DavidLong

Something of a mixed bag again this afternoon, Cambridge, Sandy, Peascliffe and around Nottingham.

 

Nottingham Victoria B1 Nottingham to Sheffield c1950 JVol1127.jpg

Nottingham Victoria B1 Nottingham to Sheffield c1950 JVol1127

 

What a brilliantly 'moody' shot of the Vic, a station that I wish I had visited when it was still open. My school railway society had a visit to the Nottingham area circa 1965 and we visited the Midland station but, for some reason lost in the mists of time, not Victoria.

Nice to see the Vic's underslung brackets featuring in shot as well.

Many thanks for posting these photos, Dave, they are giving me and a lot of other people much pleasure.

 

David

Second photo from this afternoon at Nottingham Midland. Interesting collection of signals, colour lights, LMS upper quadrant (?) and Midland lower quadrants.

 

David

JVol 1203 under the Hills Road bridge... It's not a J39 as the running plate is too straight.  I thought J19 but (Dave may be able to confirm this) I think the running plate rises up slightly in front of the cab for a short way along its length.  That would definitively make it a J20.

 

Hadn't spotted that, Jonathan, J20 looks like a good call.

 

David

David - the goods shed is now our local dentists, called 'Primrose Junction'. However, there is a builders yard close by, but on non-railway land (albeit accessed via the old goods yard).

 

Absolutely amazing. Must be unique!

 

David

3rd photo no. 3 in post no. 59: is that not a J17 on the left, rather than a J39? It has a 'large' GE -type tender by the looks of things, it looks the same as the tender attached to the D16 next to it.

 

 

You could be right, I did wonder too. Looking at the original it is no clearer than the scan.  I've altered the caption tosee what others thimnk.

 

David

 

Sorry, I'm a day behind but my vote would be for a J19. Too big for a J17 and just doesn't look J39ish.

 

David

And here's a photo of what the real Brent station site looked like last weekend. I'm glad to say that the Up Main line was relaid in time for the Up Sleepers to pass on time in the early hours of last Monday morning 18/3/13:

 

IMG_7069.jpg

 

Seeing the overgrown, closed station site today, I know I'd rather see it as Robin has depicted it!

Tim

 

Is that the goods shed on the right, in 'alternative use'? Another builders yard?

 

David

No contest. I'll take Rice with everything

 

David

The argument which always gets up my nose is the "he's not that sort of player" excuse. I suspect that only a very small minority of bad tackles are perpetrated with malicious intent but what is trying to be dealt with in most cases is simply reckless or ill-judged tackling. This is not to make any particular slur on the individual's character but simply to point out that he ought to be more careful in future and here's a significant fine and an X week ban. Football is, and will remain so, a contact sport and mistakes and bad injuries will happen. The critical part is how these situations are dealt with in fairness to all concerned. The FA's argument does not even attempt to do this and, as Simon has pointed out, doesn't even seem to be consistent with the laws as they stand. 

The weird irony in this situation is Dave Whelan attempting to excuse McManaman when he himself had to leave the 1960 cup final as a result of a broken leg.

 

David

Here it is, the 'interlull'. Just as the season was getting to an interesting stage it comes barging through the door like an unwelcome guest and waving its sub-Champions League credentials as some sort of justification. We're going out for a meal with friends on Friday evening to escape the sheer awfulness of yet another San Marino v England encounter and ITV trying to raise us to a fevered anticipation. I shall probably spend most of next Tuesday evening watching Ireland v Austria which I know will be grim but at least every hard-won point by the Irish seems to mean so much more than watching England's finest trying to overcome the might of Montenegro.

Saturday 30th March can't come quickly enough when sanity returns . . .

 

David

Russia . . . racial harmony . . . err . . .

Let's just park that until we see what sort of reception is given to the likes of Mikel and Moses.

 

Speaking of which, I see that the Totts had the usual friendly welcome from those other believers in racial harmony, the Milanese. No doubt the stout defenders of all things harmonious at UEFA will be thinking up a suitable sum in 'punishment'. £20k anyone?

I guess that they should get a better reception in Basel but these days you can't be sure where these sort of idiots are lurking.

 

David

Here you are, Colin, everything you ever wanted to know about Kazan. Judging by the wiki photos it looks like a nice place!

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kazan

 

Ditto glad that the English teams all stayed apart but there are no mugs in this last eight. I could especially see Newcastle having a tricky time against Benfica but the second leg is at home which may help. At least there's no Atletico Madrid and the awesome Radomel Falcao this time around.

 

David

Straightforward! I blame that Benitez . . . oh wait . . . :-)*

 

David

 

* my smileys have disappeared again :-(

Good night all round with three teams through to the last eight. At last we seem to have some clubs taking this competition seriously. We used to pre-Heysel and the ban but since then we have had an obsession with the Champions League. Being 'the best league in the world' means that you have strength in depth and that teams outside of the top four can compete and win a trophy.

Hope they all stay apart in the draw and we have a shot at getting three teams in the last four!

 

David

So close for Arsenal tonight. Away goals rules apply, but beating Bayern 2-0 in Munich is quite a achievement; even if the Germans weren't at their best.

We could have won that game if we didn't give the ball away with monotonous regularity. We used to be the team that you couldn't get the ball off, now you don't have to wait too long and we'll just give it back. Ho hum . . .

Same as last year though, blew the tie in the first leg.

Now, as they say, free to concentrate on the league.

 

David

does anyone know how John Whitehead's Stockport tiviot dale is progressing? does he show it on the web?

 

it will be at the Liverpool model railway show on 27th,28th April.

http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/66871-liverpool-april-27th-28th-2013/

 

it was at the 2011 show and looked superb back then in its unfinished state.

 

I don't know if anyone has seen it recently, Michael. If you look back at post 16 on this thread with photos of the North East Area Group bash last year there are some photos of it. It was certainly operational at that time and I would assume that John would have made some more progress by now. It was certainly looking very promising and I shall look forward to seeing it at the show.

 

David

You know how to twist the knife.  OK, yes please PM me the more up to date list.

 

Don't let my Association colleagues (n'er-do-wells, the lot of 'em . . . ) start persuading you away from working on Basilica Fields, Adrian. I want to see it finished and it is a thirty year project and I'm 61 now. Do the maths

 

Mmm, on the other hand you could do a lot more of the East End in 2mm scale . . .

 

David

Just heard Roberto Martinez on the radio. Is it my imagination or is he starting to pick up traces of the Lancashire accent?

 

Not Lancashire as such, Ivan, but there are definitely Northern features to his English. Not surprising as it is where he began his career in England more than a few years ago.

 

David

So nobody saw the game last night then?

 

Rob

 

Went to BWFC v Blackburn Rovers. Watch out play-offs, the Trotters are coming!

 

MU result also leaves the mighty Arsenal to bask in the glory of being England's last representatives in the CL. . . until next week

 

David

That S-Cab system looks interesting, Ron. Looks like there's no approved frequencies for Europe yet but they may be working on it.

 

David

As East Anglia was home to a number of Derby Sulzers in the early/mid 1960s then devotees of the railways of the swede-growing counties shouldn't be too offended by the presence of one at Saxted. Looks excellent, Andy

 

David

Ray Fricker was, interestingly enough, someone who moved from 7mm scale to 2mm scale as he got older. Just remember to quote that next time you get the old "ooh, my eyesight couldn't deal with that. I don't know how you see it" Grrrr

 

David (who will do his best to restrain himself at York at Easter . . .)

But would his bike stand up to going downhill at 40mph on an unsurfaced forest track without the wheels going out of shape, let alone stop before that tree at the bottom? You don't really need brakes in Southport let alone hydraulic discs.

And have you seen the price of decent cross-country bike tyres recently? Some cost nearly as much as for a car.

 

My dad's bike didn't need to go down forest tracks at 40 mph 'cos it was a form of transport and not an expensive hobby. When he wanted to do 40 mph he bought a car which he drove to forest tracks and walked down them. The mass of people didn't have expensive hobbies in the 1950s and model railways was no exception. Unless your name was Norris and he was an exception due to him having disposable income. Otherwise it tended to be all ex-RAF bomber switches, LMS 4Fs made from recycled soup tins, cardboard buildings covered with Merco brick papers and stuck together with Seccotine. If your name was Denny then of course you still managed to produce masterpieces and made your own switches from bits of wood and brass without recourse to those fangled RAF bomber things. He went all consumerist in the the 1960s when he bought a couple of Triang clerestories and converted them into something Great Central looking. Sold out if you ask me

This also prompts a question about quite how, with all the 21st century advantages, many people can spend inordinate amounts of money on a craft hobby and still make a complete dog's breakfast of it.

 

David

I could build and stock a new DCC sound TMD exhibition layout for what on-road and off-road cycling costs me in a year.

 

Never really understood why you need all that stuff to go on a bike ride. My old dad used to ride a bike to work and the only special equipment he had was one of those all-over capes to keep the Southport rain out. Then, in 1956, when he was forty he got a car and he didn't ride a bike again. Still lived 'til he was eighty four, mind.

 

David

RE MAlcolm Cross. Apparantly there was an Obit by Bernard Weller in MRJ 144. Cannot tell you more as that issue is stuck in one of a number of storage boxes.  I remember Ken York another P4/S4 leader committing suicide.

 

Don

 

edit added ref to Malcolm.

 

Thanks for that, Don. I've just dug out the copy and I don't know why I hadn't remembered it as it's on the same page as the obit for Bernard Holland and I certainly recall Bernard's passing. Must be a result of my own age and deteriorating memory! It is recorded that Malcolm made his last visit from his home in Adelaide to the UK for Scaleforum 2001 but that ill-health claimed him almost two years later in May 2003. It would appear from the obituary that, rather than being a prolific producer of models, he contributed many of the ideas behind the products from Exactoscale, the company which he had begun in conjunction with Bernard Weller. However, if anyone from the Scalefour Society has any knowledge of models that Malcolm made I would be delighted to hear about them.

 

David

I suspect they might soon be losing manager Mark Robins to Huddersfield according to press reports today. These days I often feel quite sad about the current plight of our neighbours just down the road as nothing seems to go right for them.

 

Real blow for Coventry if it happens. Robins win percentage of 51.5% is his best yet at the three clubs that he has managed. Would that Dougie Freedman with a miserable 30% could achieve that at the Wanderers. So Robins may have money thrown at him to save a team from relegation rather than sticking with a team that could achieve promotion. Still, if he goes it may give Coventry a chance to have a go for Nigel Adkins.

And so the managerial merry-go-round continues . . .

 

David