SRman

I agree with Phil H in as far as "someone" did some self-adhesive tavern car signs, but I cannot remember who. I also know that at least some of the signs have appeared in a publication, but I can't remember which that was either. I know: fat lot of help that is! It does mean that somewhere along the line, one of us may come up with something useful when we are browsing our books or websites looking for something completely unrelated.

The etched name plates and shields for 33 207 arrived from Fox Transfers. I forgot to order the depot plates as well, so those will have to await another order (I usually try to buy more than one item to share the postal costs a bit). I found that the etched plates were slightly shorter than the printed ones, so had to scrape off a little from the ends of the printed plates, which also removed a few small chips of paint. I found that a Humbrol grey #64 from the standard paint range was a very close match to the light grey, but unfortunately glossy against the satin finish, so had to matt varnish the touched up patches afterwards. I will eventually do a little light weathering on this locomotive too, so that will hide any very slight mismatches. P_20191210_171648_vHDR_On by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr P_20191210_171728_vHDR_On by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr

I think it looks correct too but there are usually two sets of wires from the pickups (one pair for each bogie). I can't see where the other end's wires are going, so I wonder if they are still connected but on opposite polarity to the ones we can see.

A little bit of work for the layout, rather than on the layout: I have finally returned to the farm scene for the back corner. I have been gluing the hedges and fences on now that I am happy with the overall look. The front retaining wall will adjoin the railway and I am thinking of using a concrete texture for that. The small white patches are wet glue that "escaped"! P_20191208_104924_vHDR_On by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr P_20191208_104936_vHDR_On by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr P_20191208_104944_vHDR_On by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr

I never got the chassis on my first one to run properly. I ended up putting a Hornby chassis under the Millholme 3rd series MN body. I have a first series kit still unmade in its box to tackle at some time during my forthcoming retirement. I missed the OP asking for the instructions, but I'm glad Richard B (30368) responded - saving me from scanning mine.

Factory seconds from the liquidators??

It wasn't a white, fluffy Persian, was it? Also, has anyone noticed Andy putting one of his little fingers ('pinkies') up to the corners of his mouth?

It is interesting in politics: as Hacker pointed out once in Yes Minister, it's not because of the opposition you have to watch your back, it's the ones on your own team behind you (paraphrased somewhat!).

If Andy fails in his bid over there, he could always run over here in Oz. No, wait: he's not allowed because of his British citizenship. A rather silly rule considering how many Australians have foreign ancestry (including me).

There's no urgency for this. I am happy to wait until we see you next (probably January at the Gheringhap meeting. Thanks heaps though, Peter.

That would certainly be true if the Janus had come along at the same time as the other classes were allocated, but I am assuming the Janus has come along after that, so has to take the next available slot, regardless of its lower power. I know what you mean about the modern allocations being seemingly haphazard.

Going with the fact that classes 10 to 17 existed, how about taking the next available one, class 18?

Perfect Peter! Now the price ... is that one beer or two?

Does the trailing bogie have additional pickups on the non-live side? If so, that's probably where the other wire came from.

I use a Power Cab for my programming track. I also prefer the panel to be upside down (compared to NCE's instructions) so that the LED is at the top and doesn't have trailing cables obscuring it. I got over the problem of remembering which side is the 'power' side, and used a white paint pen to draw prominent arrows over and under the correct socket. You can just make out the arrows on the lower left of the photo. Provender Store Progress 30-07-17 - 2 by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr

... and I have just ordered he Earl Mountbatten of Burma etched plates and crests from Fox Transfers.

Confirming that, Peter, it is a left-hand one.

Hi Peter. That would be great if you do have a spare. I am at work at present, so will get back to you this evening as to which side is missing (I think it was a LH one, but I need to check). When I bought the model the bogie side frames were on the wrong sides too, so the steps were all facing the wrong way (or at the wrong ends of the bogies, if you prefer!). At least that is a very easy fix on the Heljan models.

Slight update on the 33/2: I found the sprue of glazing bits, including the light guides, so those have now been installed, but I couldn't find any bogie steps, so I may have to resort to scratchbuilding a set, using the existing ones as a pattern. I must source a nice set of etched plates to go on this model too.

I have just picked up yet another class 33 diesel! I offered $100 (Aus) and that was accepted, so I am now the proud owner of a Heljan class 33/2, 33 207 Earl Mountbatten of Burma, in Railfreight Construction livery. It had most of the extra bits in the box, but I had to fit my own couplings (I use Bachmann straight ones in preference to Heljans cranked ones anyway), and was missing the light guides and a bogie step at one end only. I have some Heljan spare sprues of 33 bits somewhere, so may even have replacements for these if I am lucky. It tested fine on DC, so now has a Zimo MX600 decoder fitted and runs fine on DCC as well. I really didn't need another 33, but at that price I couldn't resist. P_20191201_194503_vHDR_On by Jeffrey Lynn, on Flickr

The class 25 sheet should suffice: the actual chassis and mechanism is the same, although the PCB will differ.

Adding to that last post, Southern Pride have classes 304, 305 and 308 in their lists. Maybe they could supply cabs. http://www.southernpridemodels.co.uk/

DC Kits are the only ones I know of who produced anything like the 504 cabs. I had a quick look at No Nonsense Kits, but they only seem to have SR SUB and EPB types. You may have to scratchbuild the cabs, unless Charlie at DC Kits can unearth any left over parts in his stocks.

I believe you can use the Hornby trailing bogie with only a slight modification to the chassis hole. The motor bogies are quite different and need a frame attached to the chassis to mount them. I opted to buy a cheap RailRoad locomotive and clip the detailed Lima body straight on to the Hornby chassis. I sold the remaining Hornby body on Lima chassis.

The engine room doors were on both sides, but not obvious at some angles. It is quite possible that one side had a grille while the other didn't at some point in time, but the photographic evidence suggests otherwise: they either had no grilles on both sides, or had grilles on both sides. The Lima model I referred to before was actually of 31 004 as it appeared with grilles, so it had to be from 1974 onwards with TOPS numbering, but I wanted to backdate it to late 1960s condition, still in blue. As such, the same loco did not have the engine room door grilles at that time, so I had to pick a member from the production blue star batch with no headcode boxes (a 'skinhead'). I chose D5528 as being a close match in appearance to the body I had.