TheSignalEngineer

I think it could be Hyde Central, but the train is heading away from Rose Hill towards Manchester.

An interesting formation at Worcester in this Peter Shoesmith photograph https://www.flickr.com/photos/geoffsimages/29946269852 Note also the large numbers to the left hand end of the Autocoach.

Possibly West Green on the Palace Gates line close to Wood Green? Line closed c1964.

Perhaps they could recover some of the costs by holding the World Bog Snorkelling Championships there during construction. Seriously though, I suspect the ground is rather like Ashton Moss. The Highways Agency were surprised that the M60 regularly flooded there when they put it in a trench across an old peat bog.

The Permali website still lists insulated joints ans shoe beams under rail applications. I don't know what the order quantities would be but they machine special shapes to the customer's requirements. I think Unipart only supply steel fishplates with insulated liners for other than glued joints.

Have you sold out your pre-order of Dodo?

That's another item on this year's wishlist gone. Brian won't be able keep up.

There's better off-cuts of card and plastic in my recycling bin. Must be worth at least £500

According to the blurb her hubby bought them from a car boot sale. Personally I would have offered the seller about £1249 less than she is asking.

I thought it added to the WTF

If it was SR-built it would have retained its original plate, the only difference being that the R would not normally be picked out in white. It would not have had S at the start of the number.

Do I want Dodo? Yes Do I need Dodo? No Will I confirm my pre- order at the new price? Possibly, but won't buy the second I was thinking of, and may just cancel and take my chance after it comes if I decide I want one that there will be discounted ones about next summer.

Looks like I may have to buckle under the pressure. From the Tanfield website it appears that in common with the two Longbridge locos Ada ll and Austin 5, NCB 35 and 36 were also Davenports, Works numbers 2503, 2505, 2509 and 2595 respectively. Doubt if one will appear in Austin Lined Green RTR, and will be many years if it does. If only I could find a colour photo from the Bristol Road bridge to get the livery details.

Sounds like I have started an argument in an empty room.

I don't know why the junction was named Horseley Fields, that is indeed the area of Wolverhampton where the canal junction lies. Horseley Heath is the section of the A461 betwen Dudley Port and Great Bridge running parallel with the South Staffs line.

, my next project will be based around the same area to enable me to run both Western and Midland Stock. My chosen period is after the introduction of the late crest but before yellow panels, basically 1959 plus or minus 2 years. I think most of what I intend to run actually happened in that period within about five miles radius although a few numbers may be a little out of area. Don't forget the Dudley Zoo Specials and Works Outings. These brought anything that ran within three or four hours journey time. There are records of B1s and Brush Type 2s, virtually anything LMS, although Pacifics were only towed dead to Cashmores, GWR engines working through to Bescot on occasions, etc, etc.......GWR and LMS Autotrains, Flying Bananas, Derby Lightweights, the list just goes on. Eric

Hi Andrew. The West Midlands is a very interesting railway area historically. Lots of political infighting, skulduggery, fisticuffs and sabotage in the period from around 1840 till it settled down a bit in the mid-1850s. Links put in and taken out, authorised but never built, or like the Duddeston Viaduct at Bordesley 99% built but never finished. If you are planning anything in the area Rex Christiansen's book the Regional History of the Railways of Great Britain Vol 7 The west Midlands is a good background read. If you haven't got it there are usually plenty for under a tenner on the web. Possibly a bit dated now, but a lot of background. It also has a useful chronology for each section with authorisation, opening and closure dates. Eric

The S&T siding will be loosely based on Saltley where I was based for a while in the 1960s. Signalling itself is still a bit open, as the South Staffs was LNWR boxes. That was the original intention but as I am looking at it as a joint committee I may go for a mixed solution like Wellington where alternate boxes were LNW and GW.

At last some progress? If it ever arrives I may be tempted to get one as I found a picture of one in late 'Southern' livery shunting at the Bilston Steelworks, only a couple of miles from my semi-ficticious Black Country project.

Talking of Industrials, I've just found a picture of LSWR B4 No.99 still carrying late Southern livery shunting at the steelworks in Bilston. Wonder if the model will ever get delivered?

After a delay of over a year due to dealing with family matters layout building resumed recently. We've got a spare room which is used as my hobby den. It can take baseboards approximately 8'4” by 8'10”. I had designed various grandiose schemes over the years but most were impractical in 00 given the space available. Several attempts rotating and flipping over the plan gave me something which would allow me to run what I wanted in a fairly realistic way. The layout is based on several Black Country “might have beens” given the difficult birth of the railway network in the area. Nothing was straightforward and events included pitch-battles settled by the local garrison intervening after the Mayor of Wolverhampton read the Riot Act. During the 1830s and 1840s the transport map of Britain altered rapidly as canal building gave way to Railway Mania. Mergers, takeovers and downright dirty deeds took place on a weekly basis as rich men and speculators tried to grab a share of the prizes on offer. One of these was the area lying to the north-west of Birmingham. It had been at the forefront of industrial development from the start. Now it was gaining strength through selling to the world, but was being held back by poor transport. Canals appeared everywhere, and then in the late 1830s and early 1840s Birmingham leaped ahead by being linked by rail to London, Manchester, Liverpool, Gloucester and Leeds. At first the Black Country was largely ignored. The Grand Junction passed to the north, whilst the Birmingham and Gloucester came up the Lickey Incline, although some of the backers had favoured a route via Worcester, Stourbridge and Dudley. This proposal pre-dated the eventual Oxford, Worcester & Wolverhampton route by over ten years. The London & Birmingham proposed the London, Worcester and South Staffordshire Railway, starting from Tring and heading via Banbury to reach Evesham, Worcester and Wolverhampton. This failed to get through Parliament, but this was probably only a spoiler to try to block the Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton which was in the Broad Gauge camp. The Birmingham & Gloucester together with the Bristol & Gloucester nearly joined to GWR instead of the Midland and the Midland tried to take over the London & Birmingham. Huish of the Grand Junction courted the GWR and reportedly suggested that they would provide mixed gauge from Birmingham to Manchester and Liverpool. The various wheeler-dealing ended with the formation of the Midland railway and the LNWR. In 1846 the South Staffordshire Railway, Birmingham Wolverhampton & Stour Valley Railway, Birmingham & Oxford Railway and the Birmingham, Wolverhampton & Dudley Railway. The following year the Derbyshire, Staffordshire & Worcester Junction Railway which was intended to enable a through route via Walsall, Rugeley and Uttoxeter to Buxton and Manchester was incorporated. This didn't succeed but a section was later built from Walsall to Rugeley as the Cannock Mineral Railway. The layout is set somewhere between Dudley and Walsall, around Great Bridge. This is where in 1866 a line was built by the GWR to link with the BW&D at Swan Village, thus enabling a direct link via the South Staffs from Snow Hill to Dudley. Rather than the two Great Bridge stations in real life I have combined this at the site of Horseley Fields Junction. An Industrial branch at the south end of the station represents the plethora of private sidings, factory and colliery branches which abounded in the Black Country. Probably the largest of these was the Earl of Dudley's Pensnett system which covered about 45 route miles at its height. The last part at Round Oak Steelworks only disappeared in the 1980s. This will give the option of running an industrial loco or two on exchange trips. The main line assumes that the various warring parties decided to swallow their pride in the wake of financial problems which hit many schemes in the late 1840s and form a West Midlands Lines Committee. This was a local equivalent to the West London Line, providing some extra junctions where lines crossed and the abandonment of some proposed routes to 'privateers', factory and colliery owners and the like.

Remember a trip to Kyle on the train with the post on it. We stopped in a station, possibly Achnasheen, where the doors of the brake were immediately opened on the six-foot side for the post and newspapers to be unloaded across the track to the other platform.

Hope the 'Custard' in the B&C doesn't come out that yellow. Too many E numbers in the mix by the look of it

The Sykes Flange fishplate is the same profile inside and outside the rail