big jim

Hmmm, I have part of a pen-y-fordd to Avonmouth on Tuesday evening wonder if it will be the same rake doing that run?

Couple of bits, firstly, what hope have we got with clowns like this...... then, for fans of the league of gentlemen Matt Lucas has done a duet with Pam Doove of his baked potato Song

That’s one 66 I’ve still not driven! i remember we had it at fastline for a couple of days when it was in black livery and I missed it then and I’ve yet to get on it with GBRF too

Fixed down the back upper level this evening, have used dowels at the front edge and screwed to the batons along the rear wall, then I put the higher level on dowel legs (just 3 for now) to get an idea of how it will look. I bought that bit forward a bit so the line nearest the wall won’t be in a tunnel for the whole of one side so I may need to cut the outside edge of the high up bit back a bit so the oo9 line can run round the outside of the outcrop while the oo gauge goes through a tunnel onto the viaduct Had a look at the viaduct and the laser cut pieces from the last post, bit the bullet and cut the noch viaduct back by one arch on one side to line up with the (now painted black) ironbridge looking at the pieces on the narrow gauge bridge I’ve decided im going to put the bridge deck along the top of the laser cut bits, a couple of MM down, basically along the top of the oval holes then put a hand rail on top of that so the oval holes are below bridge deck level Imagination time again, 66789 head light engine over the ironbridge while Bridget heads over the dual gauge track with a couple of GVT coaches over all view of the viaduct And a view from the river bed up to the ironbridge with 66789 passing over planning a day in the garage tomorrow to crack on with getting track up to the lifting section and maybe the last of the higher level boards in place so I can bin all my offcuts and have a tidy up in the room

it was on the Apple App Store but having just has a quick look I can’t see it any more, it was 10 years ago I downloaded it there are plenty more GPS trackers available on there Now though, don’t know which one is best though

Some from today, coleshill to Doncaster iPort, nothing about so got a run at it, arrived amp hour early and no containers to unload so back mega early! Working it back again on Monday Doncaster decoy And parked up in the RMT bay with a line of 91s

Important news regarding the GBRF charity railtour........ At GBRf Charity Railtours we are very proud of the fact that we have raised an incredible amount of money for great causes over the years, causes that genuinely change the lives of many. We now however live in a time where all of our lives have been changed, and where life may never be quite the same for a long time to come. Over the past weeks and months during lockdown, the organisers of GBRf 2020 have considered carefully what the impact of the global pandemic may do to our operation, always taking into account and reviewing the latest government advice on social distancing and how it intends to release the UK from lockdown. It is still not clear what the rules in society will be come September, as the latest government advice suggests that this will be conditional on the UK passing a number of tests to reduce the alert level. But also, it’s worth noting that the alert level, and therefore the rules could well vary geographically. How we overlay any rules that may be in place onto a twelve coach train full of passengers is not clear. What is clear though, is that even if somehow by September that the pandemic has passed and relative normality is restored, the appetite for such travel is likely to have significantly diminished, either because of remaining concerns about contracting the virus, or not least because many of us may have suffered some level of financial hardship through the course of this summer. With all of the above in mind, and the ongoing uncertainty, it does not feel appropriate to continue to make arrangements for GBRf 2020 to take place this September. All that said, whilst reviewing the latest information over the last eight weeks and coming to this decision, it was always in the back of our minds that if we arrived at this point, we would want to announce such a decision with a plan B. It is not in our nature to give up, and there is still very much the desire to deliver this operation at a later date. We also considered though that a short postponement for such a big operation would be unwise, given that a number of other railtour operations are now being postponed to later in the year - a large number of tours in a short timeframe would be unsustainable for both the number of people wanting to travel and their ability to afford to travel on them all. As such, we are pleased to advise provisionally that GBRf 2020 (ish) – “This Time it's Personal” will now take place from Thursday 15th April to Sunday 18thApril 2021. We intend to keep the itinerary broadly the same, though there were a few ideas we had originally that were scuppered by engineering work. We will need to review the operation against the engineering work planned for that weekend and expect there to be a few modifications/improvements which we’ll share over the coming months as and when confirmed. It would be remiss of us not to be clear that the re-dated operation is of course still conditional on the global situation. Let us all hope things are very different by the turn of the year. We will release tickets for sale when we are confident that we can run and will give plenty of notice of that date as things progress. We have not taken the decisions above lightly, and we trust you understand why we have come to the conclusions we have. We are very grateful for your support and we very much look forward to you joining us in April next year. The sad problem with the current situation, is that many charities have lost their funding streams as people are unable to raise money through their usual activities and many projects are stalling. Redating our train will have the same effect on what is potentially a huge donation to Prostate Cancer research funding. As this year progresses, GBRf Charity Railtours may still look to offer some of our more simplistic operations, similar to those we have done previously perhaps using the empty coaching stock moves from other operations. As the ability to do this becomes clearer over the coming months we will share details as soon as we can. We hope that you and your families are all safe and healthy, and enjoy what you can of this summer. The GBRf Charity Railtours Team

Now you have written the above i tenner one of the problems I had , the power steering pump as soon as you filled the reservoir up it just leaked straight back out within minutes from the pump one of the oil seals went too, that just leaked oil onto one of the pulleys and ended up spraying the engine bay with oil interestingly they must share an engine with the BMW mini somewhere along the line, I was looking at a gasket set for my cooper S (1.6) and the part number came up as mini/Chrysler pt I do know of someone who bought one purely because he liked the bonnet shape so he could pretend he was driving a class 37!

I remember when I was at DRS @charliepetty kept asking me at exhibitions if I knew what was happening to them as he said they could be used to provide power to ex woodhead electrics instead of using the overheads?

I had one for a month or so, bought it cheap as a project, such a nail even after a load of work done I got rid of it for scrap!

Some from today, ex shanks livery 66522 and while in mountsorrel the HOBC machine went past, what you can see in this pic is just under 1/2 of the whole train

yes, a 27 not a 26, it’s parked directly behind the 58

there is a mk3 DVT behind the 47 too, also I think there may be a 33 lurking there somewhere

Some from today, Leicester to mountsorrel and back to coleshill leicester depot, looking like a proper depot! 10 car meridian 66743 heading to Felixstowe, eluding me again! My loco in fox street neck, the train is in humberstone road and we run down to the station to swap over otherwise it’s a long walk for us both! and on the train in humberstone road for the last leg to mountsorrel same again tomorrow but landor st to landor st without a run round as the train is returning from Eastleigh

Only the Avanti west coast ones

I’ve never had issues with the handsets, so much easier to get in get out and get gone the only problem I’ve had in the past is ideally you should be packing your bags in the trolley as you go round so when you get to the tills and paid your all ready to load straight into the car, the times I’ve done that I’ve been chosen for a random item check so the assistant has to them go rummaging through the packed bags to scan certain items on the random checklist so now we don’t bother and pack it when we get to the car at the moment Sainsbury’s are losing out on our weekly shop because of their one person per trip policy, quite simply I can’t be trusted to shop on my own as I’ll just by junk and my wife if she goes on her own buys healthy stuff, going to Tesco together is a compromise as I get away with a certain amount of junk and she tops up with the healthy stuff This was me after the first solo shop after lockdown

We now do one big shop a week in Tesco, today however we needed some extras so popped into Aldi on the retail park in crewe and fair dos it was one of the most efficient well organised shops we’ve done, one queue for all tills, called forward, plastic screens between checkouts and the usual one protecting the staff, super quick service from then, very impressed passed the newly re-opened KFC too, queue right round the car park to get in there!

It’s a euro spec 66, a one off, the horn is really loud on it and almost like a triple tone

You missed a Laira to Doncaster move too, pair of back to back XC HST powercars

Nice to have a run at it, the yard manager said I’d have no chance of getting away early but lots of pleased and thank you’s to control and NR and off I went! same today, derby to longport, not much about, asked the signaller nicely if I could turn back at kidsgrove instead of alsager loop and sorted, saved me over an hour some from derby, sliding door HST voyager my train to longport, 66750 and 66788, 750 has the coolest sounding horn of all 66s I’ve driven! Changing ends at kidsgrove and longport peeped into the shed and saw the line of new class 69s being worked on too, no pics of course! couple of days of mountsorrel coming up

sounds like my mini, the blue one is off the road again! starter motor this time I think, nothing at all when you turn the key, not even a click, bump start and it goes 1st time, I can get one for £15 but it’s the time to get it over to my mate on the Wirral and get a train back that I don’t have, ive decided to leave it until the end of the month and get it done then (along with the sump gasket and oil cooler o ring that are weeping slightly, he’s going to do the piston shim things too while the sump is off ill use the red car for now, I need to keep the mileage down on the blue one anyway, saying that I used the Touareg for work today and it was lovely on the motorway, I’d taken the bluefin off it the other week as I didn’t think it made much difference but I reactivated it before leaving bescot and on the drive home I realised it does actually make a fair difference acceleration wise when overtaking

Surprised you saw it, I was running 3 hours early!

Did a rugby to bescot on sunday first up 6G51 passed through with 66743 and 66751 on it then mine arrived with 66760 toton tripper tomorrow

nope still here! this made me laugh earlier in rugby station, perfectly lined up spots, simple things!

That’s tempting, drove the real one last year and wanted to get one since but I’ve spent too much through this thread this month