. The effect of Ascot on race days or Waterloo at 5:30pm on a weekday is not wanted. On the other hand, signage.... The human brain blots out most of it but the modern world seems to be drowning in the stuff. When you actually stop to look how many signs there are in any view, in any street, on any station, you suddenly feel overpowered by it . And cars (not that I've much road to worry about) . They've been breeding . They swarm everywhere, thick masses of them, swelling from around the buildings. Never mind Day of the Triffids - "Day of the Common Hatchback" is more like it. I reckon that if you take the average street, parked cars outnumber visible human being by a factor of about 5.... And now they're fitting them with computers. You may be able to take out a zombie army with a machine gun but can you take out a lane of slowly advancing BMWs? Enough.... The lack of station lights and station nameboards was annoying me - the station looked bare , it was completely anonymous and lacked a certain vertical emphasis. I wanted T lights . Because in my youth , those T shaped fluorescent light standards were the norm , a familiar part of the grey universal BR Corporate image. Some were old and had the station name on them, others were newer and didn't . But every station had them and had had for years. Anything else was cause for a second look They all seem to have vanished while I wasn't looking. It was only yesterday... A rummage through the scenic box turned up 3 packets of PD Marsh castings, total 15 lamps. And 3 packets of Knightwing castings , total 18 lamps. I reckoned 15 or less would do it. The Knightwing castings are bigger - taller , with longer light strips across the top. After a certain amount of throught I reckon that the PD Marsh castings represent the original 1950s version , with station name on the strip light, and Knightwing represent the second generation 1970s/80s version, with a plain strip light . Given that Blacklade Artamon Square is a run down dump that has had no refurbishment/investment since Dr Beeching was Chairman of the BRB, I went with PD Marsh, . Several coats of Centro grey later (the jar has now finally expired) a few coats of Tamiya gloss white for the strip lights and some departmental gray on the top, I had lights. But not station signs on them. A rummage through the accumulated mass of sheets turned up something from DC Kits with blank Regional Railways plates on it - 9 of them. To get the actual name I produced a sheet of possible sign in Word - for modern BR signage , all that is needed is the name on a plain white background . Arial, in bold at 5 point size seemed to be ok , so that's what I went with. Suitable sized strips were then cut out and stuck to the DC Kits signs with Rocket glue, then the DC Kits signs were stuck to strips of plasticard. Then the plasticard strips were stuck to fixing castings robbed from the Knightwing packets Poster boards were a next step. Three whitemetal castings for standard notice boards were painted up: departure posters were added to two, and timetables to a third . Two of these three were also glazed with scraps of acetate sheet. After that three poster display cases were needed : these were made with 10 thou plasticard, edged round with square microstrip, the poster(s) added and glazed with scraps of clear plasticard. The route diagram came from a DC kits sheet, and three posters from a Signs of the Timessheet; three more were found on an old Tiny Signs sheet , which seems to reperent 1975-80 . At least it features posters for the 1980 Railhill cavalcade, the 1975-6 GN suburban electrification and lots of HSTs . Fortunately no Jimmy Saville though. I picked a couple of "holiday by train + ferry" posters as Blacklade is supposed to be set in the late 80s or 21st century. This does highlight just how long the post -steam era now is - you can't use posters from the age of Harold Wilson and Edward Heath next to current TOC liveried stock . It's actually more of a gap than using Edwardian posters on a 1950s BR layout... From there I moved on to signage , courtesy of two more sheets from DC Kits and Signs of the Times. By this time I was getting a bit alarmed about how much needed to be done , how long it was taking, (and how much stuff I had available to use) . So I adopted the rule that only the signage and items which were absolutely necessary should go in.... That was still an awful lot. Departure simplifier sheets on every platforms . Timetables (1 set) . Regional route map (1). 3 BR posters, 3 commercial posters . Litter bin on each platform . Platform bench on each platform - these were PD March items , bought at the CMRA Workshop and repainted blue - two went on the concourse , in place of the long - and narrow - platform 3 . Refreshment facilities in the form of 2 vending machines (S kits whitemetal blocks with Signs of the Times wrap round sheets) . Signs - these were stuck to scraps of 10 thou plasticard with Rocket card glue , and stuck to the walls with same.. Platform numbers for each platform. I decided after I'd installed the signs that I didn't really want to hide them by installing a length of canopy. Strictly speaking there ought to be some covered area on the platform to protect passengers when it rains , but having worked out what would stop being visible as a result , I've been deliberately lazy and decided to leave it out. The figure came from Cats Custom Characters and is beautifully painted. As I don't intend to have many figures on the layout I thought I could afford to have one really well done. Another job tackled was the installation of some Knightwing castings for point motors - I only had seven , so the point tucked under the bridge hasn't got one. These were painted and suitably weathered. I also installed a signal cabinet - a whitemetal casting from Radley . I still have 3 out of four that I bought in my scenic box , not to mention some InterCity Models castings , and a packet of Hornby Skaledale that turned up the other day. The shading was done with one of the new Humbrol washes , thinned - a technique shown on a video on the Humbrol website and apparently used by aero modellers to emphasise and shade the panel lines on planes. Finally the finishing touches were added to the fuelling point. It's striking how only a handful of small touches have a big impact - and are all that are needed. Two oil drums were added (Merit, weathered) plus one of the cast whitemeal pallets in the Signs of the Times pack , suitably sunk in the weeds outside the doors to the store . Hi-vis warning signs were added , and finally the actual fuelling pump . The support post ,and nozzle are from the Knightwing fuelling point kit - where they are essentially extra bits for an earlier version. And that was all I actually used from the kit... I could still built two entire fuelling points with what was left. The hose is from the Signs of the Times detailing pack , and I used the lot (15" - so it can reach the full length of a parked DMU.). It looked shiny and plastic so I toned it down with the Humbrol blue/grey wash And that was it on the detailing front . A couple of figures are needed , and I have to sort out the back of the station building

I've built two, but not in LNWR livery , and I built them very much as they came , since they were a first essay in coach kitbuilding. You are evidently aiming for a higher standard, but in OO at least, I don't think there is anything particularly wrong with the Ratio bogies . Both my kits had turned brass buffers though the shanks are very thin . I painted the sides before building, and weighted them to just over 100g Details in my blog here, though I suspect you are aiming much higher: http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/blog/296-on-ravensers-bookcase/?st=5 (Look through all entries referencing Set 1) I'm surprised how rarely we see these kits on layouts, given that they seem to have lasted to 1953 or so

Blacklade had its first tentative public appearance a few weeks back, when I took it along to the CMRA Workshop event as a display item. It's been taken along to a society area group meeting twice, but this was the first time it had gone into the wider world. Chiltern Model Railway Association is the federation of model railway clubs and societies in the South East of England and beyond (Indeed over the last few years they've picked up members well into the North of England, and seem to be growing into the nearest thing to a national association of clubs we have.) As well as organising the St Albans exhibition each year in January, for a good few years they've run an event for members of CMRA clubs at Watford in July. Essentially it's a bit like the demonstrators section of an exhibition - except that there is no general public, just the folk demonstrating and other club members . (There's also a programme of talks and a couple of traders) It's a good event , and I've gone for a number of years and enjoyed it (both my club and a couple of societies I'm a member of belong to CMRA). This year I decided to take something along to display, under a society banner The theory was that the layout, spread across two tables on its side, would be a demo of DCC for layout control - as opposed to DCC for loco control. I don't claim to be any kind of guru , techie, or expert, but after being involved with a club project and my own layout where all the points etc were DCC controled without a conventional panel , I suppose I must know more about it than most. With three types of point motors, and three types of decoders on view , working signals interlocked with points , and route control by macros , I was hoping there would at least be something to talk about and show. If I'm honest , I wasn't exactly knocked down in the rush . A couple of people were interested to see the working signals, and whenever a potential punter came in view I gamely launched into my "what this is all about" spiel. I'd prepared some handouts on DCC , plus a sheet giving the background of the layout and a copy of the DOGA OO Intermediate standards, but I think only one of the DCC sheets was taken. However I did get a potential invitation to demo at a show so someone must have been moderately impressed, and I think there were some tables that were quieter than mine While in theory Blacklade was there as a static item, I did bring some stock on the sly, and for the last hour and a half I turned the layout right way up and ran it . What I hadn't realised was that Bradfield Gloster Square was also going to be there , and inevitably made my little effort look like a clockwork torch in competition with Spurn lighthouse. Even worse , the gremlins came out for a carnival as soon as they saw one of the Bradfield team was watching - and no layout on the circuit runs as flawlessly as Bradfield . I think part of the problem may have been that access to the fiddle yard is tight, and it is difficult to see if all wheels are on the track - some stock may not have been on the rails when it left the fiddle yard.... Once this was sorted out, things settled down and it ran reasonably smoothly while a couple of people from the adjacent EM gauge tables were watching. The main weakness of the layout has been reliable throwing of the points - the Marcway points are very stiff , and I didn't cut adequete recesses in the cork before laying them. In the run up to the show I had done a lot of work digging out the cork around various points to free them up , and this paid dividends. I also refitted the Hoffmann point motor , which in one direction was buzzing - meaning that it wasn't moving quite far enough to work the cut-off switch . The overall result was that everything bar No 1 crossover worked every time and point derailments, except at No 1 crossover (which has teeth and likes a Hornby 31 for breakfast) stopped. In the run up to Watford Workshop I also , finally, managed to sort out various ragged edges to the ballasting , and touched in exposed cork with brown cork acrylic, as well as touching up a few bits of the hard standing. That dealt with the obvious defects - the rest of the scenic work had to wait till after Watford (and merits a separate post) One discovery was that Blacklade is most comfortably operated from a chair at the station end , with the layout set up on a pair of tables. Unfortunately the clutter in the study at home has prevented it ever being set up as originally intended - on top of the bookcases and modelling cupboard. It only ever gets set up in the sitting room with the (very basic) legs.... I also had a running session with the layout the week after Watford . One of the Bradfield crew recommended a Peco railer, which does seem to help get things on reliably in the fiddle yard. The main problems seem to be with the parcels train - the body of the kitbuilt Van B was lolling to one side enough to catch the bridge abutment and derail (I've tightened up the fixing screws on the bogies as far as I can , though one bogie is still loose) and the 31 and No 1 crossover kept disagreeing. As this is one end of the runround loop, and as at present the Hornby 31 is the loco that works the two parcels trains and the trip TTA , this is unfortunate. One solution may be to get on with the detailed body for the old Airfix 31 (not to mention the fitting of Kadees) on the theory that Hornby 31s are a little track sensitive, DMUs seem to cope, and a loco with a slightly coarser wheel profile may be better (This is in no way a problem of the track standard - it's a question of the wire from the point motor to the tie bar being a little too flexible leading to closure not being quite positive enough. A more drastic step is replace one or both Tortioses with Cobalt Blues - meaning shorter, stiffer wire, over £30 and a certain amount of rewiring work.) It's clear I need a second 31 if I'm to run loco hauled stock as a DMU-substitute - that will have to go into Pl 3 as the only platform long enough, and that doesan't have access to the run-round loop. So the Hornby 31 will still be needed, and it's not as if I'm adding an extra project to the list Also on the subject of Pl 3 , despite efforts to ease the clearances of the edging slab - through repeated rubbing with an Xacto knife handle to crush the balsa down - the 108 seems to stick , derail and somehow this scrambled the decoder. I tried to reprogram in haste, forgot that the MERG point decoder is sensitive to programming commands , and scrambled that... Reprogramming the thing requires flyleads , taking down the layout etc so that was the end of a running session. I hope this is the last time for this particular problem. Some time ago I removed the NCE AutoSwitch which was supposed to switch off the rest of the layout when programming - because it didn't seem to be doing anything. I fitted a DPDT switch instead - and that doesn't seem to be doing anything either. It looks like I have somehow created an inadvertant connection across the isolation of the programming track (the fueling point siding) . However all this meant I had an unused NCE Auto Switch in the decoder bag, so I installed it between the MERG decoder and the DCC bus. Oh and a fault book is now in operation , to identify any gremlins...

My guess - and it is simply a guess - is that the loco was still in GC livery until repainted, though it might have recieved its LNER number, simply for practical operating reasons

Looking very good indeed

I'm clear that a circuit breaker(s) should go as far up stream as possible to protect the system. So I'd put one between PowerCab and AutoSW. In theory you could put one on every board, between the connector and the bus, so that only the board with the short dropped out , but in your case that's not really relevant We seem to have pretty similar layouts , wired in a pretty similar manner

I'm working in OO and I sometimes run a pair of Hornby 153s I intend to consist pairs of multiple units where I can My layman's understanding is that if the value of the circuit breaker in amps is higher than the maximum output of the transformer , the breaker won't trip, even if there is a short. (Hence comments in the past about the "coin test"? I presume this is why NCE state that their own circuit breaker isn't suitable for the PowerCab - ie the PowerCab isn't capable of delivering enough current to trip it? I could be wrong here - electricity isn't something I claim to understand very well. But I don't want to spend £15-£20 on a PSX-1 and find that it does nothing at all because not enough current flows through a short to trip it. £1.49 for a component from Maplins is cheap enough to take a punt...

Anyone have any views on this, as I shall probably be going near Maplins tomorrow? a) will the original US-supplied transformer at 1.1amps actually trip a PSX-1? b] Will the Maplins circuit breakers do any good?

Can anyone give a bit of advice/clarification on this issue? I have a Powercab , and the power supply is the US transformer it came with, plugged in via an international plug adapter (with part of the plastic rim/ring cut away so the transformer fits - but nothing electrical exposed of course). According to the markings on the base this delivers 1.1 amps At present there is no breaker and when anything derails or goes the wrong way into a point it wipes /scrambles the display and I have to pull out the lead and reboot the system. This is an irritation , but I'm more worried about the suggestion shorts can damage the Powercab's electronics (I've seen it suggested the Powercab doesn't actually shut off power but just limits it?) So I'm thinking of fitting a circuit braker but none seem low enough ampage. The NCE EB1 breaker is specifically listed on the nearest DCC supplier's website as "not suitable for the Powercab". (Thought EB1 was a rebuilt Shildon-Newport electric but there you go...) The PSX-1 seems to have a minimum trip level of 1.27 amps - so I don't think that will work either? All I can find - dimly remembering a comment long ago that Maplins sold fast acting circuit breakers that were far cheaper than the specialist commercial products - is this: http://www.maplin.co.uk/auto-reset-circuit-breakers-493 The 1.0amp version would presumably be low enough to trip with a 1.1amp transformer? Even if the Powercab trips faster , it would presumably act to protect the Powercab itself from a sustained short - which is my biggest concern at the moment I'm an electrical ignoramus so I may be missing something fundamental here... For clarity , the layout is 2 boards, each 4'3" long, the traction bus is two lengths of solid core mains cable , linke to the power cab panel /board connectors by bits of 0.2/24 "5amp" wire , droppers are a minimum of "3amp" (0.2/16) wire, and there is at least one and generally two droppers to every piece of rail . Interboard connection is via bulgin plugs and 7 core cable from Maplins. So inadequete gauge wiring shouldn't be an issue here. I'd be grateful for comments/views /help before I drive to the nearest large town with a branch of Maplins to buy one. Or even 2 (one for each board)

Quite apart from copyright, scan/copy may well result in slight variations in size, so the panel overlay may not match the underlying layer , never mind the variation in colour tone and density/finish . You may be better off just buying a second kit - I reckon there's enough extra parts in the kit to overlay one brake vehicle but that's as far as you'd get without extra material. I've got a StreetLevel Ashburys kit myself as my Streetlevel cardboard Met Bo-Bo can't cope with 2 Ratio coach kits at 100g each (should have added more lead inside the loco). Bogies on the Ashburys seem to be drawn as 7' wheelbase - 247 do a cast whitemetal GW 7' bogie which looks close and would supply useful weight as well as getting it very low down . But this is a very long way down my very long "to do" list....

To be honest , I expected the link was going to a "recipe" for varnished teak finish or a photo of a model painted by someone very very good. This is the first time I've seen someone say that Hornby's current teak finish is unacceptably poor , and suggest it can be bettered by a handpainted finish . That does beg the question " how? -using what method/"recipe"?" and whether the techniques will deliver a result better than Hornby's in the hands of an average/ better than average modeller , or whether only a professional painter of the calibre of Steve Barnfield or Larry Goddard with all the kit can "get a result" I can and do paint things but I can't achieve the quality of finish of current factory finishes even on a single colour livery (I'm still trying to pluck up courage to attempt 2 colour liveries) and I rely on weathering to get me out of jail

Having accidentally found the relevant thread , it's worth pointing out that two of the three criticisms made relate to colours . In one case it's a question of red - which is notoriously problematic on old black and white photos , in the second case no reliable evidence is available to judge the state of late LNER "faux teak" since no such original finish survives and period colour material is desperately scarce and not likely to reproduce the colours accurately (if anyone wants to chase hares theres about 5 secs of archive colour footage in the recent BBC documentary The Joy of Sets which shows a post war LNER express with teak/"teak" coaches) . In the third case the RTR model matches a builder's photo of how the insignia were applied. It may turn out to be a rare varient, but it's not wrong and the suggestion it may have been changed before the vehicle entered service feels like clutching at straws Not a lot can be done to "upgrade" any of this - while the cottage industrialist in question may not personally be satisfied with Hornby's rendition of teak , the awkward fact is that about 5 generations of modellers have failed to "crack" varnished teak finish successfully (we've been trying since the early 30s) and almost nobody is going to do a better job than Hornby. Mercifully apart from one brush with LNER/ER painted brown - not teak - I don't have to face this particular issue but I'll still have one of the coaches in question when they are done in maroon. This doesn't seem to be a case of pointing out a clear error in the model (eg the fact that Bachmann's cattle wagon is a scale foot short) or offering a solution, and it's by no means certain that the criticism of the RTR model is correct. On a slightly different tack, one issue is the situation where all the rivets are present and correct , the detail is spot on and the whole thing's totally wrong. That's to say where the detail and craftmanship of individual models is absolutely right, but the overall combination is completely wrong and incredible . The afore mentioned TMD layouts are a classic example - the locos may , and often are, detailed and very accurate to specific prototype, but such a depot never existed anywhere , and looks nothing like any depot that did. For example someone recently quoted the main shed at Sheffield Tinsley (TI) as scaling out at 37' in 4mm . The typical TMD layout has an 18" long shed, often from Hornby. Stations with 3 platforms holding 4 coaches and claiming to be Euston, Kings Cross or Waterloo vanished from the hobby decades ago as absurd.... Or - for another example - the presence of brightly coloured wooden PO wagons sprinkled into BR steam era goods , when A) coal wagons generally ran in coal trains - the local pickup goods being the exception to the rule and B) post war PO wagons were severely weathered or unpainted wood . Not to mention that most post war coal trains would have had lots of 16T minerals , and that 98% of all 16T minerals had scored /damaged paintwork and streaks and patches of rust...

Richard: A word of warning - correspondence in MRJ in the last year has revealed that PVA is acidic and promotes corrosion of lead very nicely . Especially as the surface area of lead shot is so much greater than an equivalent weight of leadsheet Lead corrosion does 2 things . Firstly the corrsion products have greater volume so everything swells (as with rust) Various finescale modellers who happily filled the boilers of their etched brass kit locos with lead shot in pva have reported with horror that the boilers have started to swell and burst as the lead shot corrodes and expands inside them. This will probably happen inside your chassis moulding over the next 2-4 years Secondly the corrosion product of lead is white lead, a highly toxic heavy metal product , which takes the form of dust - easily inhailed. When the Victorians used white lead in paint it did serious harm to those producing the white lead, and to painters , and there are very strong warnings today about using masks and avoiding sanding and dust when stripping old painwork which may use lead based.pigments Use superglue, use araldite, but don't use pva with dust shot....