Ravenser

It's about time I posted some stuff I've actually done, rather than grumbling that I've not got much done. These wagons were done in September , but I've not got round to posting them till now. A mixed bag of elderly wagons on their last legs... Exhibit A , as they say in court, is a down at heel Walrus, unaccompanied by a Carpenter: I have to confess that I've tweaked the photo very slightly in Microsoft Digital Image 2006, to compensate for the effects of flash , though the adjustments to colour balance and contrast are only a couple of notches. I feel a bit guilty but the contrast/border between different weathering washes always seems to leap out and hit you on a photo in a way that it doesn't viewed in natural light by the eye. Here the jarring note is the boundary between the track dirt on the wagon (Railmatch brake dirt/track dirt mix) and the general browny muck on the sides (wash Precision LNER coach teak - I'm not likely to paint many LNER coaches, and somehow I've ended up with two tins...) It's quite subtle viewed with the naked eye, and I'm fairly pleased with the overall result. This wagon has finished up much better than I'd dared to hope at one time. It's now been fitted with Kadees - I'd no hope of getting S+W couplings under those platforms. - and is destined for the early period (1985-90) engineers train on Blacklade. The SReg off-loaded them on an unsuspecting LMR at the start of the 80s. Not sure I'm up for building another of these though... Next in this collection of clapped out opens is a Cambrian coke wagon, a kit of very elderly vintage bought off the club second hand stall. I discarded the moulding for the underframe members after using it to set up the solebars - I want to put lead sheet under the floor, not stick a large injection moulded obstacle in the way. Construction is very conventional, and much as it comes. Painting and weathering is according to the recipes given by craigwelsh in his MRJ article, using Games Design Workshop -although I'm certainly not in his league I'm very pleased with the result. This type of wagon with the coke raves is a pig to get into all the nooks and crannies and the photo really shows any spots I missed. I think I've got most of them since then. Transfers are Modelmasters Next come two LMS opens: The first, bought at St Albans last year, started off looking like this : and now looks like this - a D1892 open retrofitted with vacuum brakes by BR once again any imperfections are cruelly exposed by the enlargement, such as the tie rod... A glass fibre pencil was used to cut back the weathering, and transfers are a patchwork of Modelmaster bits to give a plausible seeming number Finally there's a more or less as-it-came-in-the-packet Cambrian kit for the wooden chassis D1666, possibly the most numerous open wagon ever built in Britain and arguably second only to the 1/108 16T mineral as the most numerous wagon diagram ever Much of the effort has gone into an attempt to represent an unfitted wagon showing the remains of late 1930s LMS bauxite, which is a bit more washed out than the photo shows - again the greater contrast under flash is a factor . I've either missed the base of the hook , or the thing's come out and been glued back in...

It's a sign of something - not a good something - that I find myself doing my New Year stock take /resolutions in the middle of January Twelve months ago I set myself a fairly ambitious programme of catch up and finish. This was tempting fate, I suppose, and Fate duly obliged, wielding a large blunt instrument. At the end of that January, my then employer embarked on a third major round of redundancies . The redundancy process and jobhunting took up most of my time and energy in the first half of the year, and railway modelling didn't happen. Nor did a lot of other things. I then decided, as a preliminary, to try to get on top of the piles of debris and the backlogs which had built up on various fronts. Since I had been seriously overcommitted anyway for several years this has taken a lot longer than I'd hoped, and I haven't been around here very much in recent months. Come to that, I've been to my club twice in the last 6 months It's still not done. A trip to IKEA after Christmas produced a small bookcase, what is billed as a DVD tower but which can also serve as a narrow bookcase (good for society magazines, Oakwood branch line monographs and old combined volumes) and two magazine boxes - that wasn't sufficient to clear up the piles of books and it will be back to IKEA for another DVD tower and a lower DVD case (for use as a book shelf) to finish the job. The clear up went as far as removing the long defunct board from Ravenser Mk1 which has been cluttering up the study for an appalling numvber of years. I still have a few shelves with books jammed sideways in the top for want of space but I can see and find things and the study looks like a habitable room not the scene of an explosion. A trip to my Mum's at Christmas removed the last salvagable bits of my teenage efforts at buildings from the Blacklade Corporation Tramways, and the BRMs have disappeared into a box. So what's been cleared and what's to be done for the new year? Wagons: There's little or nothing outstanding on the air-braked front. As I said last year, I don't really have much use for airbraked wagons these days . I duly bought a Dapol KQA to support the cause and handle the couple of 40'HCs I'd acquired. Although the container train has no immediate use at present, it's one thing I'm definitely keeping regardless, and (in a very desultry, unurgent way) I may quite possibly acquire a Realtrack FLA set at some point to complete a train from my own resources. Otherwise this front's been closed down for the foreseeable future I made further progress with the steam era wagons in the autumn - I really must post the results and fit them with Sprat and Winkles. This leaves those stubborn perennials the ex WD road van and the DOGA COV B on the bookcase. The road van will have to wait till the spring because resin has to be worked outside on safety grounds- for that reason I never seem to get on with the kit , and the awkwardness of using this material puts me off exploring it further. A Cambrian Dogfish and Shark for early period Engineers trains might be on the cards, and perhaps one or two more wagons to round off the collection for the boxfile. I need to fit Kadees or Sprat and Winkles to a few more of my older models to get them back in service. And that, essentially is all that needs doing on the wagon front So this year really needs to be the one where I finally move on beyond wagons into achieving things in other areas . Starting with - Coaches: The Ratio Van B needs finishing , top priority . The sticking point was that the roof needs shortening at both ends. And 2 of the brake blocks have disappeared along the way. An upgraded Lima CCT might be a sensible follow up. Then there's the question of sorting out some loco-hauled coaches from Blacklade as a DMU replacement/steam special set. This is not urgent , and given the complications of fitting Kadees to Bachmann Mk1s, and the fact that DMUs are much more important, it may quite possibly not happen this year The Ratio ex LNWR BCK got as far as one teak undercoat on the sides and stalled. Unless the group BLT shows signs of progress , there seems no point diverting my efforts in this direction. I shall probably get rid of the rake of Mk3s I acquired: I can't see I'll ever have the space or need for an HST, and it would reduce the clutter in the study DMUs: Now we get serious. Immediately behind the Van B comes finishing the Provincial Pacer I started and which I haven't touched in over a year. This one's needed for the layout, so must take priority. Behind this comes finishing the Bratchill 150/2. Now I have laser cut windows, the last major stumbling block to further progress is removed. A "quick and dirty" rewheel of the Skipper + DCC installation + Kadees may not be not far behind About the one thing I did get done on this front last year was to buy a Provincial 150/2 from Trains 4U. Retail therapy is quick and easy..... I fitted a Bachmann ESU decoder , and added Pete Harvey's sillhoutte seat etches which look a treat. Unfortunately the Bachmann decoder doesn't seem to support consisting - awkward when the whole point of the 150/2 is to work in multiple with a 153 joining and splitting. So I've got to take it out , replace with the rather pricy TCS 21 pin decoder I bought at Warley, and weather the underframe. The recovered Bachmann decoder can go in the ROD. As I don't propose modelling Worsborough bank before electrification I can't see I'll ever need to consist my O4 Other modest jobs in this area include populating and weathering the 108, and sorting out the 101 - the replacement underframe mouldings are to hand. And if I've got time on my hands, a DC Kits Cravens needs building On the RTR front, a Wagon und Maschinbau railbus would be ideal for the group BLT , and a Realtrack 144 in the earlier W.Yorks red and white would be ideal for me. However as that livery won't appear before 2012 , it can be parked until then. As can the railbus unless a) the BLT makes progress and B) no-one else in the group gets one Plenty to keep me busy on this front Locos: The one bit of "progress" on thisfront is that I bought a discounted 63601 at Warley. A Frodingham O4 withdrawn in 1966 is as good as I'll get. Its a bit over the top for the group BLT , and if that doesn't make progress it's way over the top for Blacklade , but it's a very fine loco and I've redeemed my pledge on the LNER Consensus thread. I now have 2 kettles in need of chipping. And if I succumb to a discounted L1 (Hornby have done one from one of the local sheds.. perfect for the BLT and suitably compact for a steam special - yes I klnow none are preserved but Blacklade doesn't exist either - we're talking alternative realities) that'll be 3... The Baby Deltic kit has gone to a good home - someone brave enough to build one The 57 seems best candidate for aType 5 to trip one TTA, so that ought to be a priority for weathering, followed by repairs to the hapless 60 Beyond that, DCCing and upgrading the old 03, and trying to finish the Drewry 04 for the boxfile are the obvious targets, followed by a detailed bodyshell for the Airfix 31 if I get ambitious That should keep me busy Layouts require aseperate posting

D605Eagle Ian Allan abc combined volume for 1972, p39 top has a picture of one of the last 29s, 6119, and although the photo is black and white, the area just above the cab windows definitely seems much lighter than the rail blue sides or the roof above. The loco has double arrows and no D prefix. My detailed Hornby model was finished accordingly....

If direct access onto the existing high speed route is provided , without reversal at St Pancras, there is of course already a London station available to call, with full international facilities, and extensive heavy duty Tube , surface rail light rail and bus connections. This would include very good access into a major Central London commercial district (or even 2 ) Stratford Intl Commercially there should be no difficulty calling at Stratford with a through Birmingham/Paris train and letting Crossrail, Javelin, the Central Line, the GE, the Jubilee Line and the DLR take passengers into the City, West End and Docklands. The difficulty/cost is providing full international facilities a la Ashford and Ebbsfleet at stations nothe of London

Very useful and instructive - excellent results

I've been building stock boxes : one last weekend and one this. And here are the results: which is the air braked box and the steam age stock for the shunting plank. There is absolutely nothing original about this - the idea was taken from Chris Ellis' book "Next Steps in Railway Modelling" , published a couple of years ago, in which it is credited to Stuart Robinson. The construction should be obvious from the photos - take one box file (price 3 quid) , rip out the spring clip and insert dividers using corregated cardboard from a dismembered box and parcel tape. The result is remarkably effective - because the compartments are close fitting and sometimes even a shade tight, the stock doesn't move around and doesn't get damaged. And because of the honeycomb effect , the partitions are strongly reinforced by other partitions and end up pretty rigid It also saves a lot of space. 2 box files for the shunting plank contain a total of 35 wagons and 4 locos. I reckon you save about two-thirds of the volume storing stock this way compared with leaving wagos in the manufacturer's boxes. Not to mention that the vast majority of my wagons for the plank are kits so there wasn't a box to start with. It's also much quicker and easier to find things in these boxes - just lift the lid and it's all there. As opposed to using the long cardboard loco boxes they sell for a couple of quid, where you have to hunt from box to box and unwrap everything to find the wagon you want. This was brought painfully home to me when turning out the collection of long boxes that was housing a lot of this stuff before. I found a Conflat or two I'd forgotten about and never run- not to mention a Red Panda Lowfit I'd forgotten I'd ever owned - built for Ravenser Mk1 and rarely if ever used, not least because it was stored somewhere else and forgotten about. Once fitted with S+W couplings it can go into use on the shunting plank. As well as helping to clear up some of the debris around the place and bring a bit of order and accessibility to my fleet, this exercise has helped to define my wagon building activities for the medium term. As you can see, there are a number of vacant slots. These will take the wagons I'm currently working on, plus the ex WD road van and the etched COV B which have both been sitting on the bookcase for an embarassingly long time. There are slots for a couple more wagons to be recycled out of the fleet from Ravenser and fitted with S+W couplings for the plank. And that leaves just 2 slots for further steam-age wagons.... Plans for Tranche 4 of stock for the shunting plank have therefore been abruptly curtailed, especially as once I'd turned all the "overspill" stock out of it's boxes it was clear I was already almost there anyway. So this just leaves space for a rebuild of a Hornby refridgerator van and an elderly Ratio coke wagon kit I picked up unbuilt at the club, and tranche 4 is done. On the airbraked side, there's no real need for most of the revenue vehicles now I'm less actively involved at the club. With a little bit of work with a knife, and some more parcel tape I relocated a partition in one of the stockboxes I built about 2 years ago - a further advantage of thistype of construction is that, if push comes to shove , you can modify the size of the compartments. This now provides a home for the Walrus which has acquired its Kadees (no 49 long overset , if you're interested) and in a burst of enthusiasm I coverted two more wagons to Kadees while I was about it. With some wagons transferred from the old box to the new, there are now slots for a Dogfish and a second Shark from the bag of Cambrian kits I was given earlier this year (The idea here is to have an engineers's train for both early and late periods - in the early period it runs with Walrus , Dogfish, grampus and Zander , using an ex GW Toad and a Shark - in the later period it has Seacows, Rudd, PNA, and a pair of Sharks. Hence I could use a Shark in olive green, which could run in either train) I could also probably squeeze in a Starfish with a bit of ingenuity (another kit from the cupboard) . On the other hand there's no slot for a scratchbuilt PNA . And the fact that there's a convenient slot for an old Lima CCT as well as for my PMV means that sorting it out has risen up the To Do list.. Suddenly the way ahead on the wagon front is much more sharply defined. If it's in the boxes, it will probably get run....

My attention span has obviously atrophied and my focus suggests an eye test is required urgently. In short , rather than pressing vigourously ahead with the van B, I've become side tracked into finishing two wagons. The Walrus has been the subject of long-standing lament round here. In a fit of mental aberration I decided to paint the thing - only to find that it is clearly determined to fight me to the death. A first coat of my home-mixed tin of "off-black" produced a distinctly thin coverage . How can black not cover ? - especially Humbrol which normally has far better covering power than the dreaded Precision . Well, I could have tried mixing the stuff thoroughly . That then produced a shade I thought to grey - and still a slightly streaky uneven finish. I visited the model shop near my new office and , having investigated the Revell Anthracite Black, ended up with the Humbrol equivalent , number 85. That still didn't give a totally even finish - how can thishappen with black. And - whisper it - there was another imperfection: one or two nibs in the finish. I then did what I should have done in the first place - having rinsed the brush thoroughly in white spirit , I worked it thoroughly on a bar of wet soap . Alarming numbers of little black bits came out on the soap. Rinse brush and soap well. Try again. An almost equally alarming number of black bits came out on the soap. After 5 or 6 separate bouts of working on the soap, teasing out and rinsing, the bit count finally dropped almost to zero. Many of them may have come from the stock of the bristles, but it was still a very sobering exercise. The wagon side was rubbed down gently with fine abrasive board where there was an imperfection (possibly fine wet and dry paper, wet, would have been better) and a final coat applied. It's acceptable rather than perfect , and my mood wasn't improved by finding I already had a tin of Humbrol 85 on the workbench.... The hopper interior has had two coats (inevitably) of Humbrol acrylic leather and will have a slightly lightened final thin wash Meanwhile the Dapol ex LMS open collected 4 coats of Precision Bauxite before the old lettering disappeared (I bought a large tin of the stuff - one of my worse purchases) Transfers were a struggle as well. I couldn't find any suitable waterslides for Walruses in my various packs of engineers transfers. As the wad of transfer packets is over an inch thick, this was just a bit vexing - and I wasn't really prepared to pay about a fiver and wait about 10 days to source a special pack just for one (miserable) wagon. So I ended up using the elderly rubdowns in the kit. The first broke up partly - I have found the secret is to cut the transfer out, very close to exact size, and them apply , thus making sure it sits exactly flat and in place and ensuring it does not move while rubbing over. The first attempt was patch painted and a second data box transfer was salvaged from one of the other Walrus kits I was given. The rest of the elements came from various Modelmasters packs, plus electrification flashes from a very decrepit sheet of Woodhead transfers (the latter largely held on by a liberal application of microsol - the vulnerable bits will have a coat of varnish to seal them). The lettering elements don't exactly match any of the 5 photos of Walruses in black I've found , but are a free amalgam of all that covers the key needs. Thus I didn't copy the way "Walrus" has been painted out of the lettering box when YGV was applied over: Walrus - York 1985 - Paul Bartlett and that wagon hasn't got electrification flashes - in 1985 I doubt if there were overhead wires on any part of BR within 100 miles of York , and these wagons were not exactly likely to wander, given their crippling limitations. As Blacklade is somewhere in the Midlands and sees a few DMUs from Birmingham, I suspect my Walrus spends much of its time lurking at the back of Bescot Yard, where it most certainly would need electrification warning flashes.. I've also added "min 3 chain curve" lettering and I've still got to add the coat of chocolate brown muck (I'm just puzzled who else has pushed Walruses into the week's most popular photos. I can't have looked at each shot 5 times. I'm sure of it..) Transfers for the LMS open have also been improvised . I couldn't find anything suitable, and I'm afraid I bodged it, by cutting out number and other elements from the Modelmaster ex revenue Engineers wagon sheet. They were supplied in a post '64 data box - I cut out the bits I needed for pre '64 style. The number has only one digit wrong for the type, and it really ought to be bang in the middle of a block of LMS opens - only , as it happens, it isn't. You'd have to have a very good knowledge of the subject or careful reference to Essery's book to realise the number is actually wrong All I have to do now is add vac pipes, tie bars and we're done

I've made a very slow start on things, but there is some progress to report with the Ratio Southern parcels van. I've seen some adverse comment about this kit on here - notable Roger Chivas' remark that having seen somebody build one he went off and designed an etched brass kit because it would be so much easier. Given that most people are frightened by etched brass [I'm not saying they ought to be, just observing factually the way people actually react] this makes it sound like the Ratio kit is unbuildable and may put people off even thinking about trying it. I'm far enough in now to make some comment on the kit. It is certainly much more intricate and fiddly than the older Ratio MR and LNWR kits. Take the roof - which I'm currently tackling. This is moulded with a slightly textured surface - probably to represent canvas. You have to drill out holes for seperate whitemetal torpedo vents - the instructions say 1/16" drill which equates to 1.6mm in new money. I've still had to ease every hole a fair bit with a broach to take the torpedo vent casting. And at first glance the roof moulding looks a bit long - so I may have to file back at each end. Now compare with the older Ratio kits - a one piece roof with the vents moulded on in the plastic. No doubt not quite as effective but much quicker and simpler. Take the sides. These require seperate doors to be fitted to the basic side, and etched drop light mouldings to each door window. Not to mention seperate droplight mouldings for the guards' door. The Ratio LNWR coaches have a single injection moulding for the whole side Take the underframe. Each battery box requires the addition of 4 lengths of microrod. The dynamo comes in 4 bits There's nothing exactly difficult about each operation, and everything is supplied. It's very far from difficult to build so far - bear in mind that I've not attempted a coach kit since a few teenage attacks on Ratio MR kits, so I must be counted as a novice builder here. But there's no doubt it's a much slower, more laborious and intricate process than the older Ratio kits. I've added lead flashing along pretty well all the floor to bump the weight up to 130g+ . I know 4 x 25g is the standard formula for a 4 axle vehicle , but that seems a bit light for a 50' coach Two detailed gripes - not exactly with the kit design. The transfers cover SR and BR pre 1965. Nobody seems to do BR Corporate image post 1965 transfers in white. [The same situation exists with the PMV - the only "4mm" transfers available are actually to 7mm ] This is odd, because these vehicles were well known as the last surviving pre nationalisation coaching stock and ran for over 20 years after the Corporate Blue livery came in. And it's not as if there were only one or two survivors either. There must be plenty of modern image modellers who fancy a bvit of variety in their fleet by adding some Maunsell vans in rail blue And somehow quite a few of the brake blocks have come out of the sprue, and despite a hasty search on Sunday I'm now two short. I am reasonably certain I had one floating around on the workbench earlier and didn't realise what it was. Somehow I'll have to improvise for the one wheel I can't cover... I've even made a start on the Dapol open I bought at St Albans , to turn it into a retro-fitted LMS wagon. This is a very simple conversion - a spare Parkside vac cylinder cut down for height, remove the old couplings and securing lugs which hold on the chassis , glue body to chassis , cross shaft from plastic rod, scrap of plastic rod for the crank off the vac cylinder , and there we are, ready to paint. Can't think why it's taken 6 months to do...

I've had a fairly strenuous 6 months, involving being made redundant at the end of May . Thankfully I found a new job and started work again just three weeks later, but as all my time outside work was taken up with pursuing avenues for future employment no modelling got done at all. In fact very little else got done at all , with the result that I've spent the last 6 weeks in catchup and clear-up mode, and only now am I getting to the point where I really ought to start doing some modelling again. However my personal circumstances have changed , and that has a bearing on my modelling. Fortunately I've had only a small drop in income once travelling costs and other factors are netted out, and as I had over 10 years service with my previous employer the payout reached 5 figures, so overall the financial impact is negligable. I've been very much more fortunate than a lot of other people in my position, and I know it. The big changes are not financial. In the previous job I was commuting by train for about 2 hours a day, leaving home at about 7:20 to get home 12 hours or more later. Now I'm working locally, and driving to work in about 35 minutes. That's meant I've got an hour and three-quarter a day of my life back. It also means I've had to get a small car, after a good many years of not driving. And since my club is near to where I worked and I've surrendered my season ticket, I'm not likely to be going very often in future There's no doubt that up until late last year I was heavily overcommitted. I was heavily involved with a club project and with other club commitments that meant two nights a week at the club. I'm also actively involved with a society and that took up further time. Add in long working hours, a few shows a bit of time on here, and the rest of my life and interests and everything seemed perpetually to be crowding out everything else. All this has now been drastically simplified. I can't be involved in club exhibition layouts (except perhaps as an occasional operator or builder of stuff off-site). I suppose now I have a car I could join one of the clubs "near" where I live - but all are about 10 miles or more away. This, obviously, frees up a lot of time and eliminates a lot of commitments The flip side of this is I may now be in a position to take a layout of my own to a show, though I haven't even checked whether Blacklade would fit with the back seats folded down. And to be quite honest, my feelings about exhibiting are ambivalent. Getting to some shows and events would be possible in a way it wasn't before (bringing the car down from Lincolnshire I broke the journey by calling in on the Nene Valley Railway - somewhere I hadn't visited for a couple of decades). In the past there was no hope I could get to a members' day at Butterley or Chasewater - now it might be an option I also lose easy and instant access to the big smoke and won't be travelling by train on a regular basis (something I've been doing for best part of two decades). On the other hand I still live next to the railway and my new office is in a former station building. There's a model shop in the high street of the town where I now work - it doesn't sell model railways, but it does sell brass section, styrene sheet, paints and tools . Having lost our local model shop about 4 years ago , this is a useful plus. I should also be able to reach two other model shops within 15 miles drive if I need to At which point we can cut to the chase. How does all this affect the "catch-up and clear the cupboard" programme I ambitiously committed to in a posting at the start of the year - just a couple of weeks before I got poleaxed by fate? Actually , almost nothing changes - other than the fact that half a year has gone up in smoke with zero modelling. Pretty well everything on that list was for either the shunting plank or for Blacklade. The few bits that were'nt were for the potential group GE BLT . If I can actually focus on those things without distractions, and with more time at my disposal, I might start to get somewhere The obvious place to start now is the same as it was then... Finish the Southern bogie van so I have a suitable length parcels rake. Build the Cambrian open kit and fix up the wagon I bought at St Albans for the plank. Sort out the Pacer Not to mention chip and weather the Provincial 150/1 and the Central 158 . Someone remind me which member does the etched seat outlines for the 150/1 and where I get them? I only want to take the body off once, to fit decoder and seat sillhouettes in one operation Thankfully change of circumstances has limited effect on my collection of stock and plans . In future I won't have much access to a large continuous circuit . The full set of HST coaches I'd assembled is almost certainly redundant and I may decide to dispose of it at some point (fortunately I never got any power cars). The half a container train is a slightly different matter. I only bought the FEAs to support the cause , the locos can be re-used in a very limited way on Blacklade to haul an oil tank, and the eight or ten boxes are not a problem (I'd have wanted some of them anyway for personal reasons). I'll probably get a Dapol pocket wagon anyway- I've a high cube to accomodate The Voyager can be stored - those things are short enough that at some time in the future I'll probably build a layout which can accomodate it. Otherwise I'm more or less fine. The cheap black kettle I bought at Warley can probably just about be used for a steam special, and would not look out of place on the GE BLT. I will still , almost certainly , get an O4 to support the cause- it's just I want to wait to see if the NRM version gets discounted (she was a Frodingham loco until 1966). It would be a bit over the top on a GE branch freight, but not entirely impossible. I may even get an L1 if any end up cheap at the boxshifters - not only would it be suitable for the possible GE BLT, it would be more sensible as motive power for a steam special on Blacklade than the other two [ I know none are preserved. Blacklade doesn't exist either... And I did say , if I see one going cheap at a boxshifter] The only other change is that the forthcoming RTR class 144 would be very suitable for Blacklade and a lot easier than fixing Hornby 142s. I think I shall probably end up getting one. Everything changes , but things remain the same Now all I have to go is make a start

Is there any risk that the tinplate will weaken the magnet in the motor over time , affecting its power . A bit like shielding the motor in case any metal filings get onto it ?

And given the route structure (just 4 options out of Central to the north- 2 of which are round the City Circle in either direction) delay or blockage anywhere on the City Circle is going to disrupt a large part of the network . Hence special measures to keep traffic moving.....

I was going to be a good boy and not buy much RTR this year.... What are the coupling arrangements (ie does it have NEM pocket? as I would want to run in multiple/split units and use Kadees))

Don't be disheartened. The Scharfenburg coupling on the 73 is truly impressive What have you been doing to the 101 underframe? I have a 101 and an uncomfortable feeling I ought to do something to improve the underframe - but I can't quite see anything practical...

It is perhaps worth pointing out that these days the Government at Westminster does not run Scotland. Thanks to devolution , Scotland, by and large is run by Alec Salmond and his mates. And this arrangement was put in place by a party dominated by people from Scotland , essentially without any input , consultation, or consent from the English people, precisely to ensure that a future Tory Government at Westminster would be powerless to do anything meaningful in Scotland At the same time that party seemed to intend to rule England using Scottish and Welsh MPs votes at Westminster ad infinitum . Hence no form of "English votes for English laws" It has been rather striking in the last few days how many of those appearing in front of the cameras expressing their views on what should be the Government , essentially, of England have been Scots (John Reid, Tom Harris , David Steel , Alex Salmond, Gordon Brown, etc etc),- not to mention the un-elected players (Lords Mandelson & Adonis and Alaister Campbell) Sometimes elected English voices seemed far and few The old cry of "no mandate to govern in Scotland" cuts both ways. Given the overwhelming rejection of the previous Government in England , the agonising over whether the Scots would tolerate the English replacing the Government they had rejected with something else looks a bit odd to English eyes. Sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander Again - very simply , Scotland is largely autonomous these days and a situation where people are agonising over whether a given Government would be acceptable to people whom (by and large) it doesn't govern , when its evidently acceptable to those it does, looks mighty odd. Can you really have laws for England only being voted through with the votes of MPs from half a dozen parties which did not even stand in England, let alone attract a single vote there? Take out the party names and policies , and in the abstract it would still have been a very curious and problematic situation

It's taken a long time to find this - sorry. The answer , basically , is I just extended the lines outwards. Thus a 2 car platform/fiddle yard road becomes a 3 car one. I was also using Marcway 3' radius points which added a little bit onto the central point complex, and I added an extra road in the FY at the back.

This is by way of a holding entry - because of a difficult period at work I've not managed to do any modelling for about 6 weeks, and consequently there's been nothing to report. I was really hoping to make some serious progress on the backlog this year , only life comes along and throws a spanner in the works... However I did manage to get to Ally Pally this weekend, and while I was there managed to purchase some laser cut flush glazing for the Bratchill 150 from Shawplan. I gather these are the "beta" or test version of the thing and they are not yet openly on sale : he had some tucked away in a box. Anyway , £20 and enough for 2 cars was mine. Some weeks ago I showed a friend the completed Walrus (see below) . A week or so later, when I saw him again he said "I've got something for you" - a plastic bag containing some Cambrian kits. "I'm not going to build these now - you can have them". So I'm now the owner of two Shark kits, a Dogfish kit, and two more Walruses. I admit my feelings about the last are a little mixed, but I sourced some replacement plate bogies for them at Ally Pally. Plus some Modelstrip as I'd run out. My Provincial 150/1 from Trains4U arrived a week or so ago, and very nice it is too. I remember these units in Provincial on the Lincoln/Nottingham services when they were new and based at Derby Etches Park, so it's a very appropriate addition to the early period for Blacklade. However with pressure of things at work it hasn't even been out of the box and run yet, let alone fitted with a decoder. There seems to be little prospect of getting Blacklade set up to programme and try it out in the next fortnight, the way things are at present. My other purchase at Ally Pally was the 21 pin version of the Bachmann 3 function decoder (for £12 - I'm counting the pennies) . The one I have in my 108 produces excellent running and according to the paperwork the decoder now supports 4 digit addressess . The old version didn't - my addressing convention is class number for the Modernisation Plan units (ie within 2 digit) and for locos and 2nd/3rd generation units - first 2 digits , class, then last 2 digits of the TOPS number . Hence 150 135 needs to be 1035 (I'm never going to own a Western or a Hastings unit so there's no risk of duplication) - there are so many 15x classes it seems best to drop the middle digitof the class number to get a distinctive ID This may be more or less the last RTR I buy this year as things look at the moment: I've more or less completed the stud for Blacklade, as far as RTR spending goes. The gaps are the things that need to be built, not bought - ie Pacers, 150/2, Cravens , and longer term 114. I've got the kits , I just need to build 'em. There's quite enough on that front to keep me busy for at least 2 years without flashing the chequebook around About the only thing that's made any progress is the Van B. The droplight etches are painted, the windows glazed, and the etched bars from Roxey have been sourced and fitted behind. Doors are fixed in place and the interior of the van sections has been painted a suitable brown. And that's as far as it's got... I now have both the Cambrian LMS 5 plank and LNER 6 plank open kits - thanks to Barry at Cambrian. The LMS kit is sitting on the workbench - I've not had chance to start it. And it's looking as if I won't make it to York this year, though if travel disruption during and after Easter is bad enough I may well find myself with some time stuck at home and perhaps something might happen on the modelling front

I'm no expert on these things, but it looks good. I think I'm correct in believing later deliveries collected more and more grills in order to keep the crew cool - hence the lack of grills on the sides would make this one of the earlier locos. However no doubt one of the usual suspects in the etched bits sector will come up with suitable extra grills for those needing a later loco Shouldn't the top of the door be open - ie the door stops at the line of rivets halfway up the side? See here: Sentinels - LNER encyclopedia

Er, you're suggesting it's as valuable as Rocket and Hardwicke and you'd like to put a gas axe through Colombine and Queen Victoria's saloon???????? I'm not a great advocate of scrapping , but I do feel this is pushing it to extremes in defence of one severely delapidated duplicate Peak And no, you can't cut the last EM1 (which will never run again because there's no 1500V line to run it on)

Some very nice stuff.I've built the NuCast Sentinel , twice , one for me and one for someone else. Apart from it being a lengthy job to clean up the whitemetal and get the corners smooth and the roof to fit well, I found the Tenshodo very unsatisfactury .Occasional wheelslip running light is emabarsssing - it looks very pretty but it's not a terribly good shunter on the little plank . The bull ant has got to be a lot better. The relevant RCTS volume suggests that the wheelbase was slightly adjustable because the system of taking up slack in the drive chains involved moving the axleboxes. About 3" difference seems to be indicated

I can fully share your dilemma , having at one point found myself actively pursuing 4 layouts (and that's ignoring the stalled light rail project , the half forgotten ambitions for Ravenser Mk2, and the bits of modern N I started acquiring) But with one exception, all of them were 4mm/OO (provided you ignore the large padded envelope stuffed full of 3mm wagon kits) At least there was scope for me to reuse stock originally intended for one project on another project. I think the first step may be to try and sort out which scale you want to commit to. You've mentioned 3 scales above: N , 4mm, and 7mm. Once you choose one scale, you're likely to find you stick in it for most or all future projects A useful second way of approaching this may be - what models/stock/materials do you already have? Using what's on hand is a cheaper and faster way of getting somewhere than starting completely from scratch in a scale, with absolutely nothing, not even a sheet of brickpaper A further suggesting is do do some rigourous scoring and analysis as a way of clarifying your thoughts and choices. The Americans like to do this, and I found it very helpful when deciding what to attempt for the last challenge. Draw up a list of things you want out of a layout , and a list of constraints (cash, space, skills, trade support etc), and probably a list of other factors like stock/materials on hand . Score each possible project against each category , say on a scale of 0-3 (0= doesn't do this at all, 3= perfect fit) Add up the scores for each project , and you should get a feel for which one is going to suit you most. If you have any other ideas you've toyed with , even if abandoned, score those too. Hope this helps

One further possibility here might be chopped up Networker seating , if East Kent Models still have supplies

Striking improvement. I still have my Bratchill 150 to finish - having decided to upgrade with jim s-w's etches , ready made correct size windows would be a great help, so I'm eagerly awaiting Shawplan's formal release of these (Ally Pally / York time?)

I had a bout of fitting Sprat and Winkle couplings a couple of weeks back - the vans (see below) were done and released to traffic and I duly dug the MCV out of the stockbox - quick win , low effort and another model back in traffic. I was half way through when I noticed: Remember that the shunting micro is Transitional . Airfix kit - modified without top flaps to represent a rebodied wagon. So it's out of period and can't be made in period - these rebodyings started around 1970. It would have had to have the couplers replaced with S+W at some time anyway , so no loss . I think I was probably quite pleased when I originally did this one , and I've added brake cross rods with brass handrail wire and reweathered the brake blocks This means I still need to build the secondhand Ratio coke wagon kit, despite having also found this : This is the old Hornby steel mineral - Norstand, Cory, S+C and various other versions down the years - cleaned up. It seems to be based on the GW's "Felix Pole " 20T steel minerals of the 1920s, and the best and closest fit seems to be dia N32, of which about 1000 were built for hire to various private owners as part of the GW's encouragement to private owners to modernise their antiquated mineral wagon fleets. Cory and S&C may be authentic liveries for these (both were major coal traders /coastal shipowners with S.Wales connections) , though I wouldn't bet my life on it and recent debate in MRJ implies that green was not the usual base colour for Stephenson & Clarke. Needless to say MRJ were not discussing anything so humble as a Hornby wagon... This model has now been displaced in the main Hornby range by the rather better ex Airfix moulding: the Hornby effort is a bit chunky around the top edge. It reappears in the Railroad range , but I am confident none of them ever reached EWS..... The chassis was removed and chucked away, a Parkside 12' wb Morton chassis built onto the bottom , and the whole thing repainted and weathered. A photo in Iain Rice's Irwell book Detailing & Improving RTR Wagons (p10) shows what appears to be one of the breed uprated to 21T (no doubt the standard wartime uprating) and numbered in the PO series as P7826 . This would make some sense with the N32s as they were on hire purchase arrangements with the users, and of course P-series renumbering was completely random , so any P-series number would be plausible on a model. The wagon in the photo is branded under the diagonal stripe "To work within S.Wales and Monmouthshire only" These wagons are common enough - every second hand table seems to have a few - and if you've got one at home, this is a way of turning it into a credible wagon at low cost. I'm afraid the economics don't quite work if you buy a second hand example - market price for second hand RTR wagons like this seems to be about GBP3 , and by the time you've added the Parkside underframe , wheels and any paint or transfers you need, it's going to be over a fiver. But if you already have one, ex trainset, you can make a proper wagon of it for about GBP2 The tension locks will be ripped off asap, and I need to replace the missing door spring . Given that Ravenser Mk1 was set 1983-4, this wagon didn't really fit it , but as the shunting micro is 50s/60s, depending on the stock used, it is now just as much in period as the MCV is out of it Couplings have gone on the MCV (obviously) and the remaining vans but not yet on the 21T. I'd like to say that yours truly and S+W couplings were a marriage made in heaven , but I'd be lying . To be quite honest, making and fitting them is a protracted awkward job , and one that I rather dread. If I'm lucky, and determined, I can manage as many as 3 wagons in a whole evening , and this slow messy process rather puts me off. Sparky has recently posted some shots of the bits and process on his blog here .What follows is my moan after the last bout of S+W fitting reminded me that this is not my favourite modelling job First fold up your loop, from a coil of brass wire so it isn't straight... If I follow the instructions that come with it (which quote 17mm on each side) , I end up with loops that are far too long and stick well beyond the buffers . Even 15mm seems a bit too long when you try it in place against the wagon . So having soldered the wire in place , you have to unsolder , and then as fast as you resolder one side the other side melts and waves in the air (remember the wire was curved to start with) . So you resolder that , and guess what... Sparky's tip of using a Bill Bedford handrail bending jig hadn't occured to me and I must try it - it should make things easier, straighter and more reliable Then you twist up the etches for the coupling hook and counter weight paddle - not a problem - and go quietly mad chasing tiny wire loops with tweezers to form the 3 links of chain. They won't stay together and fall out of the gap in the loop, you drop one on the floor, another one flies out of the tweezers, you try adding them to the coupling hook and the gap opens up and the other two links fall out and you hunt them round the carpet.... Then there's the hasp... Like most folk , I avoid the suggestion of making one from soft wire and us a staple, melted in to the mounting block from above. But straightening one leg of a staple and rebending it to the right width and them leaning on the thing with force and a 25W Antex until it finally starts to sink (but don't push too far else you'll pin the coupling hook etch so tight it can't move) . Then repeat... I have a little difficulty getting the wire loop to the right, matching height . To deal with this , I've built a gauge or jig from scraps - which is what the wagons in two of the photos are sitting on. The block gives a height for the wire loop, and a basis on which to bend it down - the slot takes the coupling hook and limits the angle at which it is set, to a more or less consistant value. I found you couldn't possibly do either of these by having a "reference wagon". When a wagon has clasp brakes, the outer brake shoes invariably foul the mounting plate . So out with the tinsnips and chop away the corners of the plate - then flatten them back. It's all a slow painful process. How do S+Ws work in practice? Well - one of the purposes of the shunting micro was to test them out. And results have been a little mixed. Coupling is normally reliable - there's one place , crossing a rather rough board joint, where some wagons insist on uncoupling . This almost certainly requires me patiently to track down and tweak each of the couplings that gives a problem. It only happens when the loco is pulling a single wagon : perhaps the drag of a trailing load keeps the couplings in tension (though that would imply the couplings might part at the rear wagon - and they don't. However locos are not fitted with hooks- just bars). It is going to be a long and patient process to find and adjust all the rogue couplings, and to be honest the micro hasn't been run as often as it might, which doesn't help. I haven't been very successful with auto-uncoupling let alone delayed action. However the fact I was trying the couplings out on a micro forced to me put the uncoupling magnets in thoroughly unsuitable places - the middle of a crossover made up of small radius Y points for example - so I'm not sure this is really fair comment . Manual uncoupling with a jeweller's screwdriver is easy enough , and I've seen them working fine on other layouts , including one I've operated briefly, so I think the problem is simply that I've pushed the application beyond its reasonable limits How do they compare with the Kadees I use on Blacklade for locos, airbraked stock and multiple units? Fitting Kadees is certainly a great deal quicker and easier - even excluding the NEM versions which plug in in a matter of seconds. The Kadees are slightly more reliable in coupling, but I can't comment much on uncoupling as my electromagnets are not yet wired - exacept to say that manual uncoupling is much more awkward. Where I've operated another layout using Kadees I've found auto-uncoupling using electromagnets a bit hit and miss , though it appears alignment of the electromagnet is actually quite critical (I'm not sure the ones that went onto Blacklade were spot on). Kadees allow you to lift a wagon straight out of a train. But they are quite expensive - fitting them runs out at about GBP2/vehicle . Ouch! S+W is a cheaper option, though it doesn't work out at pennies either I now have almost 30 wagons fitted with S+W coulings , so in a sense I'm committed. But would I consider a return to tension-locks? No. Despite the problems I've had- which may well not be the fault of the couplers - Sprat and Winkle couplers do everything tension locks do, and do it more reliably- even at this stage. It might be possible to improve tension lock performance by standardising everything on one specific type of tension lock - but that itself wouldbe significant work. And Sprat and Winkle couplings look a great deal less obtrusive than the old "Volvo bumper bar " of the tensionlock So we press on. Meanwhile, the saga of the open wagon to go with them continues. I couldn't find suitable Cambrian kit at St Albans, but I did manage to find a second hand Dapol wagon, which I think is one of these (photo courtesy Paul Barlett's site) LMS open . It looks as if most of these , at least the late survivors, were retrofitted with Morton vac brakes by BR. Wheelbase is 10' The older wooden chassis opens to dia1666 seem not to have been - very naturally - and it has been suggested most of the latter went in the late 50s/early 60s. Since the balance was shifting rapidly towards vans (BR inherited 2 opens for every van , but built two and a bit vans for every open) , it looks like wagon fleet modernisation took the form of breaking up old wooden chassis opens and replacing them with new fitted vans, while upgrading the more modern opens with vac brakes to boost the fitted proportions of the fleet. Hence I intend adding tiebars, vac cylinder and cross shaft Someone has handlettered one side neatly - my dried up old Modelstrip wouldn't shift any of it , so a coat of bauxite will be applied over the top. If the original owner sees this - sorry, but a weathered bauxite fitted version is what is appropriate for my layout.... The wagon seems to have a further type of coupling , which I take to be the"Lincs" coupling. As this is single ended and I have portable layouts, I won't be adopting it....

The TPO looks very fine indeed