Galteemore

You can then puff the piece up as having had expert input. Sadly, it can all be a bit of a Potemkin village with very little real substance. What matters is telling a nice story that gives warm and fuzzy feelings...I am an academic historian by training and have written a number of things. It’s actually really hard to stick to the the facts when you have an attractive agenda or story to push, and the facts just don’t seem important.

The point of these programmes is not to convey information but feelings. Part of a wider cultural trend - we just happen to spot this because we know the facts on this one. The intellectual roots of this lie way back with Rousseau and Nietzsche but I bet they weren’t named in the credits......

I started the ‘Enniskillen’ saga with a long post so may as well finish with another one. You may wish to make a mug of tea! I promise that when you’ve battled through the text, there are pictures. Lots of pictures, as I got rather carried away.... I have long admired those - including those on this illustrious forum - who can take an expensive box-fresh model and gaily waft an airbrush over it, to great and convincing effect. I’d never have the nerve for that! So you can imagine how anxious I was about weathering an engine that has taken me almost a year to build from scratch. But weather it I had to do. It wouldn’t fit with the layout if I left it, as it would stick out, and all the details I’d added would be hidden in the plain unvarying black. Martyn Welch’s excellent book was my guide - and I had the gall to contact the guru himself for extra tips. I also practiced on some old Wrenn/Hornby Dublo bodies - sorry @WRENNEIRE - but hopefully the sacrifice was worthwhile!! Welch warns that bad weathering looks like a loco has been attacked by an incontinent bullock and I know what he means. Even the SLNC’s overwhelming cattle traffic couldn’t justify that ! So I determined to follow his approach religiously. BTW I don’t have an airbrush....so this is all hand applied. I think it could have turned out worse. First off is a coat of gunmetal/grey/leather stippled on with a brush. The lovely black engine starts to look like a shotgun barrel - what have I done ! But hold your nerve - carefully applied weathering powder tones all down nicely - but do work from photos and not what you imagine. Hours have thus been spent on studying grime......Underframe and wheels are a similar process - with lots of talcum powder added. Even the lovely red coupling rods were plastered in gunge. Much detailing work remained. Coal and glazing were added to the cab, plus screw couplings and dummy inside motion, made from plastic rod and strip. I had the chance to poke my head between Lough Erne’s frames a few years ago which was helpful for this. The crew were painted up and glued in, along with the boiler backhead and Wakefield lubricator (although it should really be a Detroit). The crew’s position in the cab is based on a quote from the SLNC CME Mr Egan, who described how crews on the steep banks would anxiously watch the water disappearing from the gauge glass and pray for a third injector to appear. That’s exactly what they are doing in this pose... Before we let loose on the photos, which are taken in a mixture of day and LED light, and show details plus overall views, I do apologise for the cheesy cotton wool ‘steam’. I did get carried away.. One last vignette. N W Newcombe travelled behind ‘Enniskillen’ in Apr 57. I read his piece 30 years ago and recently rediscovered it. Here’s a brief edited excerpt - I’ll let him have the last word. If my small effort does any honour to this wonderful railway as he describes it, I’ll be happy with my year’s work. But the next project will be plastic - I’m over soldering and filing for a while....the cab roof needs stuck down, and she is still a bit light on the front drivers so I’ll squeeze some lead in -but we’re now effectively signing this off!! ‘Enniskillen’ laboured terribly on the restart from Glenfarne, climbing to Kilmakerrill. Soon we were belting along in the dusk, a fine moon coming up behind us. It felt like 50-60-70mph but the sober evidence of my watch said it was just over 16mph. ‘Enniskillen’ was simply pounding along, waggling her shoulders so ferociously that I had doubts we should arrive safely at Manorhamilton. It must have been quite exciting on the footplate too. I saw now and then the driver’s head against a lurid background of fire, sometimes it protruded against a greenish night sky. Now and then showers of sparks went up from the funnel, once even a rush of fiery smoke billowed out from the cab itself. And always there was tremendous black smoke....

Nice neat wiring. Will be worth it in trouble free running

Classic stuff. Looks really well against that scenic backdrop.

Apologies - the Airfix one won’t work as it’s tender drive! So you may need to look at another manufacturer. To be honest, you might be as well making your own frame for this. It is far from as daunting as it sounds - Simon Bolton has a number of useful books which helped me build my first frames. https://www.abebooks.co.uk/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=30874693493&cm_sp=snippet-_-srp1-_-tile2&searchurl=kn%3DSimon%2BBolton%2Bscratch%26sortby%3D17

That would be useful, David. Some 4mm modellers on the Irish Railways Group on RM Web have been using the WW stuff, I think.

Nice NIR vibe. Unusual to see an 80 class in the suburban livery

That’s a really nice model. Can you tell us more about it?

Yes, I was thinking Airfix for a cheap trial one.https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/324557016104

LMS 4F is 5’3” and can probably be acquired fairly cheaply if you go for an older one.

That half model is really useful! That looks a pretty ancient open frame motor. Is the new Hornby model smaller ? As you say, may be better going for an 0-6-0 of some sort, with separate bogie. What size drivers are on a Bandon tank ?

Really impressive George

Looks close enough, David! Nicely applied

Coaling plant was built c1945, I think Ernie. The top photo has a 1920s feel in terms of loco condition, but the bottom one puts me in mind of the rundown of BCDR steam c1950.

Surely it has to be Duke Ellington ? ‘Take the A Train’

Yes, all that’s often required is a suggestion. A level crossing gate at the end of a line suggests continuity in a way that the normal buffer stop does not! This was my rather poor effort when I modelled 1930s Southern (based on Basingstoke/Alton Light Rlwy).

Sounds like a nice plan. Such a simple layout needs a rationale though, as in real life a terminus normally needs some kind of goods facility etc. Wingham (Canterbury Road) is about as basic as it gets, and it was atypical.http://www.disused-stations.org.uk/w/wingham_canterbury_road/ Are you going to pretend these facilities are offscene? Or perhaps this could be Portaferry Harbour, for passenger traffic only, a short extension from Portaferry proper.

Clearly the mouse is lapping most of us here !

Yes. Could be a ‘free to free’ working.

Interesting photo in Sprinks’s SLNC history book showing the 1115 goods from Sligo after entering NI - with a car on a flat wagon at the back.

I don’t mind greenways if done sensitively. Ireland was over furnished with railways and most of them have no rationale for resurrection - not even my beloved SLNC! If a greenway gets people enjoying fresh air and their heritage, that’s all good. Programmes like this can do a lot of good, and are only enhanced when the images are accurate. It’s all part of that respect for the past. Look at this heritage trail sign from Fivemiletown, which shows the pride they have in their railway history - they get the loco shape right and didn’t just grab a ‘train’ off some graphics library ...I can overlook it being an 0-8-0.....

I think Tim Moriarty has some stuff on this in various IRRS journals.

Nice use of an Airfix signal box to create a Waterford style tribute. Good use of space and the vertical dimension.

We live in an age where atmosphere matters more than accuracy. You’d think that as we are apparently more sophisticated and educated than ever before we could at least spell and use grammar effectively - how often does that lapse! A century ago, a visiting Englishman once criticised a Dublin street preacher for an overly technical commentary on Catholic doctrine. When the talk had finished, however, he heard two Dublin working men dissecting the arguments with analytical precision. My grandfather, who was a shipyard cabinet maker with a limited education, had a bookshelf that would not be common now and could discuss literature with the best of them. Just been reading an American academic textbook which says that education is now about drawing out our inner gifts rather than teaching us things....good luck with that!