roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Jan 15, 2011 23:44:24 GMT
Reading an old thread about a resin based Met loco kit, there was mention of the MTK range.
At one stage, MTK attempted to produce 1938TS in etched brass. I was running GS Models at the time producing cast metal bus kits, and knew Colin Massingham. I had discussions with him and he asked if I was interested in buying the 38Ts from him. I went to his place at slough and took several frets away for measurement and examination.
The frets proved to reasonably accurate but totally unbuildable. Why? Because all the roof detail was etched IN, not OUT! The rivets were etched in, as were the rainstrips. no thought had gone into how to bend the roof to countour..what an absolute waste of money. Oh, and virtually none of the etch lines were straight.
I didn't proceed with the purchase of the 500 or so frets they had produced! I intended to proceed with my own version and got quotes for a pressed brass kit, with windows and doors stamped out, as per the MTK coach series, but got ripped off by the company supposedly doing the work on them, so they never appeared.
The only Underground model I produced was the Met F class.
I converted a Triang M7 into L44 at quite a young age, and quite good it looked too.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Jan 15, 2011 23:23:47 GMT
The W&C just couldn't cope with any more passengers. the depot can't be extended without demolishing a lot of The Cut; you can't move Waterloo platforms round the corner, the walls support the main station and would be on a very sharp curve and a steep gradient...
I know, I worked on the line long enough!
Edited to add the curved bits towards the Bank end is where Blackfriars station is; the curves are there to take the line round the supports for Blackfriars bridge.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Jan 15, 2011 11:20:41 GMT
Not forgetting the river bridge!
In my days at Waterloo, we used the bays for ecs movements, can't really remember what for though, definitely not usually for Rugby specials.
the rugby specials would come out of Strawberry Hill or run round via Kingston loop to Twickers, then run Richmond-CJ=Waterloo. some did non-stop Waterloo. Tthey varied.
ISTR the bays were used for postal traffic in the evenings.
Rugby specials were whatever stock was available, not neccesarily 4SUBs! These all went by about 1983. Mainline stock was used too.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Jan 13, 2011 9:44:42 GMT
What I miss is the whine of the R stock MG's!
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Jan 11, 2011 18:23:31 GMT
A good question indeed. Probably very well! The wonders of modern signalling always slows things down - e.g. 38 trains per hour timetabled in 1933 east from Baker Street. Now 28-29tph at best, and that's on a good day without any glitches. 1933 signalling was done by people, not computers.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Jan 11, 2011 18:18:55 GMT
There's a similar thread on the RMweb, hidden in a bit on EMU identification. thanks to lnwrelectric for clarifying the dates.
I remember the layout well as I used to park a couple of my preserved buses at Pioneer's yard on the old goods yard. Remember too there were 2 electrified sidings there.
An interesting tale, one day when working as a guard on the DR, on platform 5(?) the far left platform, in semaphore days, the guard couldn't see the starter so had to use the Loudaphone to ask the motorman if the signal was off. I phoned Charlie, my m/m, who said, yes, the flippin' thing's off, you'd better come and have a look. Lo and behold, there was the arm dangling down the post as it had literally fallen off!!
Remember too the intermediate block section signals between Kew and Richmond, ISTR the only ones on the underground system.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Dec 16, 2010 22:32:21 GMT
Dave Burleigh done a lengthy article on Sarah's most recent rebuild and a superb set of photos in the MRC Bulletin which don't appear to be on the website. themodelrailwayclub.org/aboutus.aspxA request to that site may provide more information.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Dec 15, 2010 22:39:01 GMT
I'd guess that Sarah could supply power for the ETH; presumably the 4TC heating has been modified to not earth through the bodywork as this will cause problems on the 4 rail system. the class 20s are not fitted with train heating.
Re Dreanoughts and shoe beams, I don't see quite how a dynamo could provide steam heat for the train unless a steam heat generator was fitted somewhere in the train. Could it be the stock was fitted with ETH as well as steam heating?
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Dec 13, 2010 23:17:20 GMT
ISTR the Met locos had the same motors as the SR 4SUB units, which have been passed on to the 455s...
The chap to talk to is Dave Burleigh of the Model Railway Club. He was heavily involved in Sarah Siddons in the 80's up date I think.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Dec 12, 2010 9:56:19 GMT
D stock in Lillie Bridge is nothing new. Member BigAl sent me a picture of such activity taken in his days as a ballast motorma PG?n there in the 1980's!
If I can wake him up in Haverfordwest, I'll get him to post it here.
BTW, what's the plan to remodel PG?
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Dec 8, 2010 10:05:51 GMT
ISTR the old eastbound bay was taken out of use when the present Tower Hill bay was commissioned. It was certainly still visible in my days on the DR, and we used to use the centre bay for Mansion House short workings.
As MRFS says, it was built as a terminus for the DR, hence that layout. I suspect locos were changed there as well in the early days as it was later an end-on junction between the DR and MR. During their feuds in the steam era, locos may not have been allowed to run through!
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Nov 25, 2010 23:52:56 GMT
Son of roythebus works as a rolling stock engineer at Selhurst and told me a while ago that the original proposal was to use a Marsh line 2 car DMU for the Ealing-Wandsworth Road service. NR reckoned there would be problems if it broke down on the WR as nothing there would couple up to it, and SR didn't have a spare unit anyway. Crews already had limited route knowledge to Ealing Bdwy.
The engineers done a test run in their works van to see how long it would take by road from SH to EB, and found it was quicker to get from SH to St.Leonards! so that project was put on hold for a while.
Meanwhile, I';ll ask him if he's heard any more about the project. It could be the latest idea is to use a 2 car EMU for the service.
I've got some 8mm cine of the Kenny Belle in steam days with a very grubby standard 2-6-4T and a 4 car suburban set, taken in 1967.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Nov 21, 2010 21:26:56 GMT
there was one advertised on Ebay recently, ex Grimsby. front entrance. A customer of mine in Germany was thinking of buying it. a dealer friend in hull said not to, it was an absolute dog, despite being immaculate. It had rear air suspension, low speed diff, 35mph maximum and gave a vert bad ride.
Not one of AEC's best products. ISTR there's one in the Oxford Bus museum.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Oct 11, 2010 7:42:35 GMT
Aluminium is quite difficult to cut. Having broken up a couple of Routemaster buses in the last 10 years, I don't envy the scrap man's job.
You can't really cut ali with the traditional oxy-acetylene, (gas axe), we tried a butane gas cutter, more effective, in the end we used a chain saw!! the metal was disposed of by the local itenerant scrap metal recycling operative (pykie).
When they scrapped th RTs, they were attacked by men with axes who peeled off the beading and panels from what was left of the timber frame, which was then burnt. RMs are considerable stronger, and had they been around in WW2, I doubt that we'd have needed tanks to beat the enemy; RMs are mor e robust.
No doubt the professionals have a better method.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 29, 2010 6:32:02 GMT
BigAl has just passed me details of this site which members may know of, but it has a good selection of photos, mainly 1950's Met, but some other interesting bits: web.ukonline.co.uk/53amodels//london.htmThere's also a pic of the South Acton shuttle.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Sept 17, 2010 22:27:13 GMT
What about the KESR with their "District" 4 wheeler?
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 17, 2010 22:25:22 GMT
Quite a few were painted like that.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 10, 2010 23:40:26 GMT
Oh, the youth of today.....
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 7, 2010 2:46:13 GMT
Yeh, still seriously thinking about reprinting and publishing this book, it's too good to keep hidden. Just thinking, it must be 60 years of the Met, 1863=1923!
Anyone got any ideas on sales volumes for such books, it's a new one on me.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 7, 2010 2:43:13 GMT
Oh the wit and wisdom of the internet! Maybe the smell would be the WSP relays burning out.
Back to the OP, most drivers I've worked with on heritage railways don't use the vac brake properly. This is probably because they've never used them at "proper" working speeds, 60mph +.
I was taught to set the brake at about 18" til it gets a bite, then drop the vac further if needed, than, as with the air brake, release it before stopping to get a nice smooth stop. The vac brake was ok at up to 110mph. I know by experience. Working the "midnight" 0012 Euston-Wolverhampton from Rugby one night, my driver was a bit of a speed king, and approached Coventry "a bit fast", 110mph, class 85+8on. He dropped the vac just outside Cov, and stopped dead on the mark, much to my surprise.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Sept 6, 2010 0:04:51 GMT
An interesting read at this late hour. there are similarities between this and the Clapham Junction crash of 1988, of faulty signal wiring.
A couple of other comments, interesting to know how a motorman could look out and see trains going the other way without dropping the deadman and going to the other side of the cab; and that until the withdrawal of Q stock in 1971 nothing had been done to improve the tail lights on that stock. then there's also the matter that in those days staff were expected to cross the running lines during traffic hours in tunnel sections. no elfensafetea in those days!
Admittedly, the Q stock did have an electric tail light, but that was fed by line volts in series with the cab light or gauge glass lights, so, no juice, no tail light! It was still a requirement for R and CO/CP stock to carry an illuminated oil tail light in case the battery supply failed too. Very few guards bothered to light them though in latter years.
Again, the accident was partly caused by staff failing to acknowledge the meaning of what each other were trying to convey.
What the report doesn't say is what happened to the staff held partly responsible. I wonder, were they disciplined? Reprimaned? Dismissed? Who knows after all these years.
Whilst on the subject of accidents on the DR, I remember walking through filham cemetary many years ago. In there is a grave of a DR worker who was killed in an accident at Parsons Green some time around 1886. Does anyone have any info on that one??
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 5, 2010 23:15:40 GMT
It was indeed a "depot" as far as train crew were concerned. I was going to move there in1973 after getting married and moving out to Northampton.
On the Bakerloo tour of the Met in 1973, the DI (now area manager) Harry the Hat, convinced me to move to Ricky instead, which i did.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Sept 5, 2010 23:09:43 GMT
Son-of-roythebus is one of the diesel engineers at Selhurst. He told me the original plan was to run this service using one of the Oxted Line diesels, but they are short of stock. there were also problems with compaability re the SR stock and WR stock, emergency couplings and all that, so the current plan is the best they can do at the moment.
There was indeed a replacement bus service which used to run at the "parliamentary" time of about 0100 IIRC.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Sept 3, 2010 21:18:28 GMT
313s, when introduced, wer quite whizzy. i actually designed a T shirt for the kings Cross crews who worked them, 313 Squadron!
working a 31+6 on a Cambridge train one evening, we left Finsbury Park at the same time as a 313. we were non-stop, he was all stops. He beat us to Potters Bar!
Passed through Brighton at the weekend, lots of 313s there on the Seaford services in pretty colours.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Sept 2, 2010 21:44:14 GMT
Sounds about right, there was an incident on the W&C where blocks hadn't been fitted, in the days when they ran as a single car during the day. the car ran away and eventually rolled to a stop in the dip, quite a while later. After that they only ran with a minimum of 2 cars!
The 455 brakes were bloody awful and frightening. At a lecture at the Model Railway Club we had a lecture by the Chief Inspecting Officer, Major Rose. I only caught the Q&A section as I was working earlier. I asked if the Inspectorate tested new rolling stock like they did signal interlocking and the like. Only after an accident came the answer.
This was a short while after the non-stop Putney-Mortlake incident mentioned above.
Back to LT brakes, remember on "normal" stock with EP and Westinghouse, in Westinghouse only you only had 28psi available as with the EP cut out, the mercury retarders did not operate, so the blow down valves were always open! quite worrying if the EP fuse blew!
As for computer driven trains in autumn, how would a computer ask for a change of underwear??
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 2, 2010 21:31:27 GMT
In my days on the W&C we did indeed run a 5 train service, all with 5 car units.
It it probably not possible to widen the line as it runs very close to the piers of Blackfriars Bridge, hence the sharp curves once it leaves the alignment of Stamford street.
Lengthening the platforms is unlikely as the former overrun tunnels at Bank are used for the Travolator and subway to the DLR. A long travolator is not possible as they only work in straight lines!
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 2, 2010 13:23:32 GMT
There's a lot of truth above from the tube and mainline drivers experiences; I can relate to all of them.
I certainly did drive by the feel of the train. Trains cannot be driven by numbers. My favourite brake was the Westinghouse on the 4SUBs or the W&C "proper" stock.
To take up on Glyn's thread, with a 4 or 8 SUB you could approach Clapham Junction on the up local, pass West Hill bridge, shut off, give it the lot and stop on the mark. However, one fine morning I had 2 cancelled in front, so was rather crowded, including the front brake van. Done as above, stopped on the 14 car mark, the first 2 being of course beyond the platform! Oh poo I though (or a word to that effect). Luckily the starter was off, the punters clambered down and away we went!
The introduction of the 508s was a turning point, where at least one train tried to stop at Putney on the down local and ended stopping beyond Mortlake..I ended up in the sand at Hampton court despite approaching the platform at 10mph; and of course the Shepperton incident.
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Sept 2, 2010 0:10:18 GMT
It depends what type of braking systems you want to compare.. there's now almost as many types as there is rolling stock.
On the "old" mainline, we had the vacuum brake; the Westinghouse air brake; the twin pipe and single pipe "modern" air brake, the EP brake...
Vac brake dates from steam days as does the straight Westinghouse air brake. the "modern" twin and single pipe air brake uses a distributor instead of a triple vale, but is compatible with the Westinghouse brake. In about 1975 to conform to UIC standards, the old air brake was modified to work on 72.5 psi instead of 65psi (I forget how many bar it is), and during the changeover caused problems when an unmodified loco was put on modified stock; the brakes would not release.
But then on the DMMUs, they had a twin pipe quick release vacuum brake; that too could work single pipe to haul a parcels van or be assisted by a vacuum fitted loco.
EMU stock generally had an EP brake plus Westinghouse for emergency. The EP brake was not fail-safe. again, there are various types of EP brake, depending on the stock. some south Eastern MU stock had a Laycock Knorr brake, not self-lapping, a bit like Q stock.
Later EMU stock from the 508/313/455 era had Westcode brakes plus regen/rheostatic brake combinations where they had 3 positions, ineffective, more ineffective and oh sh*t. Later a panic button in case the last position failed to stop the train. See references to Shepperton High Street for a good idea of the use of the panic button. Thanks to driver Griffiths for that one and the designer of the Westcode brake.
Then we have the old-fashioned goods train, unfitted, yes, no brakes apart from the loco. the rest of the train had hand brakes only, and these had to be pinned down when the train descended a gradient. ?they took an awful lot of stopping, hence unfitted trains were limited to 35mph. some were partly-fitted, with a few vac braked wagons at the front, controlled by the driver.
As they say on the BBC, "other brakes were available", the above is not an exhaustive list.
On the Underground, the EP/Westinghouse combination was the norm until after the C69 era, not sure about the tube stock, never worked on it. but even then we had the type A EP brake on Q stock, the type C on CP/R/CO/A/38TS/59TS/62TS. Only really with the 67TS on the Vic did we have rheostatic brake. again, there was the regen brake on the O and P stock. aqll these types needed handling differently.
Met main line stock was generally vacuum braked as it had to be compatible with steam locos beyond Ricky. the Met electric locos were dual fitted with vac and Westinghouse brakes,, no EP. The last vac brakes on LT were on the former BR pannier tanks.
How to use said brakes could take an entire book, and to describe how they work another book.
To round off as it's getting late, the old brakes relied on the driver's skill and knowledge to make them work, and generally they worked very well. Modern stock is computer controlled over which the drive has little or no control, so in my view the skill has gone out of driving. Drivers are now taught to drive defensively in case the train won't stop where they want it to. They had to learn new skills. No more hitting a platform flat out, giving it the lot an stopping on the 8 car mark. Minutes have been added to journey times these days to account for the new brakes.
But, before my throat gets cut by today's drivers, they have to have computer literacy and a spare change of underwear, especially when it's autumn and the worrying psst-psst-pssst-psst of the WSP carries on as the buffers are fast approaching.
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roythebus
Pleased to say the restoration of BEA coach MLL738 is as complete as it can be, now restoring MLL721
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Post by roythebus on Aug 21, 2010 7:54:59 GMT
there was an amusing bit somewhere on the other District Dave site about what happens when a DR take the wrong road at Hangar Lane by Piccadilly Pilot..
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roythebus
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Post by roythebus on Aug 17, 2010 22:11:39 GMT
I certainly worked 6 car r stock on the "District" circles on Sundays. They ceased to be used when they were reformed to 7 car sets.
Some guards would take delight in asking for a PNB at Baker street; the Met crews weren't trained on R stock, so it would sit there for 15 minutes while the guard used the toilet!
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