Are They Having a Laugh? (1)

Probably Not. Probably They Are Serious!

Time for an Exciting Festive Competition!

Yer wot?

Apparently if you get on a Stagecoach Midlands Bus you might find an "elfie" on it. (Brian Souter in a silly costume?)

Perhaps not.

Anyway; take a selfie with the elfie, send it off to Stagecoach Midlands and you could win one of these:-

You have to send it via Twitter and the company will notify the succesful entrant using a winning Twit message in return.

But please take care to read the terms and conditions. Here are 6 of them.

And here are another 5.

And a couple more.

Whoops! fbb failed to take a screen shot of condition 7 - sorry! Without that condition it isn't worth entering now.

Are the having a laugh?

A Really Exciting Model Railway Development.

This is a B12.

The Great Eastern Railway (GER) Class S69, also known as 1500 Class, and later classified B12 by the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) is a class of 4-6-0 steam locomotive designed to haul express passenger trains from London Liverpool Street station along the Great Eastern Main Line to places like Colchester and Norwich.

Seventy-one S69 locomotives were built by the GER between 1911 and 1921 and numbered 1500–1570. A further 10 locomotives were built by Beyer, Peacock & Co for the LNER in 1928 and numbered 8571–8580. From 1948 the British Railways numbers were 61500–61580 (with gaps).

The model version was introduced by Triang in 1962.

A version was available fitted with a smoke unit and a little plunger couples to the motor which produced "puffs" of exhaust.

It was called "synchrosmoke".

A youthful and not so f bb thought this was a silly gimmick and shunned the idea. In any case, he could not afford one as it cost over £3!

Later versions were produced under the Triang Hornby label ...

... and still available;e when the Triang name was dropped.

It was also sold in the delightful "Garter" blue.

The model was last produced a recently as 2010.

Today models are priced on Ebay are between £25 and £35 unless you want "synchrosmoke"; in which case you will need to shell out £150 to £165.

Reviewed in the current edition of Hornby Magazine ...

... Hornby have just introduced a brand new B12.

Readers will immediately notice the one special feature of this product. Here it is in close-up.

And here is a better close-up.

It could be that our readers haven't spotted the revolution in modelling, so fbb will reveal all at the end of this post.

The model costs almost £160. 

For the record, the £3 price tag he refused in 1962 would inflate to about £60 today. Which means that Hornby's model is nearly three times more expensive than it used to be.

But you do get significant improvements in detail and the special new feature.

Are they having a laugh?

A Model Ideal For fbb

It is a model (sort of) of Waddesdon Manor in Buckinghamshire.

It is made entirely of gingerbread and icing and took 500 hours of work. Even the interior detail is edible.

fbb does not think it is for sale. BOO!

Red Rose 17 runs to and from Waddesdon.

Maybe call in and ask for a bite? Maybe they won't be having a laugh?

But talking of Synchrosmoke, read tomorrow's blog. Synchrosmoke IS BACK!

And the new feature of Hornby's new B12?

"Flared spokes" curve up a bit as the join the central hub.

fbb is so excited that he won't sleep tonight. Flared spokes!

 Next similar blog : Sunday 13th November