Rolling Stock News
Three Jeco tank wagons arrived at the beginning of the month, one each in Gulf, Mobil and Nynäs liveries. Unfortunately, the running numbers have been changed from the ones advertised and all three have incorrect UIC control digits. (They would have been correct with the original numbers!) We now have seven of this style of tank wagon, and unless something especially interesting is produced, we don’t intend to get any more. We look forward to the time when we can run them as a train (all seven).
Manufacturer News
HNoll reports that the motor vehicles (motorvagnarna) are ready for tool making. But, we do not know what this refers to (we were aware of the Ma-loco, but that is something else). Of the Ma loco HNoll has said very little other than that it is coming along nicely and maybe some photos will be available before the end of the year. Deliveries of the next passenger carriages can hopefully take place at the end of 2021. The Blue X carriages (IC-11) A11 and B11 have been moved to 2022 (March-April-May) together with the B4 carriages when they will make a tool for the extra window panes on B11. The special carriages (type S1) will take a while longer due to a production and costing misunderstanding! They are not removed but paused for a short time.
Brekina has released models of the Volvo 66 sedan alongside the Daf 66 version. They note that the Daf is a 1972 year model, and the Volvo is 1975. As usual, there is an assortment of liveries. The kombi (estate) version is also offered in post livery and for Sweden’s neighbours, in Norwegian police (“Politi”) livery. The post version should of course have the steering wheel on the right, but the model doesn’t!
You won’t need many of either for a Swedish or other Nordic diorama; being produced in Holland, in the Daf factory, they never did become at all popular, and the same dislike was shewn to the Volvo 343, which also came from the Dutch factory, despite being designed by Volvo. But plenty were made!
Other News
We had planned to investigate a model railway event at Kårsta at the beginning of the month (and which was on our forthcoming events page), but public transport to the event was terrible. Kårsta has a railway station (the northernmost point on the remaining Roslagsbanan), but it was closed due to engineering. Instead of providing a rail replacement bus to serve the route, SL provided an assortment of busses to serve different parts of the route, and some to serve also areas not even reached by the railway! At least two changes would have been necessary; so we decided to give it a miss. Hopefully, next year will be OK; and we’ll get to sample a ride in a new X15p train at the same time. Well, maybe!
Stockholm’s Cultural Society for Steam and Railways (or correctly, Stockholms Kultursällskap för Ånga och Järnväg) – SKÅJ had an open event at Krylbo locoshed, and a special train was run from Stockholm with electric loco F 701, of which the FLMJ has a model. So, we went out to catch (film and photograph) the train whizzing through Häggvik on its outbound journey. You can see it here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=psVK3o0JMV0 in a video from the mobile phone because we forgot to fully charge the Go-Pro!
Do check our events listings; especially if you happen to be in Sweden. MJ-Hobby is having an open day of sorts on October 2nd, and there is a two day event proposed at Uppsala. And then at the end of November, there is the Hjulmarknaden, which was often visited from the UK because it is such a worthy event!
Finishing on a personal note, the former Director General of the FLMJ secured employment during September, and this means that the light is in sight for the process to restart searching for a new home for the Railway. A lot of expenditure needs to be recovered first, so it will not be before next year. However, we intend in one way or another, to ‘mark’ the 30th anniversary of the opening of the original KRBJ (from which the FLMJ emanated) on 25th July next year. Maybe just an announcement (to be realistic), but who knows?