The Night Mail

[New Haven Neil]

21 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

The idea of getting to Marseilles, having a cold beer overlooking the old harbour*

That awakened an old memory, at anchor awaiting to go into Fos-sur-Mer, and going ashore in the lifeboat in Port de Bouc for pastries .  Lush.

[Winslow Boy]

22 minutes ago, New Haven Neil said:

That awakened an old memory, at anchor awaiting to go into Fos-sur-Mer, and going ashore in the lifeboat in Port de Bouc for pastries .  Lush.

Shouldn't that be Wicked.

[Hroth]

5 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

Then I'm off to Hokkaido on this:

 

And I'll be going "Hard Class"

 

 

 

"Hard Class" being located in the nose crumple-zone?

 

[BSW01]

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before but 

I don’t have a garage

I don’t have an extension

I don’t have a conservatory 

and I don’t have an annex. 

 

HOWEVER, 

I do have a shed

I do have a workshop

and I do have a dedicated model railway room. 

[J. S. Bach]

Night Owl from the land-of-three-sheds Piedmont.

[Chris Snowdon]

On 25/09/2024 at 23:01, AndyID said:

 

Le Chateau Frontenac in Quebec.

Stunning picture.  Am tempted to suggest it would make a great backscene, but for two reasons - not quite my style for what I've geerally been modelling (I'm currently thinking about mixing Breugel country-scapes and Lowry city-scapes for mine, so I definitely can't ever show images of that...), and also we re-open the whole "copyright" thing.  We in the UK don't yet have the same culture of settling almost any dispute by litigation which the US (actually, quite understandably) has, but then again, we don't yet have the "fair use" defence.  Simply popping down to a high-street photo-shop or stationer and getting them to print off a home-brewed photographic backscene is not as simple as I would wish.

[Chris Snowdon]

3 hours ago, New Haven Neil said:

That awakened an old memory, at anchor awaiting to go into Fos-sur-Mer, and going ashore in the lifeboat in Port de Bouc for pastries .  Lush.

Ah, the flashbacks...

 

Walking from my 2* hotel, west along the Promenade des Anglais into the sunset for a negroni on the terrace of the Negresco, then back into the old town (which had the builders in, to replace the tram network) followed by a salade Nicoise and a bowl of bouillabaise.  The following morning, a taxi (an S320) along the Corniche, watching the sun rise over Cap Ferrat, before descending into Monaco...

 

Whereupon reality kicked in - the superyachts were emptying their septic tanks and I was just going to a meeting in an office building four floors above that.

 

regards

cs

[Chris Snowdon]

3 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

"Hard Class" being located in the nose crumple-zone?

 

That double tree-line is also stunning.

 

regards

cs

[AndyID]

46 minutes ago, Chris Snowdon said:

That double tree-line is also stunning.

 

regards

cs

 

You like trees. We got trees.

 

 

 

Taken 5 minutes ago.

[iL Dottore]

7 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

"Hard Class" being located in the nose crumple-zone?

 

I don’t think that safety has dictated the nose shape, but aerodynamics (interestingly, as the Shinkansen got faster and faster, they found that they had to change the shape of the tunnel mouths). Anyway, the Shinkansen has an unparalleled safety record. No fatalities since they started (although, recently, someone jumped off a bridge and into the path of an oncoming Shinkansen - an obvious suicide), some technical issues (always promptly addressed) and - of course - the various impacts of tsunami and earthquakes on the system.

 

When the Japanese Railways say “your safety is our priority” it’s not just a vacuous marketing slogan.

 

I had mentioned that their time keeping is flawless, well except for the time someone found a snake on a Shinkansen, which did cause some delays. Could it have been our very own PB who raised the alarm????

 

Edited 13 hours ago by iL Dottore
Typo

[pH]

13 minutes ago, iL Dottore said:

… except for the time someone found a snake on a Shinkansen, which did cause some delays. 

 

They appear to have made a movie about that:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_on_a_Train

 

(Reasonable representation of an F40PH on the poster.)

Edited 13 hours ago by pH

[bbishop]

Last game of the season.  Definitely autumnal. Oh and sitting in a "Networker"; at least I have a seat.

[Hroth]

2 hours ago, iL Dottore said:

I don’t think that safety has dictated the nose shape, but aerodynamics (interestingly, as the Shinkansen got faster and faster, they found that they had to change the shape of the tunnel mouths). Anyway, the Shinkansen has an unparalleled safety record. No fatalities since they started (although, recently, someone jumped off a bridge and into the path of an oncoming Shinkansen - an obvious suicide), some technical issues (always promptly addressed) and - of course - the various impacts of tsunami and earthquakes on the system.

 

When the Japanese Railways say “your safety is our priority” it’s not just a vacuous marketing slogan.

 

I had mentioned that their time keeping is flawless, well except for the time someone found a snake on a Shinkansen, which did cause some delays. Could it have been our very own PB who raised the alarm????

 

 

According to a programme I saw on Ch5, the nose shape was originally based on that of a late WW2 piloted flying bomb. Swords into ploughshears and all that, I suppose....

 

[jjb1970]

Japan made a mistake early on by specifying quite tight tunnel clearances. At the original running speed the clearances weren't a problem but as speeds increased they had to resort to some pretty extreme nose contours to manage airflow around the train. 

 

The tunnel boom effect is made worse by the Shinkansen trains using lightweight aluminium construction,  if you rest your head against a bulkhead it can be quite a bang when the train enters a tunnel.

 

Something about the Shinkansen is the innovation was always with the high speed line concept and extremely intensive train operation. People in other countries claim it is impossible to operate anything remotely like the intensity of services at Tokyo Station with the available platforms yet not only do they achieve it, they do so with insane reliability and punctuality  (it's the same in their container ports). The trains themselves have always been technically conservative,  put a lot of distributed power in a lightweight train and keep it simple. They refused to consider plug doors for decades because they refused to accept they could match the speed and reliability of a pocketed door.

 

The latest sets have more tech, limited tilt, active damping and more advanced drive trains, but the tech was only allowed in when they were very sure it worked. 

[jamie92208]

23 hours ago, J. S. Bach said:

Those look like nice trains but I prefer the styling of the original ones. My one gripe when the HAWK pulled into Sasebo, none of my usual running/squadron mates had any desire to even leave the ship. I finally managed to almost literally drag one of them into town! "WE ARE IN JAPAN, GUYS. LET"S GO!!!!" I wanted to go to Tokyo and walk the Ginza, ride the Hokkaido line; nope, no luck. And I did not really want to go alone.

 

Note, the same almost happened when the HAWK anchored in Hong Kong harbor. At least there (for some unknown to me reason) a couple of them decided to go. We rode the Peak cable car and the trolley that runs (ran?) along the harbor. One thing we did not do was ride the train up to the Red Chinese border, although we did talk about it. I wanted to ride the hydrofoil to Singapore and go into Raffles but for "political" reasons (at that time) we were not allowed to go there and a scheduled "show-the-flag" ship's visit was also cancelled for that reason. Back to Subic Bay instead! WOW!! Absolutely no idea as to why Hong Kong was "acceptable" and Japan was not.

 

 

 

Sadly I witnessed the same reluctance of your compatriots to go ashore and mix with the local I habitants, whilst on cruises.  In Tunis I got a local train into Tunis for 50 pence and in New Caledonia and Fiji, the brits were the only ones sampling the delicious roadside food.  In Tunis they paid $70 for a bus ride into town,  Having a working knowledge of French helped. 

 

 

10 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

Japan made a mistake early on by specifying quite tight tunnel clearances. At the original running speed the clearances weren't a problem but as speeds increased they had to resort to some pretty extreme nose contours to manage airflow around the train. 

 

The tunnel boom effect is made worse by the Shinkansen trains using lightweight aluminium construction,  if you rest your head against a bulkhead it can be quite a bang when the train enters a tunnel.

 

Something about the Shinkansen is the innovation was always with the high speed line concept and extremely intensive train operation. People in other countries claim it is impossible to operate anything remotely like the intensity of services at Tokyo Station with the available platforms yet not only do they achieve it, they do so with insane reliability and punctuality  (it's the same in their container ports). The trains themselves have always been technically conservative,  put a lot of distributed power in a lightweight train and keep it simple. They refused to consider plug doors for decades because they refused to accept they could match the speed and reliability of a pocketed door.

 

The latest sets have more tech, limited tilt, active damping and more advanced drive trains, but the tech was only allowed in when they were very sure it worked. 

The HS2 Tunnel portals have drawn from that experience and have quite long tapering entrances.  The tunnel diameters from Euston to the Chiltern tunnel all increase with the speed profile. 

 

Jamie 

Edited 11 minutes ago by jamie92208

[Happy Hippo]

10 hours ago, Hroth said:

 

"Hard Class" being located in the nose crumple-zone?

 

Imagine a Swiss figurehead.

[Happy Hippo]

14 minutes ago, jjb1970 said:

 active damping 

 

[Winslow Boy]

1 hour ago, Happy Hippo said:

 

I see the extended family, Aunt Gladys Emmanuel has been letting the side down again.

 

Can't paste a link I'm afraid but it would appear that Auntie gored a couple in a canoe who got a bit to close to her whilst she was looking after offspring. The husband got dragged down to the bottom of river whilst the wife was tossed. Luckily he managed to escape, whilst the wife swam ashore and complained she'd lost her phone so wasn't able to film it - I made this last bit up.

 

There both back home now in Norfolk but he's one hell of a lucky fellow if you ask me.

 

Will you be writing to GE asking her if she wants to claim compo for her emotional distress.

[Happy Hippo]

Normally, GE would have dragged the woman down and tossed the man.

[polybear]

21 minutes ago, Winslow Boy said:

I see the extended family, Aunt Gladys Emmanuel has been letting the side down again.

 

Can't paste a link I'm afraid but it would appear that Auntie gored a couple in a canoe who got a bit to close to her whilst she was looking after offspring.

 

Bear comes to the rescue .....

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c869jj5dy4qo

[PhilJ W]

6 hours ago, pH said:

They appear to have made a movie about that:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snakes_on_a_Train

 

(Reasonable representation of an F40PH on the poster.)

What a load of rubbish. Distributed by a company called 'The Asylum', very apt.

[Dave Hunt]

On 25/09/2024 at 22:30, Chris Snowdon said:

Hi Dave - I believe that a similar ratio applies in airliners -  "FL310 outside is FL180 inside" once popped-up in discussion (civilian FLs are barometric rather than radio).

If we really go stratospheric, a long time ago I once drafted an outline on the use of heavy stratospheric balloons.  I was really only bothered by the details of the ascent and descent stages:  Everything in between was between 12km and 20km altitude (rather than 20-40km) but I needed to check maximum operational altitudes of "normal" aircraft. as publically-declared.  IIRC, Concorde was operated at FL650, above which most FIRs weren't too bothered, but I also found that some fighters can/could exceed that, that someone once took a Canberra to >70k, and someone else took a Lightning to about 83k before the engine began to complain (the canopy remained attached).  The U2 and SR71 did not feature in that study.

I seem to recall, but may be wrong, that the minimum ICAO requirement for CAT is 8,000ft equivalent in the cabin, hence the need to dive if a depressurisation occurs.

 

regards

cs

 

You are correct that the maximum cabin altitude in an airliner is 8,000 ft. As far as I know, Concorde was usually cruising at around FL 520 - 550, at least that was the height at which we sometimes did practice interceptions on them (all legal as the target aircraft has either to put 'embellish' on their flight plan or agree via ATC). As regards a Lightning getting to 83K, the best I ever heard of was about the low 70s.

 

Dave

[Dave Hunt]

15 hours ago, Northmoor said:

ISTR an issue early the Typhoon's introduction to service was that the altitude of much of Afghanistan was higher than the setting on the seat's AOD.  One of the pilot's said this would have been unfortunate for the ejecting pilot, although possibly preferable to surviving if it was the Taliban who found you first.

 

The barometric setting for the ejection seat's automatic 'chute deployment is variable but the normal 'European' setting is 10,000 ft.

 

Dave

[Dave Hunt]

On 26/09/2024 at 09:49, Happy Hippo said:

Me too!

 

 

One of the best fighter pilots I ever knew was a Dutch girl F16 driver. She was also drop dead gorgeous.

 

Dave

[Happy Hippo]

2 minutes ago, Dave Hunt said:

 

One of the best fighter pilots I ever knew was a Dutch girl F16 driver. She was also drop dead gorgeous.

 

Dave

Is that the lady who trashed the American F15  driving motormouth?