John Isherwood

All this 'brown' livery identification in late steam days is getting out of hand! Rail muck was brown; get enough of it on a vehicle that received zero cosmetic attention - such as a horsebox - and it was impossible to identify the livery. I know, 'cos I tried to find out by rubbing through the dirt - to little avail. There is a real danger that it will become an established 'fact' that BR painted stock brown - they didn't, except perhaps for a the short period until crimson paint was made available. CJI.

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So what's wrong with 10800? If you refer to the short length of missing beading - who pointed that out prior to delivery, that Heljan failed to listen to? CJI.

Link not working. CJI.

I am increasingly commonly getting a message that RMweb is not available when navigating between pages. Closing and reopening the window seems to resolve the issue. CJI.

Kernow Models have 78047 listed as 'In Stock' in their weekly news bulletin. CJI.

None of us were able to undertake these tasks from birth; nor did we acquire our renumbering skills by working on brand-new, expensive models. Buy some scrap loco bodies - there's plenty on Ebay or in the junk boxes in model shops and at exhibitions - and practice to your heart's content. Any failures will come at minimal cost until you, (quite quickly), find that it is not a 'nightmare' job. At which point, you can confidently graduate to more important models; no modelling task comes with guarantees, but it's amazing what can be achieved after a little confidence-building practice. There is no excuse whatsoever for moans of 'Why don't they produce it with such-and such-a-number'; either practice and acquire the necessary skill or, be honest and say 'I can't be a*rsed to renumber a model'. CJI.

Probably just a mistake in the advert. CJI.

.... and why the French can build an entire network of high speed railways in the time it takes us to build one and a bit! CJI.

Do a Google search on 'BR dmu data panel', and choose 'Images'. CJI.

Same sort of thing - but that is a far more modern version. CJI.

Exactly - the jack-shaft drive locos. CJI.

No photo - but it varies between car types. It's the vehicle type code, plus seating capacity, weight, dimensions, etc. The red on white sticker is the overhead live wire warning. CJI.

Quite so - my layout was conceived and built well after the introduction of the bullhead track; but I had to use flat-bottomed because quite a few essential components weren't, and still aren't, available. Any new track range must be exactly that - a range! It will never develop it's potential sales until all elements are available. The trouble is, Peco know that, if we don't use the new stuff, we'll buy the old stuff. CJI.

Please clarify - the purpose of the crane was to lower and lift the very heavy test weights used by Pooleys. By definition, it would have to be mounted adjacent to a door in order for the weights to exit the van. CJI.

Wasn't that the earlier, jack-shaft drive ones? CJI.

Shhhhh- hadn't you heard; I don't do bespoke transfers! CJI.

I recall using it for tracing paper when doing homework. CJI.

I don't quite follow that! When increased prices are queried, we are told that the market demands ever more visible detail, and it all costs. However, when we query invisible detail, we are told that it costs next-to-nothing. Do the Chinese ladies stick in and paint all those extra internal details free-of-charge? Frankly, such statements are nonsense; ever more detail, visible or not, is provided in order to out-do the competition - it's a form of arms race! I had hoped that this pointless competition would have stopped before we got into invisible additions - but it seems that I was over-optimistic! Toilet rolls in the lavatory compartments, anyone? Who will be the first? CJI.

Exactly! It's a good few years since I had need to remember the name. CJI.

Now - what follows may be completely irrelevant. However, I do know that galvanised steel requires what is known as a mordant solution to be applied before conventional painting can be undertaken. The solution deactivates the surface of the galvanising, such that paint will adhere. The visual effect of applying the solution is to dull the shiny bright surface of the galvanising to a satin / matt grey. Is this what we see being undertaken in the second image above? If this is the case, the original finish was shiny 'silver', but the as-released finish (with insignia) was a satin / matt metallic grey - not grey paint; (though it would have appeared to be painted grey from any distance. CJI.

Unless I'm missing something - you illustrate a 64' coach; what is being offered is a 56'-11" coach. As per your link, BR(SR) were not allocated any 56'-11" coaches. CJI.

Have you got a photo of one with the serpentine lettering? CJI.

I will be returning home tomorrow, so will check on Tuesday and get back to you then. CJI.

Look through the Appleby Model Engineering section of the Cambridge Custom Transfers website. CJI.