Your wish is my command, Mr H - next project under way. Although this one is an altogether bigger job...done under the watchful eye of the Collooney station staff in the background...
Cheers MM. They are Methfix transfers from the Historical Model Railway Society - 1920s Southern Railway. The labels such as ‘guard’ and ‘third‘ are straightforward. But producing ‘SLNC’ means cutting out individual letters from the ‘Southern Railway’ carriage transfers. There is if course, no letter C in that phrase. So I took the letter ‘o’ and sliced a chunk out. It was a fiddly job...
This was meant to be a quick fill in project but I think we are finally done after 3 weeks!
R W Sparks’ 1920s rebuild of 6w saloon No 4 awaits her loco in the evening sun....loads of mistakes made and lessons learned. It’s not perfect by any means. But for a first effort at an SLNC coach I am not completely disheartened. The real No 4 makes an appearance in an @Irishswissernie shot ..seen here at Enniskillen.
This one also made it behind the platform - echoing how the SLNC 6w were stored at Manorhamilton, and where the real no 4 spent much of her last years.
One 7mm card kit is available to start you off...Alphagraphix, naturally. It’s for one of the bogie coaches which started on the Ballymena - Larne ‘boat train’, then ended up in Donegal via Ballycastle. An ideal way to start scratchbuilding with that as a drawing to help you.
Just been reading the summer 1951 IRRS journal (it has a wonderful account of the SLNC by its chief engineer) and the ‘news’ section records that the CDRJC had only initially acquired one of the corridor coaches on trial as ‘great difficulty’ was anticipated in adjusting buffer height etc....
No need! This was perhaps one of the most well appointed coaches on the NG in these islands. Corridor stock so no compartments. Also had electric lights and a toilet IIRC.
Lovely JHB! Make sure you’re finished in time to catch the 7:20 back from EKN - I heard that the bogie passenger coach No 9 was worked back on the mid-morning goods from Sligo so it’s guaranteed to be steam tonight !
Worth a look - he’s got a Leinster models ‘Maedbh’ amongst other things. I bought a coach kit in an earlier auction and he refunded some postage which was rather decent. Must have been some collection - he seems to have had at least one of everything produced by Alphagraphix and North Star!
After the fiddly work of gluing sides together and making footboards, the paint is making an appearance....rolling part of chassis is masked off as it’s black already. Halfords red primer for now.
Any scratch builders who like narrow gauge drawings, here’s a few nice ones..https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/DAVID-LLOYD-IRISH-NARROW-GAUGE-LOCOMOTIVES-SCALE-DRAWINGS-RAILWAY-MODELLER/133432096047?hash=item1f112c352f:g:Jz4AAOSwzMFe3PTq.