People may wonder, why am I going silent for a long time? (56K warning! 5 800x600 shots within)

I know a thread picked it up a while ago and I still am very much hooked onto Handhelds (They are my college life now! Instant on/Instant Off, why don't they issue students with these things?), but other work includes Art (As I am an full time and part time Art & graphics student) and Trainz work, which takes ages to make, here is the latter:




Class 455 units for inner suburban use, this type used around the London and South Western Lines (Woking, Guildford, Reading, Wimmersh, etc). The units have several derivitives (Spelling?) for other areas of the UK, Several AC emu versions and several DMU versions! I find the MSO (the 2 last shots of that particular car) the most impressively detailed car and there is still more work to do on the set, interior painting mainly.


Class 477 fixes and tweaks (fictional unit)


Thumbnail of scripting, includes many liveries!


Class 117 trailer (the brighest car, the second and fifth car), which needs tweaking.


And of course, this layout for Trainz in time for Warley.

If these shots are too much for others to view please tell me and I will either modify it myself, or I may give C:Anime (Spelling?) some pressurising.

Looks fantastic.

I was on one of the new Silverlink rolling stock a few weeks ago (for the first time), they're fantastc, so smooth and comfortable... except for the constant drone of the air-con, which really didn't do my ears any good what so ever as it would only relent for a few seconds at a time.

Better yet, the doors don't *bang* in the air vacuume formed when an express passes by, and I don't suffer several heart attacks on the way into Euston. Kinda' useful really.

You'll have to let me know the next time you're at Watford Junction, I've been working around there frequently recently, who knows, may be I'll let you buy me a drink

EDIT: Where's the HPC:Factor livery?

Your artwork is a real pleasure to view. I enjoy the days you post your newest works for us to critique. Me? I can't draw stick men if my life depended on it.

Hey, I know Woking. Williams or MacLaren headquarters? I forget.

In Canada passenger trains are in decline, and have been for a very long time. We don't get it. Tracks and rights of way are being abandoned at record rates. We keep building more roads. When it hits home that trains are cheaper and cleaner it will be too late.

I do envy you EU people. To see your domains from a train would be a great experience.

Oh yes, the Class 350s!! I saw one at Coventry last week, nothing much different from my home soil, and 'lo and behold, we have, Class 350s450s! The 350s have shoes, and very nice pics, so I see from the images in the railway presses and one thing that did supprise me, is that they also have shoes on the Driving Motor Composite Open (the first and last car, it might be second, depends if first class is mixed in).
Perhaps they intend to run them on the Watford DC lines too! (God help them, they'll get ripped to shreads!)....

The trains we have here are extremely simliar to the ones you have, except ours don't have pantographs, as they don't need them yet, they also have 3 by 2 seats in second class, but they are really impressive and very bright. When you get a chance, if you stop at Watford Junction, you should find the Watford Junction to Clapham Junction service, it is usually formed of Class 377 electrostars, which ironically the units I have to use every day, they aren't too bad, but I seen them at their worse and sadly, it is more often than the desiros..
... oh and the Southern interior is bad!

Loud aircon.... Yes, I know what you mean, I pray when the train goes over a conductor rail gap, as it is dead silence, even at high speed. The doors however are VERY noisey, first the opening, which is like "BING, BING, BING", then the Closing, which is "pssssssst BANG!". The guards bell nosie thingy is rather alienated too!
The annoucements drive me up the wall sometimes, its like:
"This train is for... London Waterloo.... Calling at.... PetersfieldHaslemereGuildfordWoking.. AND... London Waterloo.... AND.... The next station isPetersfield".

Mind you, I have been in one, with the laptop plugged in, in horrid weather, and a lighting strike about 50 metres away (the bolt of lighting hit a tower, under construction, as the train was passing..), those passangers saw, but heard very little, of what we heard, it was the rumble that we felt! Yes, a RUMBLE is all that we felt heard a little bit.


As for constant drone, the best part is the electrostars driving cars, or pantograph trailer, depenidng on the power source. They make a very nice (very annoying!) ear piercing, loud and high pitched electrical hum! Believe me, that gets to you after a while!
Moving on, heres what our Disastros Doritos Doddlebugs (Siemens of Germany built) upside-down-hairdryers undesirables Desiros look like:
(Class 444 "Super Desiro"

(Class 450 "Desiro"
]
(For comparasion, Class 377 "Electrostars"
]

By the way, in the UK, if you take off the last 3 digits, you will find out the trains class number, so for example, if you had a unit "321 423", and removed the numbers "423", its obviously a Class 321, For sublclasses, take away the last 2 digits, so a Class 321, becomes a Class 321/4, A Silverlink one! Ofcourse, it doesn't always work! There was soo many Class 450s built, that they ran into the /1 range, but they are still /0s!
As for numbers? They are almost always found on the front of the trains, except pendos and Voyagers, which have the numbers on the cab side. If you want to find out more about a class, type in the words "Class" and Number into your favorite search engine, then enjoy!


EDIT: Whoops! Wrong images, I didn't want the supersized ones! I thought I copied over the thumbnails! Appologies for those that enduried the "wrong kind of images!"

Edited by Wessex_nut 2005-12-12 6:01 PM

I also enjoy your work. It is funny, but I saw a hat with a local train company on it. It also had the "Lone Star State Star and flag colors" on it. I thought about how much you like trains and wondered if you like the locomotives in America. I live next to a train track and I could send some photos of trains we have over here. That is if I have my camera, and am here. The only passenger type train we have is AMTRACK; there is also a planned commuter "local" train service to come in the next few years.

That is very good 'digital art?' I can just draw stick people with Microsoft Paint

I'm really impressed with these images too.

Like in Canada, our passenger rail system is struggling. The feds are threatening to shelve Amtrak. I'm hoping that high-speed rail (and maybe regionalization of passenger rail - ie, several interstate systems instead of one Amtrak) can save it. With high-speed rail, a lot of shorter trips will be faster on the train than by air.

My mother and father are ebay people, and they have world fare pins for sale from 1986 for my uncle who was in the US Coast Guard at that time and later retired, any way here is a link to a railroad pin from the 1986 World Fare.
http://cgi.ebay.com/1836-1986-CANADIAN-RAILROAD-EXPO-WORLDS-FAIR-LAPEL-PIN_W0QQitemZ7731010782QQcategoryZ426QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Interesting . I have not sold anything on eBay yet, however, it must be fun ...

Same here... My folks have done well and are very good at having things people want.
They have a lot of things people like who are collectors.