Build threads.

Here's a build thread that I have had going for about 6 months on another forum that I frequent. **LINK** The comments, advice and encouragement that the other people gave me were most welcome and quite helpful. One of the posters lives only about 100km away down the road so shall make a visit in the near future and may have gained a new friend.

Build threads are extra work; Setting up the subject, taking photos and editing them then finally writing it all up. If anybody learns anything from them it's all worthwhile. I only clean enough mess off the table to find the work though

* Danny M *

Edited By Danny M2Z on 17/11/2015 03:44:12

Maybe what you really need (Norman), is posts from the builder to be permanent any other posts to be time expiring with the option of the builder making them permanent as he or she chooses. This leaves the editorial control in charge of the moderators as it always has been, automatically cleans up the build thread, allows questions and comments to be posted and allows the builder some control over final content. Can't be that hard to do.

regards Martin

Anything that requires modification to the forum software is unlikely to happen. The current system is working fine, it just lacks some fine tuning.

.

Well said, David

... and I think the easy first step in fine-tuning, is for people to use informative titles for their Threads. [noting that the rather basic keyword search facility only looks at the Title, not the subtitle]

There is a wealth of information on this site, but it's often difficult to find.

MichaelG.

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 17/11/2015 09:47:47

Neil;

Thoughts from the colonies: (at least my part of the colonies!)

1) Locomotives (steam) are certainly getting built. In our club, more than ever. Some of these have huge 7-1/4" or 5" copper boilers.

2) The clubs are going towards providing amusement rides. We CAN NOT haul the public on our elevated track, only on our ground line. We gain club members because many of the new people love the interaction with the public. The public loves steam locomotives, especially interesting if you comprehend the next point:

3) I was raised without steam railways. But, I still enjoy them; used to do a lot of full size steam work, now sticking to models. We are about the same age, from what I understand. The public loves steam locomotives, despite the lack of them during their lives.

4) Sailors have the "two-foot-itis" disease, whereby, if they only had two more feet of boat length, they'd be able to... Model Engineers are the same way. I almost got caught up in it until I realized the supporting costs of building large locomotives would delay retirement by 5+ years to pay for the house and copper and workshop changes, so I'm sticking to 3-1/2 and maybe 2-1/2 and gauge 1 in the future.

5) Compare the cost of a Rob Roy boiler kit to a golf club membership, or the weekly petrol costs to commute long distances to/from work (a real problem here) and the Rob Roy boiler seems incredibly inexpensive.

Just my thoughts - John.

Hello Michael Gilligan

I put a search facility on the home page. It is still there and I believe I set it up to search the whole site rather than the titles.

Yes, the title of the thread is most important. I have started using latest posts to look at recent threads. Far more convenient than the latest post list on the right.

I think the use by/ best before thread should have been deleted by a moderator as soon as it was started. This is the sort of thing that spoils the forum.

.

David,

Yes, I am aware of that excellent facility: In fact I have lost count of the number of times that I have recommended it to others

Unfortunately; limitations of the Google search do mean that it often returns a larger than convenient number of results.

MichaelG.

.

Example

Edited By Michael Gilligan on 17/11/2015 14:12:37

Unfortunately David we (moderators) can't sit here all day watching every post the moment it comes onto the site. I dealt with the thread including getting a second oppinion a soon as I saw it unfortunately there were several posts between me going out to work this morning and poping back in at lunchtime which is when I dealt with it but it seems other moderators want that on the forum?.

Do you mean other moderators want that particular thread on the site?

PM sent

Jason shoved it in the 'Tea Room'. That's the place for idle chatter here, just as all the other forums have similar places.

Neil