Irishswissernie

A number of Loughrea in the latest batch. Dewing lists them as being 14 March 1961 but the first one looks to be earlier with the 6 wheel stock and a different (scruffy looking and illegible number) loco.

The latest batch of JG Dewing slides have now been cleaned, re-mounted and scanned.  Here's 3 Donegal images at Lifford specially for airfixfan .

CDRJC 1958-10-02 Strabane, Foyle bridge , Letterkennygoods at Lifford JGD580230

CDRJC 1959-05-12 Lifford 'Blanch' JGD5913xx

CDRJC 1960-05-20 Lifford Bus Xing fromer Foyle railway bridge JGD60430

Track has now been laid and wired up on Mullaghmore which will now be known as Mullaghmore Town station. A block of timber is dropped into the the slot at the near end of the board to stop any rolling stock running off and down the  130 cm drop to the floor. If I use the detachable extension board which purports to be Mullaghmore Pier station and Dock sidings then this block is taken out and the end of the extension board drops into the slot instead. Mullaghmore Pier station is the terminus for the ferry to a greatly enlarged Inishmurray Island which has drifted up the coast.

The Pier station means that I can run through passenger trains in the steam/early diesel era although if I am in the Irishrail period the Sligo shuttle will terminate at the Town station.

1 hour ago, airfixfan said:

More CDR to come soon?

20 plus Jim, probably 30 odd GNRI and a handful at Loughrea also Cavan & Leitrim. There are about 100 slides but a fair number are station nameboards.

Some more JG Dewing original slides arrived this week but they need a fair bit of work  to make them presentable and re-mounted.

A fair number of other photographers awaiting uploading, selection below.

SLNCR 1957-06-08 Manorhamilton 'Lough Melvin' LN1118 Nick Nicholson.

CIE 1959-03-14 Mullingar J18 593.

CIE 1959 ca Limerick shed 109.

CDRJC 1958-10-03 Strabane 11 on Stranorlar Goods , GNRI 43 on right JGD 58187, I also have his colour slide of this view awaiting restoration.

CDRJC 1959-08-14 Strabane , mixed train arriving from Letterkenny x167

21 hours ago, skinner75 said:

Am I the only one here who can't drive a car?

No! I can't either and neither can I ride a bike. I have always been partially sighted and have balance problems. Ironically my eyesight has improved slightly in that I don't need to wear specs indoors . I wear then outside as my wonky right eye looks like I am looking at passers by who invariably then say hello and I havn't a clue whether I know them or not.

Not having a car means I havn't had to in the old days ferry offspring around etc and has probably saved me thousands of pounds in the long run although Madame has a car  which I have funded in the past. I don't go in it much. A few years ago she acquired a new one and it was over 3 months before I rode in it.

I have one, a Pay-as-you-go from Tesco which is probably about 10 years old , mainly for Bank or Credit Card Security calls and so Madame can send me regular 'Check Up' Texts. Otherwise it doesn't see much use unlike hers which seems to be permanently in use and also the offspring who appear to use theirs for navigation rather than looking where they are going. At least its an improvement from walking round with a bottle of water in their hands in case of instant dehydration. The water bottle has now seemingly been replaced by a massive cup of coffee in the free hand with the phone in the other in use  for texting companions approx 3 feet away!

Yesterday I transferred and cut down the display shelves from the Loft and installed them round the desk  under the fiddle yard with a small one at the fiddle yard throat. After the drastic reduction in the amount of stock for the IR/IE era  I can actually fit the remainder on the fiddle yard and display shelving and hopefully can swop the 2 eras over between the 2.

CIE 1949-05-12 Cahersiveen 182 JGD 490603. This negative has suffered a bit over the last 75 years.

CDRJC 1959-08-14 Stranorlar , Goods awaits to cross arriving Railcar from Donegal Town. x171

CIE 1959 ca Ashtown Halt.

4 views of Ballyhaise GNRI on on 14 September 1956. 

56 arriving from Clones with the Cavan Goods and JT 91 picking up wagons off the goods and adding them to the Belturbet branch train.

Forgot to add the fiddle yard photo, managed to get 6 tracks in. There are isolating sections at the end of each siding so that locos can be uncoupled and isolated and then another loco can take its turn in running the train.

I vaguely remember the Rev Awdry (Well the operator was wearing a dog collar so I'm pretty sure it was him) showing a Thomas the Tank Engine layout at Central Hall Westminster in the original MRC Annual Exhibition CA 1970. The layout plan also figured in Cyril Freezer's Peco 'Plans for Smaller Layouts' booklet.

Work continues on Mullaghmore with the fiddle yard tracks now laid and wired up. I hate soldering!

One advantage of the layout now being in a room with a window rather then in the former windowless loft ; is that I can now use natural sunlight when photographing. 192 crosses Four Masters Bridge on the passenger.

IE 2000- ca Gort signal box.

GNRI 1956-04-03 Strabane 174 3.50pm Derry - Belfast WACS2253.

CIE 1959-03-14 Mullingar J5 627 station pilot.

I am resisting the temptation to buy a Terrier! The Rails write up about the history of the class with regard to the Great Western Railway is a load of 'bullshxt' . The locos were an LBSC design most of which were sold off to industry , small minor railways and in WW1 some were used by the Government.  The Southern Railway inherited the residue. Only 2 ended up on Great Western Railway taken over from the Weston Cleveland and Portishead Railway. They would have been hard stretched to have been seen across the Great Western Railway ,network. One was scrapped in 1948 and the other in 1954.

C&L 1959-03-14 Dromod 6T on 12.20 mixed to Ballinamore (3).

GNRI 1954-07-11 Clones shed Mck047.

GNRI 1963-05-28 Belfast approaching Adelaide, VS UTA58 'Lagan' JGD630617.

CBSC 1953-08-24 Clonakilty Junction 467 Dn Goods (2).

CIE 1951-05-17 Dublin, Grand Canal Street 460 JGD510607.

CIE 1968-05-04 Wicklow Goods B147 on 186 SPL

Westport 078 ca 2000-5  ja048

Way Back in 1982 I organised the Annual Exhibition in St Cuthberts Church Hall , Blyth for the Blyth & District Model Railway Society.We had a gate of about 331 over the 2 days, about 10 layouts and 5 Trade stands. Total income was £201  and expenditure £52, giving us a profit of about 300%. It was a bit nerve wracking at times, ie the pies and mushy peas for the Exhibitors  were late on the first day. Those were the days! 

These 3 Ektachrome originals were taken by an American photographer whilst on a short visit to Belfast in September 1955. Unfortunately the colours all had a bad red tinge due to aging but I have managed to restore them somewhat. The 2 at Great Victoria Street show UTA WT No 7 which had been lent to the GNRB prior to the splitting of the GNRI and also the MAK Diesel prior to its purchase and numbering 800 by the CIE. Apparently it was being trialled on Goods trains on the Londonderry line etc.

The final view is at Belfast Queens Quay.

Having the house to myself and the dogs for the last week as Madame was visiting relatives 'doon South' , and I could therefore use the dining room table for building baseboards on etc, I have at last managed some progress on the migration of the layout etc from the loft to my 'den'.

This involved building a large bookcase which forms the support for the new station board plus boards across the window and above the computer. Four Masters Bridge has also successfully made the trip and is now installed. Next stage is tracklaying and I will need to acquire some larger radius points for the station area. Lifted track has been roughly positioned just to check out angles and feasibility.

There is the facility to put a temporary fiddle yard board onto the landing which could either be used as the ore shipping point sidings or even to run Mullaghmore as a through station.

x226 B&CDR 1965-08 Belfast Queens Quay cattle bank UG48.

NIR 1965-CA Whitehead, MPD powered goods. It took me a while to work out this location, I think its Whitehead with the line to the later RPSI site on the left. Only part of a rather poor slide but interesting.

GNRI'CDRJC 1960-05-21 Strabane , nameboard & Railcar 111 JGD 60704.

4 hours ago, Galteemore said:

WT is Maze or Lissue - GN main

UG is Glenavy 

Thanks, Titles amended. 

That cleared the un-identified images for a few hours but there are now some more in the post!

All now identified apart from these 2, any ideas. I think the WT is on the Coleraine - Ballymena - Greenisland line. There are other slides of the train on the Lisburn -Antrim branch so possibly returning down the ex NCC main line. . UG49 is on a railtour, it did venture south  around Drogheda on one Tour I think.

X244 I reckon is Lurgan. Found an aerial view on Britain from the Air taken in 1928 with the Mill Chimney and footbridge.

https://britainfromabove.org.uk/en/image/XPW015535

I don't think x244 (2nd one) is Balmoral the sidings don't look right. The 3rd one could be Hilden, the pole line and trees etc match but compared to this one by J G Dewing taken about 4-5 years earlier the box has gone but a distant signal has appeared on the later view. The building appears to be being rebuilt to on the later view. Just to further muddy the waters I'm not convinced that Dewing's photo is at Hilden. See the snip I have added of the box (which also has advertising board on the front so the name could have been altered)