TheSignalEngineer

For occasional use you can make your own for about 20% of the price of plug-together blocks. You just have to loosen/tighten one row of the screws if you want to split them. The blocks are 17mm wide. The joiners are made of earth wire from scrap mains cable. It is bent double to be easier to clamr in and to give a smooth end when taken apart. They are fixed to stick out 8mm. I use the pin half fixed to the board wiring and the socket side for the cable from the control panel.

Last time I did that one was on a full suspension mountain bike, similarly Woolley Mill Lane between Hollingworth and Tintwistle. The accident IIRC was in Mottram a few years ago

Tameside do that as a method of traffic calming without having to do any paperwork or roadworks. Unfortunately they came unstuck a few years ago when a motor cyclist died after hitting a pothole.

Why do you think that cars used to start falling apart after 3 years before coated steel was used for the panels?

Trix Westerns were prone to chassis disintegration, but I never saw it on other Trix models. On Hornby Dublo I have stuff from post-war to the end of production and have not had any failures yet.

The Highway Code only recommends zip merging at low speed. Rule 134 You should follow the signs and road markings and get into the lane as directed. In congested road conditions do not change lanes unnecessarily. Merging in turn is recommended but only if safe and appropriate when vehicles are travelling at a very low speed, e.g. when approaching road works or a road traffic incident. It is not recommended at high speed.

Keep clear of driving up Mottram Moor on the A57 then, you'll be well p155ed off before you get half way up the queue.

I've not spotted that working, but there were several trains through to Bristol from the S&D. One I have seen photographed had a Maunsell set behind a Stanier 3P 2-6-2T.

Apologies for the thread hijack, but this shot of 37219 was posted by Stephen Burdett on Flickr Resting over at Temple Meads by Stephen Burdett, on Flickr

An update from Jim's latest e-mail:- We're looking for an experienced modeller who lives in the Ayr /Prestwick /Troon area to assist us for (initially) ten hours per week doing every thing from packing nameplates & decals and taking telephone orders, to occasionally repairing models. Neat handwriting essential. Would possibly suit retired modeller. Please phone Jim on 0777 585 0272 and leave a message if no reply.

All this talk of HS2/HS3 and the like will be F-All use to us in about 3 years time when most of the country bus services disappear due to the removal of all financial support. We won't be able to get to the stations without using a car and there isn't anywhere to park so the only choice is to stay in the traffic jam and forget the train.

For examples of mixed profiles see posts #109 and #127 above

The glazing is better and the end gangways don't look overheight like the early ones.

Timely reminder to get my upgrades to the old ones finished.

Must make sure my bar-cam is switched on next time I am cycling round Worcestershire. I would hate to miss the opportunity to share your driving antics advice on Farcebook or similar. If it's anything like round here Plod is a keen follower of such videos.

The building to the extreme right on C0830 was my base for several months up to about two weeks before the photo was taken. Looks like the Oakamoor trains had been putting down a lot of sand on the Down Goods, they used to stop right outside our window.

Sadly most of my spotting notes got lost in the course of various house moves by my parents and myself. Some photos do remain and the web has provided numerous photos linked to my regular spotting venues, e.g. www,warwickshirerailways.com also Flickr and various Facebook groups. I too model my most active spotting period, which was from the late 1950s until I started work on BR in the mid 1960s. To give more focus the present layout is based in the West Midlands during the period after introduction of the late crest and before small yellow panels. The other part of my collection, and a possible planned layout, is based on memories of Cornwall and North Devon during those days of childhood holidays when you thought the world would go on for ever as it stood. Giving your meat order to the Post Office in the morning and it being delivered by the bus conductor on the afternoon run from St Austell. Line fishing for mackrel with the local fishermen in small boats, being the only people on a mile-long beach in Cornwall on a July afternoon................. Stuck for an hour waiting for an assisting engine or relief crew at Newton Abbott on a Summer Saturday, Up the bank to Morthoe behind a Spamcan with an M7 banking, Beattie Well Tanks, 1419 at Lostwithiel with the Fowey train, D600 ex-works on the Up CRE, Zs banking at Exeter, N and 43xx 2-6-0s double headed out of Ilfracombe on Stanier stock for Birmingham joined by the Minehead portion including Gresley teaks still with all of the LNER fittings inside at Taunton................................

Switch diamonds were used depending on the crossing angle. Anything flatter than 1 in 8 normally had them. I have a picture in a book from c1943 showing the remodelling of Landsown Junction at Cheltenham with at least two sets.

Think you mean 'The Army Game'. The original Sergeant Major Bullimore was William Hartnell, following on from his role of Sergeant Sutton in the film Private's Progress. He left The Army Game to star as Sergeant Grimshawe in the first of the Carry On films, Carry On Sergeant. He returned to appear in several episode of the fifth and final series. Bill Frazer took over during the second series of The Army Game and stayed for the third and fourth series. His character was Claude Snudge, which he then played in the spin-off Bootsie and Snudge with Alfie Bass and the pair continued into a programme called Foreign Affairs.

It looks like TT66 signal on the Up & Down Goods at Blackwell South Junction. The line straight ahead was a siding and the signal showed a sub and stencil for that move or a main aspect for the Up Main.

It looks like one of those rotating windscreen wipers often seen on ships. I remember them being tried on the main line, including EM2 No. 27002, but they didn't catch on.

Got my parcel this morning, good service and cheaper than a well-known tin shed. Will definitely check here when I am looking for my future purchases.

Well said, my first fatal accident (suicide) was at Water Orton in 1966, aged just 18. Cleaning the pieces out of a Facing Point Lock is not fun. My second was Stechford in 1967. I still see the image of the underside of an overturned AM4 vividly in my dreams some nights.

Getting back to the turnout, in 1963 Birmingham Snow Hill sold several thousand platform and train tickets when FS worked the Ffestiniog AGM Special. 12 months later Alan Peglar ran a special 3-coach train to Cardiff for some tourism jolly he was attending. I was one of a handful of hardy youths who braved a blizzard at King's Norton to see the return working come through. By the autumn of 1965 the crowd at Snow Hill for it's next appearance was not much more than the usual Saturday morning spotters.