West Somerset Railway General Discussion

Did you make Gaviscon?

 

With the utmost respect, what utter nonsense.

You have about 19 years more experience than a couple of lads who will be turning out tomorrow to help prepare locos at Minehead. All you need is a can-do attitude and a bit of common sense. If you can hold a bucket the right way up then we can teach you the rest.

 

I wholeheartedly agree, as I said earlier, in the MHR wagon group, we have a wide range of skills & ages - maybe I should've added & professions & that applies to all area's on a railway!

Most times I turn up I expect to have a bus mans holiday painting, but can find myself doing all-sorts - makes a refreshing change for me as I've been about a bit, but stick a paint brush in my mates hand & he runs off trying to find with lumps metal to play with, as that's what he knows & that's half the fun on volunteering.

The pay not be much, nor the coffee up to much, but you go home at the end of the day with a sense of achievement & a job well done (even if it doesn't seem like much has been achieved... ) & that's what its all about, along with the banter & the shared common interest - go on @AnthonyTrains2017 stick your head above the parapet & give it a go I doubt you'll regret it if you play to your skills, which is customer focused & you can find your feet from there!.

 

I am disappointed that teaching how to have the bucket the right way up is not in your skill set.

 

On the volunteering front, and how much experience you need: by background I'm a chemist and by trade these days I work in IT. As a volunteer on a preserved railway, two days ago I was firing a large green pacific ...

Attitude and aptitude are important and, it has to be said, a willingness to get stuck in and often do the dirty jobs. But, to take just one example, professional steam locomotive crews pretty well don't exist now, so no-one is going to turn up with that in their skillset. Preserved Railways have, by necessity, become pretty good at training people to do complex, responsible jobs.

Tom

 

Are we to expect the introduction of tablet-catchers?

 

I haven't been to the MHR for about 7 or 8 years but modesty prevented you from adding that the MHR wagon group are the friendliest bunch of people you're ever likely to meet which is probably main reason behind their successful group.

 

To mark my 7,000 th post, herewith another WSR 'then and now' from Dunster, looking west towards Minehead in 1960 and 2017.

Robin

1960



2017

 

I like the 1960 view the best, it seems to show a rural station at which a just few interesting things might happen each day. Also less clutter!

 

Robin
You get the camera height, angle & even focal length just about right in these then-&-now photos. That's not easy to do! Well done.
Now can someone get rid of that plastic baggy lifty thing, please? !

 

That is very kind of you to say.

I have been using no more sophisticated tool than my i-phone 5.

As far as Dunster goes, the WSR needs to be creating more 'destinations' along its length, and this is a perfect opportunity waiting to be grasped. This afternoon the platform was in shade and so I, with my Railway access, sat in the P.Way yard on a pile of point timbers in the sunshine reading my book. So much better if the public could have been enjoying this as part of 'Dunster Country Station'

Robin

 

Thanks for the kind comment - but I'm not modest, I honestly didn't know we were held with such regard - we just get on with sorting out those "troublesome trucks" with the usual blood, sweat, swearing & banter in the hope our efforts are appreciated.

Maybe you should rectify your prolonged absence in July & come and see us & some of Bulleids finest at the same time, I'm reliably informed the freight rake will be out to play at some point.

 

Just think what she could do with a real camera.

 

Back to lineside passes, briefly. Has anyone received their renewal letter yet? I was told they would be sent out this week but nothing yet.

 

The iPhone5 *IS* a real camera!

 

No. its a phone, you use it to make phone calls, the Nikon D750 IS a real camera.

However, we digress.

 

Exactly. However the results obtained from the Iphone are remarkable. I suppose compared withe cameras used for many of the then shots the IPhone is much superior.

 

I have to disagree, Nikkor make microscopes

I think you'll find that the iPhone (other non fruit based devices are also available) is pretty much a powerful computing device, used in teh main for text input, pictures and web browsing. Only us old fogies use them to talk to each other.

The best camera you have is the one you have with you, and to be honest, the one most of us have most of the time is a fixed focus, fixed focal length camera phone. Ansel Adams would have used one... The next generation of serious photographers also use them almost exclusively.

That the quality of the picture Robin took is at least as good as the old print says reams.
It is also remarkably close to the original. Someone needs to do some gardening though, the railings are totally obscured

 

It's the person using the camera that matters, not the camera they're using!

 

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