big jim

6 bells jn website has it down as the 29th feb 1992 with 47600 and 47841 on a BLS tour of Liverpool and Manchester https://www.sixbellsjunction.co.uk

Especially when you see the amount of lorry’s that use that road, if a little Aygo sized car can do that I dread to think what a fully laden log truck could do

That was the cause of a spad in a possession back in 2002 at Rockcliffe hall, can’t remember the ins and outs but the driver saw a yellow(ish) light and passed the signal but it was a torch/bardic that had been accidentally left on in a pocket of a track worker stood near the signal

I have in the not too distant past received a green ‘ipad Screen’ as my authority to pass over a crossing under local control as the crossing attendant forgot his lamp and flags! As mike says the green light at night is relevant, telling me to move slowly while shunting, can’t quite remember off hand if the signal to do a braketest is also a green lamp twisted side to side or a white one, this day and age it’s all done by 2 way radio! Regards yellow flags passing signals at danger with a handsignaller I see it as “if ive just passed a yellow then I treat the next signal as being red”

I do believe they are no longer permitted to wear a red flag around the left arm any more though in the absence of an armband

I like the way this thread has drifted for a couple of pages, it goes to show we haven’t had any news worthy level crossing incidents for a while!

The first princess picture is bugging me big time! admittedly as gareth73 said i immediatly thought of the climb out of salop (coton hill) but it doesnt add up, the up distant is a lot futher back and the only arch bridge is a lot lot taller than the one in the pic and its on an embankment rather than a slight cutting and of course the OP says its going south, the climb is northbound! If as the OP says they are taken in order then Part of me says it’s somewhere near bersham looking toward Wrexham but I think there are one too many bridges (you can see a longer shadow through the bridge hole which could be Ruabon tunnel), the distant could be for croes newydd south but the skyline in the distance looks wrong but I’m also (subliminally) seeing the old Wrexham lager tower and brewery, all of course in ruabon red brick! the change in gradient is quite pronounced in the picture too which as I sign the route should jump out at me but it’s not! thing I’ve got to bear in mind though is when the photo was taken I was only 2 years old so an awful lot will have changed in the last 40 years! EDIT: im now thinking its south of ruabon in the rhosymedre, plas madoc area looking north, basically two bridges down from the metal skewed llangollen rd bridge (maybe thats what the long shadow is?) as featured in the original post, the buildings in the distance being ruabon, the red herring being the pointy tower, ruabon church (and indeed wrexham) dont have pointy spires

I’d put money on the 2nd pic of the princess being Weston Rhyn looking toward chirk from ‘old chirk road’, the signal having a subsidiary arm into the now removed loop at Weston rhyn The road bridge in the distance being trehowel Avenue

Driving to work this afternoon on the M6 near Hilton services I’m in the outside lane overtaking a couple of wagons in the middle lane that had moved out to let vehicles joining the motorway at the previous junction, cruise set to 70mph happily trundling along, clear lane ahead of me when suddenly the lead wagon cab jolts and it veers slightly toward me just as I reach I the rear corner of the trailer, plumes of smoke then came from the front of the wagon next thing is See is a Volvo estate is being pushed along sideways by the wagon as I reach the tractor unit, the smoke pouring off all its tyres and I’m thinking I hope to god it doesn’t rebound or get thrown off into my lane, the wagon braked hard as I did i and luckily the Volvo stayed put before pulling off to the slip road for he services followed by the lorry! A bit of a 5p-10p moment that was for sure, I can only assume the Volvo pulled out from the inside lane and clipped the edge of the wagon as it did so

Woo hoo, the Mormons are coming to Manchester! Got me 2 tickets for next June

They should just run this advert

I happened to flick over to that last night with about 40 minutes to go and was glued to it to the very last minute, absolutely fantastic piece of work, very poignant and at times quite some quite amusing commentary

tbh i was hoping to use polystyrene on the grounds of cost, i noticed b+q had a black version which appeared denser and didnt 'feel' like polystyrene and was in the affordable price bracket, will have to see what exactly that stuff was and, next question, should i do the floor before or after the plaster boarding? (im thinking after, so the plasterboard goes to the existing floor)

electrician booked for next week for the first fix, lots of plugs and an extra light the plasterer is coming the first week in december to board out and plaster, hes actually an on tech for NR and works on the 950 unit and TIC train! i still need to decide what exactly im doing with the floor first though, any suggestions would be welcome, i am going to put down insulation sheets (foam or polystyrene?) whatever happens but....... shall i put battens across too with insulation between (as per the walls but lot bigger gaps between joists) or just place the wooden flooring on top of the big sheets of insulation? im botherered that if i dont have battens over time 'heavy traffic' areas of the building may start to 'sink' as the insulation sheet compresses under weight

The on train techs prepare it for haulage and give a certificate of readiness, brake tested etc and safe to go I was asked to uncouple the locos at carlisle and leave them clear of the unit at each end so they could work on it but as I don’t know how to operate the handbrake on the Miller then at some point it would lose its air and roll away into one of the locos so I just left them attached!

Nice little job last night, possession at shap, tied in nicely with the final weekend at our caravan site in cumbria, went straight from there to site! Sat at scout green for 5 hours until the possession was lifted then up to tebay to change ends 66711 Rail milling machine, never seen one of these before! 66726 And away to carlisle upperby to stable Mountsorrel the rest of the week

Found another 66 with a battery switch cabinet this morning! 66726 which is an ex ‘barbie’ 66 too so as you say it must be that batch which had them fitted

Have a look at ratcliffe power station on google maps, there is an ews MGR in there that is a good 40 wagons long, it’s at the exit signal from the discharge loop but also still being unloaded in the hopper And if you follow the loop round you find a 4 1/2 wagon long freightliner stone train too!

It should work with the plastic key too, if I get a chance I’ll grab a pic next time I stable one up

Interesting, I’ll have to ask the question regards the gradients, I seem to remember being told it was also a ‘one size fits all’ solution now I’m no longer with Colas I don’t deal with ertms day to day, I need to try and get down there at some point soon so I don’t lose my competency

And some from today, iport, had another driver with me today who I was assessing to pass out on the route so we have more drivers for it now thankfully Stopped at Masborough as usual only to have a nice surprise that NR had cut back all the trees and bushes from the platform, I won’t have to stomp down bushes now to get a clear shot And ready to depart iport The train has had 66715 ‘valour’ on it all week but it was swapped out yesterday for 66717 as 66715 is an official war memorial and was removed to be given a good external clean at Roberts road ready to be used in this weekends rememberance day service in Doncaster station

The jumper is hung up in the clean air end of the loco on our locos Getting the jumper in and out is not too bad if your tall, also the cover is designed to take the brass key to hold it open, lift the flap up and insert the key into the top and flapnis held open! Regards the different cabs some have ‘euro spec’ cabs which sort of wrap round the driver rather than having a pedestal in the middle of the cab, I think the reason they were only used in certain areas was driver knowledge, even now they can’t be used on possessions where multiple companies drivers are involved as say Colas, dB, freightliner drivers don’t have traction knowledge on them (there is no drivers key or direction lever in them, just buttons and switches)

Oh bum, not going to make it after all, change of plan for the weekend (but a day off tomorrow which is a bonus!)

That’s correct and also what causes delays, traditionally it’s once on the crossing at the restriction speed you can accelerate back to line speed, ertms turns it into a 201m minimum length restriction, bear in mind there were about 6 in close succession to each other between dovey jn and towyn it equates to a good 20 mins lost in section with a 97 hauled train

No the braking curve is fixed regardless of gradient, it does show in the DMI if it’s falling or rising and to what extent but that’s just for show! That’s where route knowledge comes in, we had a manager “at my last company” who tried to claim you didn’t need to learn the Cambrian route (in tge trasitional sense) as ertms told you where to stop, brake, accelerate etc and all other info could be got from the sectional appendix. We soon shut him down by explaining it didn’t tell you where to brake for stations and indeed where those stations were and a lot more besides including in keeping with this thread locations of all level crossings such as the 100+ user worked crossings on the Cambrian (there used to be a lot more too!)