Jenny Emily

I don't know whether to be really happy, or cry; it's going to be expensive for me when these come out. I held off on the class 14s, and am glad I did as I quite fancy the Loadhaul liveried one that's forthcoming. The weathered BR blue class 28 looks interesting, but that's a lot of squids to now have to save up. Does anybody think that some interesting liveries may appear in the second batch that Hattons will inevitably produce? What livery might the class 28 suit from the later BR period? I think RTC red/blue probably would have and maybe Dutch.

When I was selling off a lot of mine and my Farther's Dublo collection, £80-£100 was the absolute maximum realistically that these would fetch. Methinks this Ebay seller has an overinflated opinion of what his stuff is worth.

How's about this listing for zero information. How are buyers supposed to make their mind up off no picture and a listing that simply says "class 29"? For all I know if I bid I'm actually bidding on the whole of class 29 from Eagley infant school. Thirty unruly seven year olds - whoopie do. minimalist info

I keep seeing stuff listed - I presume speculatively - on Ebay at silly prices. One of my pet hates is the way a significant number of Ebay sellers seem to confuse the word 'rare' with 'mass produced; there's hundreds of them'. It has to be one of the most misused words in Ebay listings.

It's not as ambitious as building a complete new fictitious loco, but I have a class 03 with the number 03254 and a class 04 with 04019. I keep meaning to get and repaint/renumber a class 15 and 17 with TOPS numbers, and I rather like the idea of Hattons' forthcoming class 14 in Loadhaul livery.

25083 waits between shunting vans on 'Grove Street Yard'.

When I was a child, not far from here, a row of around ten terraced houses developed a rather precarious lean forwards. They were demolished, and I believe unmapped mine workings were responsible for that one. No other houses in the area that I know of have ever been effected by unexpected subsidence. Well, except for the ones that were on top of a lost and filled shaft from Black Harry tunnel.

That property is quite intriging. I've looked closely at all those pictures and cannot see any cracks that would indicate it moving. 85,000 squids is still a bit much to part with without having a damn good poke around in person first.

Some really excellent pictures appearing in this thread. It has motivated me to Try A Lot Harder with a decent camera. A recent picture taken on 'Grove Street Yard': The yard's resident shunter is an ex BR class 04, D2267, still wearing faded BR blue. It waits with an empty wagon on the approach to the warehouse yard.

Can anyone confirm whether these releases are identical to those released last year, or whether they carry different running numbers? I have to agee that they were a superb model when they first appeared - the Modelzone weathered trio really do look good. I also bought the late BR and GWR versions (hence I have no idea whether the running number of the wagon showed in the OP's post is the same or different from when initially released because that was the one varient I didn't get).

I'm very impressed with the method of storage - ingenious use of space, and I guess it makes it quite mobile too. I presume the whole lot could be easily wheeled onto the tail lift of a luton body transit and then wheeled easily around at exhibitions too?

Very nice layout! I am envious of the space you have available. Given its exposure to the outdoors, how do you cope with potential issues of sunlight fading the scenery?

Very impressed with those fuelling points!

That is one impressively neat baseboard underside. Puts my little rats' nest tangle of wires to shame!

It is an interesting point that to make a more accurate model of the real locomotives that the books were based on, rather than the caricatures in the TV series, it would neatly get around the licencing issues for selling what would amount to Donald and Douglas models without the faces on the front* * When I was little we were too poor for the Hornby TTTE offerings, and several Hornby Dublo locos were drafted in to represent TTTE locomotives, using a dollop of imagination to replace the faces (and other small details)

The Bachmann Thomas the Tank engine stuff has always looked like a robust toy, designed down to a price and to be suitable for being played with by ham-fisted four year olds. However, I have to say that from what I've seen they are a lot better than the Hornby offerings. It's a shame that the consumer can't have a choice and get an easier supply of the Bachmann models in the UK - the Hornby ones have all disappointed me when out shopping for my nephew. So much so that my nephew has ended up with some of my Bachmann duplicate stock in preference. The Salty shunter has interested me, as it appears to be loosely based on an 07 shunter. An 07 is one of the BR locomotives quite high on the list of locomotives I would buy if they were readily available RTR. Also the Mavis version of the 04 looks ripe for Wisbech and Upwell convertion. I look forward to seeing any photos of the Donald and Douglas pairs. Would Bachmann think ahead and make them suitable for a UK market in non-Thomas guises?

As far as buying model railway stuff on Ebay, I've not had that much luck. I've bought a few Bachmann wagons on buy it now at a fair price from a shop in North Wales, but other than that I have succeeded in winning a grand total of one wagon on conventional bidding (a pristine boxed Bachmann blue riband five planker in 'George Lovegrove' red livery) which I only won because I decided at 99p it deserved a bid, and no-one bid against me for some reason still unknown. That was around four years ago though. Everything else I've bid on went for silly money - WHO is paying £10 or more for run of the mill Bachmann wagons that are still available from Hattons new at £6 or £7? Even more unusual stuff I bid on goes for stupid prices to the point where I'm almost tempted to strip out all the old Hornby-Dublo D1, D2 and G3 switches that control the electrics on my layout and sell them on Ebay, because every switch I've bid on has ended up going for £10 or more. Many other things are going for silly money too. I've been searching for Bosun dinghy hulls, to replace a scrapped hull that now is filled with plants and soil as a fancy gate guardian. I'm almost tempted to dig the thing out, as scrap hulls on Ebay were fetching several hundred pounds. I used to buy a lot of clothes and records too, but these areas seem to have also been invaded by the red mist merchants. The only bargains still to be had on Ebay are not in model railways. For weird little computer parts (like IDE compact flash adapters, and PCI to PCMCIA cards) Ebay has more choice than the High street at a fraction of the price. How long before the red mist merchants kill this supply too? I've sold a lot on Ebay, but whilst Bachmann I sold went for silly prices, latterly some of the Hornby Dublo and Hornby Acho wagons and locos I was selling were failing to attract even a single bid, so I stopped bothering with them. I tried selling my Father's old stash of Flying Reviews and Commercial motors too which he didn't want, and only ONE issue from 1964 actually sold. Even at 1p, no-one wanted them, and there were complete sets through to 1989 of Commercial motor and Flying review for 1960s/70s IIRC.

I've often wondered who the people are bidding silly money, often on items that could be bought far cheaper online from the likes of Hattons or Rails. Still, I sold a load of Bachmann wagons, and was amazed what they went for (EWS isn't a livery that interest me, so I offloaded). Some went for more than twice what they would cost to buy from any model shop. Still, their loss is my gain. EDIT: Oooops! A bit of thread necromancy here...

I've just had a look at the locos in the display cabinet on the wall of my office, and can report that the Super D has one axle with the weights in a different position, a Pannier the same, the 14xx has them in different positions as does the J94/Hunslet Austerity. So appears to be nothing unusual.

I've not seen the real one either, but I thought the balance weights are more to do with the positioning of the cranks inside the chassis where the con rods connect on the real thing - the con rods outside the frames aren't necessarily what the weights are balancing. I'm sure I've seen real locos with balance weights in different positions on different wheels before now.

Gosh! Those are fantastic! I'm going to jump in at the deep end with my first post and (hopefully) attach three photos of my own layout, 'Grove Street Yard', hopefully looking at least half as good as the other pictures posted in this thread. All pictures taken by a photographer I've worked with under an energy saving bulb and with around a thirty second exposure. It was the first time she had done photography with a subject that didn't talk back.