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It looks superb, what a great finish. Very much worth the effort.

A few years ago I posted a thread about some mystery objects on the lower cargo deck of the SS Thistlegorm. If you don't know this wreck, its a scuba diver/military/aviation/locomotive enthusiast's dream dive with the cargo holds full of BSA M20, Norton 16H, Albions, Crossleys, Bristol Blenheim spares...Stanier 8F locos. Fellow diver Alex Mustard started researching the cargo several years ago and following the 3D survey I did we added to the work and published an iBook. To cut a long story short...when I posted the thread about mystery objects it was not possible to view the ortho

Got the rear cross member removed and then moved onto the job I’ve not been looking forward to, removing the idler posts. As the split pin was corroded to the point the head was gone, I couldn’t pull it out. The access is so limited there was no way to get a punch in there to push it through, so I decided to just remove as much exposed split pin and just undo the nut. It needed 2100N of pressure but it went in the end, it’s damaged the threads at the end but they aren’t really needed and the post is that worn that I think I may need new ones machining up anyway. A cheap Chinese 20 Tonne

Well it is a 10HP Renault that I bought in Australia 20 years ago. I am supposed to be working on my 1934 Riley which I bought 33 years ago but I ran out of wood for the rebuild of the wood frame so I dragged the Renault out of the bushes and rebuilt the engine (see separate thread "10HP Renault"). So, not being able to resist your request for a picture I cleared a considerable amount of tut from the chassis this afternoon. The first picture shows the rear end of the chassis. Ignore the casters; the vehicle came with none of its original wheels. Everything wooden, including the bo

You are correct. If you can see them they can no doubt see you. If you were to bring a lorry that close to the front and park it they will bring down artillery fire upon you and that will really stuff your day. Mobile pigeon lofts would move with the headquarters when they moved (which was very rarely). The pigeons adopt a location as their new home after they have been there a few weeks. The loft would be manned 24 hours a day so that any incoming messages could be seen as soon as possible. You can see a "grill" type affair on the front of the lorry behind the stuffed pigeons. The birds

I would imagine that German artillery would have had a field day with that if it was an observation post (or at least one close enough to any action to see anything useful)! Wasn't it the usual idea that the observers or other messengers close to the front (balloon or terrestrial) had a pigeon basket with them with a few birds & then said birds would fly messages back to their 'home' loft (like this one) which would then essentially function as an 'exchange', routing information to the intended recipients? Kevin

Off topic for this thread, but here is how it got fixed:

We next had to decide on a top coat, something satin, and similar to the original coating would be desirable. I settled on Simoniz 'durable' acrylic which is a new product and certainly gives a nice result. How durable it is remains to be seen, as the steering wheel takes a lot of wear, (or hopefully will one day ! )

Hopefully next week I’ll have chance to ring around the wholesale traders. Today I managed to get the seized bolt out of the bogie frame and get it removed. I then made a start on removing the rear cross member. Some bolts I had to grind the heads off and some I had to chisel the nuts off. One nut was so thin it was like a washer and practically fell off. It got dark before I could remove the last bolts so that’s tomorrow’s job.