Hollar

I'm tempted to say it was a running in turn after being signed off by the Steamlines erecting shop - the clue is the highly-polished rim on the pony wheel. More likely. the driver just thought that he had to get a closer look at those fabulous 21 tonners after slogging up from Crewe with 40 16-tonners and a BR brake van that was falling to bits. Tone

Apart from the anachronism, the other thing about these 9-footers is that over time they got saggier than a sago pudding and ended up with a very glum-looking wooden solebar. I've given some idle thought as to how this might be modelled but never come up with a sensible solution. The idea of the "layout wagon" has been mentioned a few times in this discussion, and I think it has a broader and more important meaning than "layout engine" or "layout coach" - useful though those concepts are, Our locomotives are cherished individuals, and in theory at least modelled and painted in painstaking detail from dated photos of the original and carefully chosen example. Even for wagon nuts such as myself wagons are the worker bees not the queen and the significant unit is the train (or perhaps the goods yard) and not the individual unit Wagons were built and run in huge numbers, and led a life of suffering and neglect, with a very ad hoc and diverse approach ti maintenance and repair. As a consequence, the model builder can stay within the bounds of realism while enjoying huge scope for variation and detailing - replacement planks, patch-painting, staining and weird weathering, and general variation in colour and local variation. For those seeking representative realism in their layout wagons. the constraint isn't in the individual wagon but in the coherence of the identity within the train or yard. The overall impression has to be one of typicality and normality, and for me this impression is as vulnerable to thoughtless weathering, a persistently odd selection of wagon types and diagrams and traffic flows as by out-of-the-box RTR trains or the David Jenkinson school of exquisite Elysian Fields modelling. Looks fantastic, doesn't look like a working railway. Many otherwise glorious exhibition layouts have me walking away too soon because the goods traffic doesn't make sense or (worse) has an implausible number of specials. Of course, people are free to model what they like how they like; the sight of exquisite modelling spurs us all on to achieve higher standards. I'm only saying what interests me as a modeller of indifferent ability but higher aspirations: Fencehouses and Pendon, More plodding minerals, please, regardless of 4mm sea levels. Returning to the concept of the layout wagon, and taking weather in a train of 16T steel minerals as my text. Individual wagons show a pretty well infinite variety of damage and wear and tear, but if you look at a long-shot photo of a coal concentration yard it's clear that the generality is that these wagons rot around their side doors and that a model rake that shows this will be off to a good start. Otherwise and for individual wagons, I just follow Martyn Welch's maxims: what's in made of. what's it used for, where is rainwater likely to accumulate and linger, what's gravity doing, and what has the sun and rain done to the paint pigment. And above all that there is no formula for weathering, only painting what you see The photo below shows the first part of a coal train I made for John Brighton's Millhouses, which I was happy with, and thought fit to be dragged round by one of his 8Fs. I've also attached some Parkside hoppers, a line of bolster wagons (mostly detailed Bachmann BBCs and a couple of tank wagons dirtied exactly as specified in The Art of Weathering. To conclude, I have occasionally felt that the wagons in the goods yard don't quite reach up to the consistent and beautiful standards of the rest of the layout. I'm not too fussed by the occasional anachronism (who hasn't got a soft spot for cattle wagons, anyway?) but the years somehow lacks the spirit of grubby purpose I remember from BR in the early1960s and the feeling that anything you touch is going to leave your hands dirty. Tone

Very nice. And nostalgic too because it reminds me of TV adventure series in the 60s and 70s (Danger Man, Avengers, etc) where they could not afford proper night shots and so used camera settings that cast some little pall of greyness over everything, but still left clear shadows on the ground to give the game away.. Continuing the wagon conversation, I've just finished the paint job on one of the new Hornby SR cattle wagons; the level of decay being aimed at was just enough life left in the wagon for it to be worth replacing a couple of planks. If I do another one I will remember to drill out the rivets, separate the body and repaint the inside to resemble more closely a space inhabited by nervous cattle. Also, at some point I will replace the outside brake hangers which are far too delicate for my clumsy (wicket-keeper's) fingers. I've not found anything yet that looks better than empty space. Tone

If you swung Dante round LB a few times flat out with the heaviest train it could manage, would it reach the 7th circle? Tone

Mention of La Spezia brings back happy memories. It was a classic Italian family restaurant, and one of our facourites. My wife and I were very sad when it closed. You don't get sweet trollies like that these days, and not often in the 70s either. Tone

My grandfather, a lovely man but not always a concentrater, once spread his LMS goods train all over the WCML because he got distracted and didn't brake it properly. Closed all 4 lines. When the accident investigator arrived he marched straight up to him and told it just how he was, expecting to be sacked. Instead the inspector smiled at him ans said his honesty had saved a mint of time and money for the Company praised his honesty and he got off with a Reprimand. Shortly after he was moved to the NL line as a booking clerk, which was undoubtedly best for everyone. Maybe it was coverup, but maybe also it was an early pragmatic example of the No Blame culture which works so well in aviation. Going to model railway shows with Alan was fascinating - if there weren't working signals being obeyed properly he would go politely blank and move on. Tone

I also sat in that carriage in the early 60s. It would knock the fillings out of your teeth, Tone

There is much in what you say, but the mill pool in the Gravetts' Penpoul looks to me amazingly like real water have its surface just ruffled slightly. Every tiny ruffle added by hand, apparently. Tone

And speaking of interiors - this was what happened to one year's Airfix Christmas quickie. Some handy newspaper were added before the roof was clipped on. I like a brake van, as youv'e probably gathered.

I didnb't do thorough research, but I think the later LNER Toads had twin-pane doors and there are pictures on the Bartlett site which support this. The distortion on the handrails indicates that they are probably made of the same bendy plastic used by Hornby and Bachmann for their 4mm vans. I've found that as week as being fundamentally too fat (like some of us) they distort much too easily and I always replace them with .4mm nickel wire. If we are talking about finescale modelling, I think the lack of brake safety loops is the wagon equivalent of wonky reversing links or plastic coal on a loco. When changing wheels, if you are deft you can make a single sip just above the axles and then just spring the new wheels through the gap. For the rest of us, it's amazing the huge gap you can clip out without either destabilising the wire "loops" or making it noticeable on a wagon on the rails. I wouldn't have mentioned it at all, but in a 7mm wagon the loops are surely necessary. And finally, the moulded lamp irons just make the model look second-rate, in 7mm that is. And really finally, a picture of a hardworking British brake van - can't remember if the core is Hornby or Bachmann. And it needs better lamp irons, too. Tone

The Hornby OO model looks OK, but the Dapol looks very disappointing particularly for a 7mm model. The handrails are very poor - one of the verticals all over the place, and the horizontal end handrails don't look properly horizontal and are much too far away from the ballast weights. The lettering is not the typical BR interpretation of Gill Sans and untypically spaced too (maybe because the gaps between the planking is too wide and deep as it so often is. The glazing looks badly recessed, and I think LNER Taod Ds had wither no windows in their veranda doors or two windows - not four. The lamp irons are moulded and would need replacing if you wanted to put a lamp on them. Unless there is distortion in the photo, the near-end buffers don't look hotizontal. And wear are the safety loops on the brake rigging. Good in parts, perhaps, but not much better than the Oxford GWR toad. Tone

The BR P2 looks wonderful. Roy Jackson has one on Retford, which I reckon is mostly there to irritate people - which of course it does. Tone

I saw the first episode and two things struck me. The first is that any programme featuring James Richardson can't be all bad, and the second is that "realism" (as contributors to Write Rights understand it) has little weight in the judgements being made. I shuddered a little bit when a bomb much larger than the WW2 Tallboy was seen lightly chained to a lowmac (waiting unattended in a siding, for someone to build a plane big enough to carry it no doubt) was described as realistic, but then it was knocked together round a lipstick tube in no time at all and in that context it was fine. It is obviously geared to those who think no model railway is complete without a working funfair, and good luck to them. I'm not getting snooty. In a year or so I am likely to be building something similar for my grandson who is fond of a train - particularly if there is a good crash in prospect. If it shows that we are not all wet vicars with autism and gets people playing with trains that can only be good news. So good luck to them. We don't have to watch it, after all. Tone

With respect, as someone who grew up in east London in the 60s and now works within the justice system in the same area, I could not disagree more with what you say. I have lurid stories of incidents I witnessed in my youth, and there is no comparison. Tone

They look lovely. Did you take authenticity to the point where one/both caught fire on their first working turn? Just the motive power a driver yearned for on an oil train. . . Tone

There is a form of words often used in English courts to indicate the same thing, though of course without the weight of a formal verdict as in Scotland. Magistrates will often say something like We do not find that the accusation against you has been proved to the very high standard required under the law and we therefore find you not guilty of . . . The lawyers understand it, just as magistrates usually understand the phrase My client's instructions are .. . . Tone.

I couldn't agree more. No-one could question the breathtaking skill, thought and care that goes into making these "museum" model locos. For anyone who likes steam engines they are glow-in-the-dark beautiful, but for me they do not capture the fundamental appeal of the working steam engine. Give me the Martyn Welch, John Brighton and Tony Wright approach any day,beautiful though the showcase stuff undoubtedly is. Tone

And I would add my friend John Brighton who has built several locos for me in EM and OO, He has a real talent for capturing the essence of a working steam engine. Tone

There's two ways to use the American pickup system on tank engines. 1. couple up a cut-down mineral wagon like Scottish pugs used to pair up with. 2. if you make the sort of loco chassis I make, Stick a BR van body on an old Triang dock shunter bogie (apologies to younger readers), permanently couple it up to an engineless loco and hope no-one notices what's going on, or unlike your P4 visitors everyone is too polite to ask what's going on. Or you can put a pantograph on the cab roof and say it's an early experiment in hybrid vehicles. Tone

I'd be interested to hear why you you loath the American pick-up arrangement. Some of the locos I have commissioned use it and I have found it trouble-free and resilient. Tone

After a long layoff for personal reasons, I finally finished a model. It's a modified and repainted Bachman model, and will probably end up pushing one of John Brighton's locos around his Millhouses layout although it's currently on OO wheels.. Tone

If you're looking for a branch line GER loco then one of the 2-4-2Ts would give much more scope for authenticity than a buckjumper. You rarely see buckjumpers on branch passenger trains, and then they often have left half of their connecting rods back at the shed. This may be special pleading, since I have a small but varied supply of Finecast and Connoisseur 0-6-0Ts. The promised short-run NER 0-4-4T will fill the gap to an extent. Tone

I discovered the same thing when trying to do something about some of my wagons which had the free-running qualities of a house brick. Using the little device that Dave describes (which I think I bought from Scalefour Stores) I solved the problem - the salvageable became decently moveable and the others provided some useful spare parts. Flangeless brass bearings are available from Gibson, Wizard and (I think Markits). They vary quite a bit in length which can be a pain, but since the depths of my hamfisted hole-drilling varies a bit too this means a bit of time will give you perfectly-mounted axles and transformed running. All In need now is somewhere to run them . . . Tony

No apologies needed to me at any rate for posting such a beautifully evocative photo. I worked in Switzerland for a while and fell in love with its railway system in all its guises. Iain Rice likes to use the word modellogenic, but Swiss railways are downright model-like with their variety, sharp curves, shortish trains, freight services, and heir general air that the whole thing has been specially preened up for a royal visit. Little need for weathering skills on a layout set in Switzerland. If there is a station in the world less like a train set than Montreaux I would like to see it. Tone

Perhaps - browsing across suppliers worldwide to get the best price; doing your prepurchase research to make sure what you buy is actually (a) what you need and (b) fit for purpose; listening to samples before buying a recording; buying from suppliers that know you can post your verdict on their wares and customer service - and in such a way that other potential customers will be able to read what you have written and factored it into their own decisions; your own choice of payment and credit arrangements; having an absolute legal right to return items without needing to specify why. Choice, credit options, information access and legal rights - seems a long way from Kays or Littlewoods. And what have the Romans ever done for us? Tone