Sheffield Exchange, Toy trains, music and fun!

[Clive Mortimore]

On 05/04/2024 at 13:29, jwealleans said:

You come across this young lady, Clive?

 

 

I hadn't, until I heard an interview with her husband on the World Service the other night.

 

It certainly takes all sorts.....

 

You are only jealous. 

[jwealleans]

On 06/04/2024 at 18:31, Clive Mortimore said:

You are only jealous.

 

Well, you're not wrong.   Can't get the Mrs to go for that blue rinse look.

[Clive Mortimore]

I have been working on some locos.

First up is a Hornby Railroad Black Five, 44744

 

 

It is still requiring stuff on the boiler and running plate.

 

Next a Hornby Tender Drive Black Five 44687

 

It too needs bit added to the boiler and the valve gear made.

 

Both are proving to be quite enjoyable to make.

 

More work has been done on 62768 "The Morpeth"

Not too bad for left over bits.

 

The two Crap-potties together.

 

[Mallard60022]

Clive, they are the most beautiful Engines I have ever see you produce. I lurrrrrve the one with Twin Pots. I could adopt that.

beautifully ugly mate ... and that's the Engines by the way. LOL

Philth

[richard i]

3 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

 

Both are proving to be quite enjoyable to make

That’s because they are steam engines.

[Clive Mortimore]

2 minutes ago, richard i said:

That’s because they are steam engines.

Point of order Sir.

 

They are toy trains.

[30368]

49 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

They are toy trains.

 

Indeed, as my wife and daughters keep telling me.

Sometimes I'm not sure it is all worthwhile.....

 

KInd regards,

 

30368

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, 30368 said:

 

Indeed, as my wife and daughters keep telling me.

Sometimes I'm not sure it is all worthwhile.....

 

KInd regards,

 

30368

It is worth while, if you are having fun, be it making a new N-gin, painting scenery, laying track or running trains around and around in a circle. It is your hobby and Bow Locks to anyone who says differently. 

[John Tomlinson]

7 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

I have been working on some locos.

First up is a Hornby Railroad Black Five, 44744

 

 

It is still requiring stuff on the boiler and running plate.

 

Next a Hornby Tender Drive Black Five 44687

 

It too needs bit added to the boiler and the valve gear made.

 

Both are proving to be quite enjoyable to make.

 

More work has been done on 62768 "The Morpeth"

Not too bad for left over bits.

 

The two Crap-potties together.

 

 

 

These two really look the part, and you should be well pleased with the outcome. 

 

They prompted me to dig out the old David and Charles book on the Stanier 4-6-0's, written back in the 70's, which despite being a slim single volume tells us much of what we need to know about these and the Jubilees, the kind of super-detail we now get in the Wild Swan and Irwell loco books being far into the future.

 

I've always found the numbering of these rather confusing, a bit like the sub classes of 37's, as they start to go backwards in batches after the first big tranche, and had forgotten that 44687 was in fact the last one built, at Horwich, and into traffic in May 1951. My grandad who I never met worked there until his death in 1950, and I've always liked to think that he might have made bits for some of the others built there in the late 40's and numbered in the 44xxx series.

 

If 44744 reminds us how economical in beauty this batch was, 44687 is quite the other way, with its high running plate that was carried on into the BR Standards. Thanks for posting these pictures of a very interesting time in British railway loco history.

 

John.

Edited April 10 by John Tomlinson
clarity

[30368]

56 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

It is worth while, if you are having fun, be it making a new N-gin, painting scenery, laying track or running trains around and around in a circle. It is your hobby and Bow Locks to anyone who says differently. 

 

I have never doubted the fact that playing little trains is good for your wellbeing. The wonderfully balanced and sensible people that inhabit this website are the proof of this statement are they not?

............

 

Kind regards,

 

30368

[Clive Mortimore]

Got a theme tune

 

 

[Clive Mortimore]

This morning I was cutting up a LNER 4,200 gallon tender to make a 3,500 gallon one and I had a thought.

 

At a model terminus station the arriving loco will have at least a part empty tender or bunker if not a nearly empty one. Once the train it has pulled in disappears and it is free to go to the loco shed. After the raking out the ash it is refilled with water and coal. So a loco departing with a train should have a full tender or bunker. On a model railway the tender is either full or half full all the time. So a loco arriving without burning any coal looks daft. Equally a loco departing with an express with a half empty tender ain't that realistic. Just something to ponder.

 

At least with DMUs you can't see if they have been refueled but the tail lamps either end and a driver in every cab do look a tad silly.

 

Why didn't I model a through station?

[woodenhead]

Can you not model all half empty and then have an extra coal load you can add on top after the loco visits the servicing area?

[Clive Mortimore]

6 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

Can you not model all half empty and then have an extra coal load you can add on top after the loco visits the servicing area?

That was an early consideration but having a few push along tender powered engines that idea couldn't be fully applied.

 

There is always the best idea, just like no crews in the diesels ................................ignore?

[woodenhead]

6 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

That was an early consideration but having a few push along tender powered engines that idea couldn't be fully applied.

 

There is always the best idea, just like no crews in the diesels ................................ignore?

Or two of every steam loco, if you can't afford that how about one side half empty and the other side full 🤣

[5BarVT]

15 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Why didn't I model a through station?

‘Cos a terminal station is far more interesting operationally?

Paul.

[Clive Mortimore]

1 hour ago, 5BarVT said:

‘Cos a terminal station is far more interesting operationally?

Paul.

Now stop it, you are making me consider what I have done.

[woodenhead]

16 minutes ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Now stop it, you are making me consider what I have done.

Sheffield Midland or Victoria (pre 1955) - but then you'd have to pick a side Eastern or Midland.

 

I'd stick with Exchange....

Edited April 23 by woodenhead

[The Johnster]

Coal in tenders/bunkers at termini; the amount in the tender/bunker on arrival will depend on how far the loco is through its day's work.  Tenders/bunkers are full when it leaves the shed, and are supposed to carry enough for the full day's work or, if the duty is a long distance one, to get to the end of the run where it can be replenished.  At Sheffield Exchange, this would suggest a variety of fill states on arriving lcoos; a loco arriving from London will be nearly empty while one from a Birmingham or Manchester shed might still be half full.  Locals will visit several times during the day and should in theory get emptier each time. 

 

There is probably no perfect answer to this as applied to models.  Tender driven locos will always of necessity have full tenders (remember the old Airfix Dean Goods, which had a mountain of coal up to the loading gauge to house the pancake inside), but kit-builds give you a choice and loco-drive engines can usually be modified; a modeller who habitually cut'n'shunts dmus in the way you do will have no trouble with this!  I try to get the level of coal in the bunkers of my tank engines at least below the parapet of the bunker, so that you have to look down into it to see the coal; the locos have a variety of coal levels from almost empty to nearly full, but all have real coal.  This is driven by photos of real engines in service, as opposed to shed portraits; most photos were taken from ground or platform level and one cannot see the level of coal.

 

Incidentally, it is in my view high time that RTR manufacturers stopped filling our tenders and bunkers; new models should have them empty, and a bag of (preferably real) coal supplied in the box.  Only real coal looks like real coal.

 

The nature of layouts is that our normal viewing angle is that of a bird about 60 feet up and at least 60 feet away, and at Cwmdimbath I think of myself as being up on the side of Mynydd y Gwair, the mountain that rises steeply to the west of the Dimbath valley.  I have paid some attention to the angle of the lighting, because I like my trains to be side lit and many layouts fall into what I think is a trap of having the lighting directly overhead so you can see the roof detail but not much else very well, fine for the tropics but not for British modelling.  Lighting coming in at an angle over my shoulder helps to disguise what may not be strictly realistic levels of coal in my bunkers, as it's pretty shaded in there especially at the lower levels.  This is correct and prototypical, and I find it an acceptable compromise.  I work to the same principle Persian Master Carpet Weavers, who always include a single false stitch in their products because, as is well known, 'perfection is for none but Allah'.  I just duz me best.

 

Coal wagons are much easier.  In nearly a decade of working on the railway I never, ever, saw any mineral wagon that was not either empty or fully loaded; the little yellow stickyback panels gave you the 'light' and 'medium' loadings, but they were an academic consideration as coal traffic (and for that matter Limestone, Iron Ore, or any other mineral traffic) didn't work like that!  Ever.  Never saw a light or medium loaded tank wagon either; that would have been a 'live load' and very dangerous.  They were either full or empty, nothing in between; that was reserved for the world of general merchandise wagons.

Edited April 23 by The Johnster

[Clive Mortimore]

What a great day today started out to be new songs from Los Bitchos and The Warning

 

 

 

 

Edited April 24 by Clive Mortimore

[Clive Mortimore]

Then the news that Fred , our model railway club chair was found dead by his son.

 

He was mainly N gauge modeller but dabbled in other scales. Ex RAF armourer who had so many tales from his service in Northern Ireland, Aden, Hong Kong and the Falklands he could hold court all night.

 

RIP Fred.

[PaulCheffus]

15 hours ago, Clive Mortimore said:

Then the news that Fred , our model railway club chair was found dead by his son.

 

He was mainly N gauge modeller but dabbled in other scales. Ex RAF armourer who had so many tales from his service in Northern Ireland, Aden, Hong Kong and the Falklands he could hold court all night.

 

RIP Fred.

Hi

 

I’m sorry to hear that as I knew Fred many years ago when I was a member of the Cleethorpes N gauge group and he used to come over from Lincoln.

 

Cheers

 

Paul

[Clive Mortimore]

Lovely little girl.

 

[Clive Mortimore]

More lovely girls

 

 

[Clive Mortimore]

Some Russian heavy metal bagpipes.