TheSignalEngineer

Even more 'off the wall'. What about doing the Dean Goods snow plough as a separate item then I could produce Tyseley's ' Streamlined Pannier' https://flic.kr/p/2cCUHmM

At Bristol they used to walk along the coach roof to get to the toilet filling hoses on the canopy roof in some parts of the station.

They sometimes seem to have gone a bit quirky so how about a GWR 51/2 plank Open on a decent 10' underframe and a 'Reverse' Stanier brake van like the one at NRM. They should also be able to knock spots off Bachmann's LMS 10T van. and BR cousin. Clasp brake, push brake and unfitted options available to go at, so plenty of scope including Army livery. I'll take six assorted in BR 1950s state to pension off my Ratio/Airfix/Dapol hybrids. Meanwhile I'll leave the stash of Parkside chassis where they are.

A Johnson 2F 0-6-0 or a Stanier 2-6-2T please. The Johnson 2F could be as big a minefield as the Dean Goods due to its life of over 80 years. so they may wish to steer clear. The Stanier 2-6-2T on the other hand shares the same wheel sizes and spacings as the previous Fowler version. Start with the standard boiler Stanier with dome and topfeed, then continue with combined dome/topfeed, domeless. and the larger boiler carried by four locos. For the Fowler you have the standard boiler, with and without Pull-Push gear and 20 conderser fitted locos. The Fowler locos were built between 1930 and 1932, originally carrying number 15500 - 15569 then being renumbered 1 - 70. Going into BR they got mixed traffic livery early/late, but on the way some were plain black with BRITISH RAILWAYS and at least 40070 had the BR number applied to its LMS livery in LMS-style figures. Stanier locos numbered 71 - 209 were added from 1935 to 1938. As far as distribution is concerned, between them they got virtually everywhere that the LMS reached, with pictures in London including the Widened Lines, Hither Green and Clapham Junction, Bath Green Park, Bristol, Swansea, North Wales, Leeds and the far north of Scotland. So we end up with at least seven potential body variations and plenty of potential liveries across a group of 209 locos with a life span of 25 - 32 years and a wide operating area.

I've got a couple from earlier releases that don't really fit my timeframe so they may be worth offloading when poeple realise the new prices.

Ah! Looks as if I may finally get my maroon Portholes. At least I have a couple of Blue Boxes to look forward to this year.

I'll check to see. I have a folder with several in somewhere. Eric

17.00? That's either dedication beyond the call of duty or a very thick skin.

Must be time for a few of the generic 'Common User' freight wagons to be updated. Some are relics from the early days of Airfix and Mainline. Hornby did a decent job of the LMS Coke, NE-style 21T Hopper, GWR and LNE Toads, etc and are addressing the legacy Stanier Brake Van. Bachmann have a fair range of 16T minerals and 7/9 planks and made some good LNE and SR vans. The van bodies of GW parentage look reasonable althought I haven't measured any recently. Big gaps are some better and more varied Open wagons such as the LMS corrugated end 5-plank and and GW 51/2 plank types and LMS style vans which continued in production under BR. These would need LMS and BR Clasp Brake underframes to be produced which would be useful under a lot of types such as the BR Lowfit, the wooden versin of which was built at Wolverton on LMS 8-shoe frames. Then of course there are 14T and 20T tank wagons, but those are probably too much of a minefield for the big boys to contemplate.

Another reason for me getting a 15xx. I nearly got wiped out by one at that very spot, I think in the 1966/7 winter. A group of us from a club i was in had arranged to go underground at Coventry Colliery on the Maintenance shift to have a look at the machinery and conditions on the coalface. We had to drive across a couple of the tracks to get to the pit head building we were to meet up in but unfortunately our driver didn't see the loco in the dark and we nearly ended up having a confrontation between the car and a 15xx.

There's an interesting map of GWR Route Availability on Michael Clemens website. It dates from 1931 and has some later alterations done but the Cambrian is still shown yellow for most of its length. http://www.michaelclemensrailways.co.uk/?atk=634

I would buy one of those. One even managed to get onto a passenger working from Wolverhampton to Stratford via Worcester after attention at Stafford Road works. Wonder if it was four non-corridor bow-end coaches?

My roundy is just over 8' square. The visible end has a section about 8' x 4' where the lines are on a continuously changing curve, the outer main line varying between 30" and 60". The loop on the inside comes down to 24" in places. The some of the hidden running loops at the other end come down to a minimum of approximately 22" radius but they are restricted to smaller locos. The 'Industrial' branch in front of the hidden loops sets off at 18" but the largest loco using that is an LNWR Coal Tank.

Even bigger area as some also did Leamington, Stratford, Honeybourne, Worcester, Wolverhampton.

Thanks to Clearwater for the list of Birmingham sets in post 59. 4949/6237/6242/4951 are shown as having belonged to Set 40 so that will be my choice. Coaches from these diagrams form only 18 sets on the list but Birmingham had a total of 52 four coach sets in the 1951 Local CWN including 4 composed of 70' Toplights from 1913. Harris mentions downgrading from 1953 when talking about the previous batches of Bow-End Composites. Interesting as I am basing my stock on c1956/7 and many of the trains in contemporary photos seem to be formed Composite/Brake Second/Second.

More spying allegations in the news yesterday https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/01/poland-charges-including-huawei-manager-spying-china-190111120511777.html

Phil CV settings are being transmitted to Shenzhen every hour. I'm staying analogue. Dai Nosore

My edit, I thought that was how their business model works, announce it and hope everyone else lays off it for the foreseeable future

Can only be bought from a manned ticket office, so that will reduce the take-up.

Very sad, Dianne has been a fixture in our lives since since we migrated north about 20 years ago.

If the do a green Class 103 with speed whiskers shedded at Ryecroft I'll rob break the bank for one. I doubt if I will have the opportunity to buy one, even less so the Gloucester Twins sometimes describbed as Class 100. On the steam side I will find it hard to resist if the do a Johnson 2F of a type that worked on the Harborne Branch or a Stanier 2-6-2T.

Not a problem, plemty of places where that happened.

The race is on to get my 74xx conversion finished before they announce it next week.

Have you got room to put a small loco shed for the Ruston on the extra siding?

Is B used for anything other than getting wagons into the Private Siding?