Yes good idea @scottmitchell74 . Now here is a question for you all. First of all, I am not a huge Rush fan but have an early "Best Of" covering the period '74 - '87. Rush released some 19 studio albums with world wide sales of 42 million discs. In 2015, drummer Neil Peart retired due to health reasons and Rush disbanded. Neil Peart died in 2020. It was recently announced that Anika Nilles had joined Rush as their drummer for Rush's Reunion '26 - '27 tour. I understand that Anika was not specifically brought in as a "Peart" replacement i.e. to replicate Peart. So, the question is how did she do? Personally, I find her drumming very solid but a bit stiff/mechanical in style, a little repetitive but clearly very capable. Here is a taster...


Perhaps our resident drummer would care to comment @ntpntpntp . By the way, I am not a musician/drummer but do watch a lot of music. Anika did drum with the late Jeff Beck which says something.

Tim

Quote from: Newportnobby on June 28, 2026, 11:10:05 AMBob G - never knowingly buys just one of what he wants

I'll have you know that my selling of stock this year exceeds my purchases by £400 or so. I will need to sell some more stock though because there are 4 WC/BBs coming down the tracks.

Bob G (never knowingly underspent)

Quote from: Moonglum on June 28, 2026, 01:13:12 PMThe UK government is not keen on domestic AC from what I gather @scottmitchell74 . Commercial/public properties/services are another matter. Ironically, the UK Government has promoted home insulation for winter conditions over the years which in some cases isn't helping relief from the heatwaves that are becoming more and more common over here. "Mods" - this is not a political statement or criticism just a matter of fact - if it becomes an "overheated" argument please delete this post.

Tim

PS @Bealman the only fan we have in the house failed on Thursday ?

Interesting.  I bet the policymakers aren't sweltering AC-less, though.


Yep. Back to programming! Music. 

The UK government is not keen on domestic AC from what I gather @scottmitchell74 . Commercial/public properties/services are another matter. Ironically, the UK Government has promoted home insulation for winter conditions over the years which in some cases isn't helping relief from the heatwaves that are becoming more and more common over here. "Mods" - this is not a political statement or criticism just a matter of fact - if it becomes an "overheated" argument please delete this post.

Tim

PS @Bealman the only fan we have in the house failed on Thursday ?

You mention IRJs - so you need an isolation gap at the joints?

Rather than using rail joiners at baseboard joints, I would suggest you ensure the boards themselves have accurate alignment dowels and you secure the rail ends (soldering to brass screws or to copper-clad board are two common methods).  Then run a multi-way plug and socket for electrical connection.  Having no physical rail join means you can mix and match rail profiles, run across at acute angles etc.


This has been my method since the 1970s, it works perfectly for my exhibition layouts which obviously get assembled and dismantled frequently

Quote from: Newportnobby on June 28, 2026, 12:18:09 PM

Quote from: scottmitchell74 on June 28, 2026, 12:03:51 PM

Quote from: Moonglum on June 26, 2026, 04:59:24 PMI suspect that you have AC to keep you cool!

No AC in your locale?

Only 4 million homes in the UK have some form of AC.

Whoa!

That's not good right now. Hopefully you're one of the ones that do.

We went without AC for years, but woke up to ourselves eventually. Ceiling fans in all rooms, though.

Quote from: scottmitchell74 on June 28, 2026, 12:03:51 PM

Quote from: Moonglum on June 26, 2026, 04:59:24 PMI suspect that you have AC to keep you cool!

No AC in your locale?

Only 4 million homes in the UK have some form of AC.

Quote from: Moonglum on June 26, 2026, 04:59:24 PMI suspect that you have AC to keep you cool!

No AC in your locale?

I have not explained my problem correctly so will have another go!

The stockyard is all Peco track with 8 loops.
The 12' long layout is split into 2 boards.
At the moment the loops are connected at the board joint by Peco IRJs but in the event of having to separate and rejoin the two halves I anticipate having the devil of a job trying to connect the tracks.
I have used Kato rail joiners to connect/disconnect track with a small cassette when removing steam locos to return to the other end of the train and they are easy to use for this operation.
All the loops are currently powered from the ends via point blade contact which does cause some problems.
The idea was to replace the centre IRLs with powered Kato joiners and individual switches.
This would hopefully improve the separation and rejoining of the boards and improve power supply to the track.

Thanks for all the replies.

Maurice