deltic17

I was hoping for yellow bufferbeams too. I believe when locos were overhauled in the very late 70's/early 80's they were generally outshopped with black bufferbeams

Looks good as far as I can see Nice to see all the cab windows in the 'closed' position too!

Yes I too am waiting for the later mark1's with the modified side window frames added. Hopefully they appear soon after this first batch. Not too many BRBlue ones ran without the modified windows.

I have sometimes wondered this when looking at certain photographs. Whilst they should no doubt be the same I just if there are some small differences out there.

Are the numbers on the correct end of the Peak?.....never seen that before.....unless a querk of 70's TOPS renumbering?? Probably a prototype for everything so was intrigued.....

I hope the Mark1's with window frames follow closely on behind....looks good.....hopefully they have got the height right!

Thanks for your reply - most interesting - thanks for noting the HUO - as you say which were also used in the NE. So basically most of these trains were just loose coupled? - ie class 9

Hello, I am modelling a typical North East coal train around 1980 of around 18-20 wagons.....class 37 more often than not and a long rake of 21T coal hoppers. My question is does anyone know were the vacuum braked HTV's generally mixed with HTO's (no braking) to form shorter loose coupled coal trains?? or were they mainly HTV's to provide the maximum braking and probably longer coal trains. The reason I ask is generally HTO's were normally painted grey and HTV's bauxite (although I have seen a few grey HTV's on Flickr etc) but when you look at photographs there are say generally 3 or 4 grey ones (HTO?) and the rest 15 - 20 bauxite (HTV)'s in a standard rake around 1980. The grey ones are regularly randomly in the middle of the rake so were they likely to be HTV's but just painted grey? I presume there was no through piping on such? I spent ages watching these trains all those years ago but didn't really pay much attention to the wagons at the time just the BR Blue locos at the front! Just wondering if anyone could offer an insight - although my question applies to the North East - similar practices would occur no doubt around the country at the time. Thanks in advance

Definitely Bachmann Brassworks.....

It looks very nice in its BR Blue - my only comment but a minor one is the slight lack of yellow above the 3 cab front windows. Have Heljan not quite allowed enough space there to paint? - if so could probably be reasonably easily disguised or they might raise the yellow up a bit when the production ones commence.... The curved front looks fine to me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

J5303 isn't 45002 as you can see the ETH box on the bufferbeam so it is a class 45/1. Lovely photos as ever....

Will also follow this with great interest.....

I believe 45023 had black nameplates in the late 70’s/early 80’s but can’t recall any others - certainly not 45014

I attended on Sunday - my second visit after a previous trip a number of years ago. I thought Mostyn was absolutely superb - BR Blue with a wonderful attention to detail - I spent ages watching it. I had a pretty dodgy journey to the venue though which was unfortunate......but any travel in London & the South East can be testing as we know.... Just for your amusement.... Left home in Dorking at just before 10.15 (OK not the earliest start as the clocks had gone forward) Drove to Redhill (as Dorking - London trains generally are too slow) to catch the 10.53 to Victoria. Arrived to find the 10.53 cancelled due to overrunning engineering work. Great! Instead caught the 11.08 from Redhill (a Tonbridge - Victoria service) Decided to jump off at East Croydon to switch to the Thameslink. Good connection onto the Thameslink but then spent an age sitting at Blackfriars going nowhere. Eventually, after almost 15mins off we go. I got off at St Pancras. Short walk to Kings Cross...... No direct trains to Alexandra Palace (as noted by someone else above). Train to Finsbury Park and changed onto a Moorgate - Alexandra Palace service (engineering work beyond Ally Pally) Looked for free buses at the station to the venue but didn't see any so set off on foot. Up the hill......still going up the hill......eventually got there at just after 1pm So that's almost 3 hours to travel 30? miles as the crow flies!!! To be fair the return journey was better and I did really enjoy the day. Well done to all concerned.

I visit the shop at Ford a fair few times a year and it is a fantastic goldmine for modellers. The staff are ever so helpful 10/10 in my book and very knowledgeable too. I would like to use them more but in my scale of O guage most things are significantly cheaper elsewhere which is a real shame so I ending up mainly just buying little odds and ends, paint etc.

Thanks for the photos Brian - much appreciated

Re the new centre headcode 37 - does anyone have a photo of the whole chassis wth the body off? or can answer my question below. What I am interested in is .....are the lights for the centre headcode panel at each end fixed to the chassis like in the newer Heljan O guage locos? On my older Heljan split headcode 37 the headcode boxes & tail lights are operated at the end of various wires which fit/plug into the said units. Is the new centre headcode along the later design (hopefully as that simplifies things I believe). I suspect it is and I note the motor doesn't stick up into the cab as much as it does on the split headcode version so a few things have changed in the newer design. Thanks in advance for your replies. Deltic17

When I first got into model railways as a teenager in the 1970's/80's OO guage had the usual Hornby offerings but if you were a serious modeller you had to build kits to get your required locos.....after coming back into O Guage model railways 10 years ago virtually everything seems to be available these days in Ready to Run (RTR) format in my view of OO guage from afar so the kit building skills / need to kit build was disappearing...... Maybe a similar thing is just happening in O guage? Pete had an 08 kit out but when Dapol bring one out for <£200 it must be hard to compete. When a RTR product is cheaper than a kit it becomes a non starter almost for many. Looking at the Diesel angle, Pete had some absolutely fantastic kits but maybe the increasing range of ready to run offerings has simply caused sales to fall. Most classes exist now in RTR in O Guage so sadly JLTRT has maybe been forced into taking more of a back seat. Kits take time to make as RTR becomes increasingly popular. All very sad but maybe O Guage has developed so much in recent years that RTR is simply taking over like in OO Guage?

I also have to disagree with this statement. I personally think the GWR is building into a fantastic railway (one of the best in the country) and I am an avid follower of the excellent blogs on their website that keep people superbly updated on progress as it happens. The number of volunteers seems to be very high and these people are a very committed bunch. I am certainly looking forward to visiting the extended line this year (probably for me at the Diesel Gala events). It is not too long at all compared to others and they are building a lovely cafe at Broadway which will be very popular during turnarounds (can't wait for my first cuppa!!). As the line gets longer and settles down they should probably think about speeding up the service slightly to reduce the time spent sitting stationary at Toddington/Winchcombe stations on some services. I have thought before that a bit of double track would be excellent on the lines of the Great Central. Now that would be superb.....we shouldn't get carried away but we live in hope maybe for one day. Anyway best wishes to the GWR and volunteers on their reopening which is fast approaching.... Onwards and upwards...... Deltic17

I think there were 1 or 2? Toads based at Low Fell Engineers Sidings (near Tyne Yard). Not sure how they ended up in the NE?? I remember them appearing in a number of local Departmental/engineering trains along the ECML in my 'patch' just south of Durham, sometimes with a Gresley coach......

I agree - perhaps the place for many to go is Rail Express as it is all modern image modelling in their modelling section.

Yes I fully agree. Is there no stock that needs selling off? - we maybe need to watch out for that. There is quite a fair few things many of you could probably do with buying - for me this has happened so quickly.

This is very sad news to hear it seems that JLTRT are going to be no more for all us modellers,kit bashers etc in 7mm. I need some of their eth box equipment too!!! - not sure where to get all those bits from in future? Such a shame - hopefully it can be resurrected in some way?

Yes - very sad to read this news

I agree Darstaed have done a pretty good job here overall and it is great that they have LISTENED and ENGAGED with modellers on here - 10/10 for that. For me it is just a shame about the height issues - surely that should have been one of the basic things to specify correctly. For some they will be fine but others will pass. I also got my fingers burned with the Heljan versions a few years ago.