I'm not very interesting in signalling. I know the waggly arm things are important, and the colour light versions quite pretty. There's all sort of other light-up things on gantries dotted around the railway but since I prefer branch line or industrial scenes, I've never had to care too much about them.
One day, I'm sure I'll need to know something for a project and that will leave me with two options:
- Ask someone who is really, really interested. I've had that sort of person talk at me at great length at shows in the past. It will be a race to see if I find my answers before I lose the will to live.
- Read a book by someone who knows what they are talking about.
I'm going for option 2. My friend Simon is a professional signaler on the real railways. Basically, he knows what he's talking about and when he writes it down, he gets other people who know what they are talking about to check. Far better to find out from him than some numpty on the Interweb whose knowledge is based on owning a Hornby colour light signal and a caps lock key.
So, this is THE resource if you want lighty up things on your train set. It's well written, has lots of pictures and loads of diagrams to explain what is going on. I'm not going to pretend I've read this from cover to cover, but it will find space on my bookshelf, because one day I will have a question, and I'm sure the answer is in here.
Buy a copy from Amazon.
1 comment:
I like your description of instant "experts" - very subtle and understated ... .
Seriously though, this sounds like the sort of book I'd get for myself - and then read from cover to cover, in one overnight session.
I could probably make similar comments about decent books on other essential (and exciting, to me) subjects - like layout wiring and OHLE.
That's right - I officially "Have No Degree" - in electrical and electronic engineering - so this is precisely the sort of subject that fascinates me.
Of course, it also helps when books on these subjects are well written, by people who know their stuff.
Somehow, I suspect that a number of copies of Simon's book might be changing hands in the very near future (and one of those copies might be finding its way to my part of South Wales).
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