Galteemore

Merry Christmas from Rosses Point. Not sure even the SLNC could handle livestock like this!

He looks a Lidl worse for wear

Inspiring as ever, David - great progress to see, and learn from. Your soldering is also very clean !

Thanks Jim. He has a few additional comments to add for the captions if you’re keen !

As a teenager, I spent hours going through my dad’s collection of images, and thought I had seen pretty much what was out there, SLNC wise. In those days you bought slides and photos off very basic, unillustrated, catalogue descriptions, and you picked out what looked like the best. But what delightful and convenient access we have right now. These are halcyon days for researchers, with so much stuff available. Many thanks to Ciaran and of course our own Ernie ! If you’re not an IRRS member, this archive alone is worth the sub cost.

Sorry JHB - can’t do that, much as I’d like to, due to IRRS access conditions. It’s a generator van, also pictured in the recent RC Riley album....

Enniskillen is a ‘Large Tank’. So she needs...large tanks. And now they are finally on, after weeks of thinking through. She’s fresh from her Viakal bath (to clean off flux) and has a few water drops still glistening. In a good kit much of the planning is done for you with helpful tabs and slots to locate parts. With scratch building I find I spend at least two or three times as long on planning as building. Riveting the tank sides took much effort and many attempts, but turns out it was only half the fun!! 10 thou NS is very workable but also a bit bendy in long sections, so further planning.....Cue much adding of angle and rod to brace the sides and act as anchors for the other sides and ends, which also needed some rivet press attention. The tanks have a raised edge on the outside faces which needs accounting for. Anyway, stuck it all together today, adding beading and handrails as we went. Final job was adding some brackets at base of tank fronts. Thankfully all the reject rivet panels from previous work have given me a rich storehouse of ready riveted strips! Tack soldered cab faces in for now, just to give an idea of how she will look in terms of height, although cab front plate should be a good bit further forward. These were a huge task in themselves - especially the 0.3mm wires individually added one at a time for window grilles - but are effectively finished now including window frames. Hopefully the character of the loco is beginning to emerge. That’s now the ‘square’ bits of the loco effectively done. On to the round and curvy bits....or for those of you remember Playschool, time to look through the round window....

Nice work Noel. Really brings it alive

Exactly Mayner, that’s what I thought it was at first, remembering an old Five Foot Three article. It does look rather excessively military. Given postwar shortages, wouldn’t surprise me at all if some of the platework off that wagon was repurposed.

According to the McMahon Riley album, a generator van used for heating with diesel 28, which presumably lacked the onboard resources for train heating when working passenger turns.

Yes it’s the bottom photo I recall. Scary how ago that is !

Log on to IRRS Flickr site and select Clements album. It’s about page 16. It’s the SLNC ones I’m talking about JHB but there’s quite a few GN and GS locos in 1920s garb.

Fantastic new photos on the site from the Clements collection. Includes lots of SLNC photos, @Irishswissernie! Some very rare views, including 1928 photos of locos in old livery. Lots of other stuff of general interest -including narrow gauge - I even think there’s Cork and Muskerry in there too!

Thanks Ernie. DCC and its intricacies I cannot get my head round but this stuff I can begin to understand ! Also helps explain why - if they were on a tight schedule - they opted for railcar hire rather than doing what various English enthusiast parties did then - have a bogie stuck on the back of a goods working. Given that the UK was still under very tight rationing in 1950, would be interesting to see what the customs men made of a party of Englishmen making a quick trip in a privately hired train across the border and back!

Great stuff Jim. It’s a great website, which I have used for many years, and your new material is a very useful addition.

Absolutely, Jim. And sometimes these multiple angles give a ‘cross-bearing’ on the visit, adding a lot more depth. The Riley book implies that RCR simply travelled on a service train with a few mates. No mention of a special working. Railcar B was generally EKN based and worked the 0620 to Sligo - would be interesting to see if it ran home empty that night. Such one way empty railbus/Railcar runs were an occasional feature of SLNC practice. I have the WTT for 1950 and it’s fascinating (to me !) to reconstruct the group’s movements, using the sunlight as a rough time gauge. Sorry folks -I trained as an historian and it occasionally emerges in such nerdish geekery - especially when the SLNC figures....

Chances are he is !

Ernie - your latest SLNC photos cast interesting light on this book, as some of the snaps above looked oddly familiar. Riley was on that SLS trip, it now seems, as the dates check out. Reconciling the Casserley and Riley info, looks as if the railcar left EKN at lunchtime (after snapping ‘Enniskillen’ shunting). Crossed the 1115 ex Sligo goods at Manorhamilton, which was booked to leave there at 2pm, with a few hours to visit the workshops etc. Then crossed the railbus at Dromahair c 1640, arriving Sligo c5:20pm.

Brilliant stuff Ernie - thank you. What’s really nice about this sequence is that it shows the passengers arriving for the rail bus and gives a bit more of the ‘social history’ of the line that 3/4 views of locos just don’t.

These look really good John - hope you get printing sorted. I built an H van in 7mm and you are quite right - they tend to dominate other stock a bit!

That’s interesting. Max’s father Marcel Varnel presided over a location swap in the other direction in the Will Hay comedy ‘Oh Mr Porter’ - set in the imaginary border town of Buggleskelly on the Southern Railway of Northern Ireland - filmed in Hampshire but purporting to be Fermanagh !

In 1978-9 there was also a FFT with a colour cover (unusual as they were b/w in those days) with a number of articles focusing on the restoration of 184 and the film work.

That certainly featured large in the official IE take on the role: Iarnród Éireann has inherited a rich legacy of architectural, industrial and social history stretching back for more than 150 years. The company’s heritage office is responsible for the conservation of the many protected structures, artefacts and installations across the network which reflects the distinctive styles of the companies which constructed the system. Iarnród Éireann’s heritage policy, managed by heritage officer Gregg Ryan FCILT is geared towards preserving what is best from the past in the context of the operating railway system, engaging with community groups and enthusiast bodies, and facilitating the operation of vintage steam trains over certain routes to cater for the growing railway tourist market in association with the Railway Preservation Society of Ireland. Several publications have also been commissioned, with proceeds going to the railway pensioners’ CIÉ Welfare Association, while the company also co-operates with professional video and DVD production for international consumption. Celebrations on significant anniversaries associated with the railway take place regularly at venues throughout the country, and archiving of written and photographic material, together with artefacts and items of rolling stock and motive power is ongoing.’

We have a huge capacity for idiosyncrasies in these matters. Many years ago I taught in a primary school deep in hard core Republican Belfast. Before 69 it had been a Protestant school and had changed population almost literally overnight. As a result, it had a few bits and pieces that wouldn’t normally appear in a ‘Catholic’ school. One was the former portrait of HM the Queen which had once hung on the wall - replaced by the Pope of the day. It was now stored in dust and detritus under the assembly hall stage, emerging only on occasion when stored chairs or tables were taken from that location. It amused me intensely that no one could quite bring themselves to throw it out...

The Leitrim folk, are very wise, JB. Especially North Leitrim....