murphaph

The seller looks for that sort of money for all their stuff. That coach or one like it has been on sale at that price for ages. No takers thus far. Seller is happy to wait until someone comes along who just has to have that coach and is prepared to pay for it. I picked up two of them last year for normal money from other sellers.

B&I went bust in 92 I believe. How long after that were these fallen flag B&I containers to be seen and was there ever a liner full of them?

The Lokprogrammer has a basic throttle that can run a loco to test it. Mine is connected to a rolling road but you could hook it up to a small test oval. It has enough power to run a couple of locos.

Modellbahn Union in Dortmund sells GB outline stuff. I hope someday they will stock Irish stuff too.

A MK3 suburban set would make a lovely short train for many smaller layouts. Plenty of 121s out there waiting for such a set now.

Did they in fact go to Galway or just Sligo?

I'd take a few Bell tanks as well if they appeared I would also like to see the plain green Consent Leasing 40 foots that were very often mixed in with Bell liners in the 90's. I guess these would have wider appeal as well as they must have popped up everywhere being a leased container.

Great stuff. Order on the way from me for a few 40' Bells for sure. Did the bulk Bells run on Irish rails?

Animal feed maybe?

Some great thoughts there folks. Indeed I have been reconsidering what I can realistically fit into the available space and also what I can realistically accomplish alone. I would really like a mainline/branch line setup and I really want it largely based on a real location. The plan is eventually to run a real timetable from the 90s. I've been thinking a more realistic approach might be Kildare-Cherryville-Athy. This has other advantages, more colour light signals and fewer semaphores (but still some for interest). I could include the Tegral factory in low relief (it would lend itself extremely well to this and there's the interesting concrete bridge over the Barrow). Still retains some shunting/running around at Kildare and at the factory. Lots to consider. I will definitely be doing it all in phases so I don't feel overwhelmed by it all.

Me neither. In summary, many eBay UK sellers simply don't and never did offer shipping outside the UK. I feel that the eBay GSP is largely responsible for this. Some sellers would ship to Ireland if asked nicely but for those that wouldn't, parcel motel type redirection services were fantastic. I used parcelwizard. It was a very reasonable €3.75 per redirected item. They've left the market because of Brexit. Only An Post are still offering such a service currently, at almost twice the price. And who knows how well it's working. I reckon a lot of people are getting nasty surprises where used eBay items arrive without so much as a declared price and customs are estimating values.

I think 2f is actually closer but externally I'm not sure if there was much of a difference.

The mk2d's were also vacuum braked. Only the second hand mk2a's etc. acquired used in '89 or thereabouts were air braked. The original AC stock delivered from BREL was vacuum braked though.

It may have been posted before but I found an interesting video from Tom Tuohy on YouTube. It seems to show ECS mk2d's being taken in a short train of older stock. I can't quite make the loco out.

Reviving this rather than starting a new thread. Did these wagons make it down south? If so, what's the furthest the got?

Personally I've never seen an NEM 652 (8 pin) decoder with the plug directly attached. Maybe they exist though.

In real life this thing is much bigger than any that existed in Ireland I reckon (though I stand to be corrected on that): https://images.app.goo.gl/i3waRz8TemspSjNc9 Just so you know. Even at 1:87 it must still be a substantial model.

If you buy a function decoder as opposed to a loco decoder then you'll be grand. For example the 54620 on this page: http://www.esu.eu/en/products/lokpilot/lokpilot-fx-v40/ These are specially made for these sorts of lighting only applications.

Be aware that some loco decoders can't be programmed unless there's some resistance where the motor should be as they use the back emf to generate the ack pulses. That's why most locos can be seen moving a tiny bit during programming. It's certainly the case with the standard Lokpilots. I found out when installing one in a dummy power car to control the lighting.

Great stuff. I hope my lad is still as interested as Adam in a couple of years!

Thx David. Many years of construction ahead of me though!

I can live with 2'6" radius helixes and curves I think. My space is a rectangular room exactly 9.5m x 3.12m (bit over 31' x 10') with a door exactly centred along one of the long walls and window sill height is 1.45m (it's a basement room, windows are up near the ceiling). I will need to cleverly plan access to the helix in case of derailments. I think I will have to just have one helix with a lift out bridge or bridges across the door. Originally I had planned two helixes but I think they would completely dominate the room at 5' diameter. I may need to scale back my original plans to accommodate 21mm but I'm happy to do that. The gauge is more important to me than the length of track I can get into the room.

Thanks for your further feedback guys. I've had some feedback from the S4 society (I emailed both societies to see what sort of stores items they have for 21mm) and as a result of that I've joined that society. I may also join the EMGS, depending on what they say, if and when they respond to my enquiry. The S4 society has the following stores items (only) relevant to 21mm. They have plenty of other stuff like consumables that can be used by 21mm modellers as well of course: Track gauge, Type 'A', Rollergauge - 5' 3" Gauge (21 mm) Track gauge, triangular, for automatic gauge widening - 5' 3" gauge (21 mm) Roger Sander's 'Mint' gauge for fine tuning pointwork - 5' 3" gauge (21 mm) 28mm pin-point Axle, suitable for Irish Prototype, intended for coach and wagon wheels Brook Smith wheel back-to-back gauge, boxed, for 5' 3" gauge I think most of those can be of use even on an EM layout, certainly items 1,2,4 are of use and I may be able to get someone to take a bit off the BB gauge to bring it in to 19.3mm if the EM society don't have one. I know I can use a vernier here but a proper BB gauge seems like it might also make getting the wheels on square that bit easier? Brendan, when you say you wouldn't use the same method again, why is that? How would you regauge a Craven now, given your experiences? I have a lot of Cravens to regauge but little steps!

John, a couple of questions if I may... What are the black dots at the end of the plastikard "torsion bar" stretcher? Some sort or rivet? Or how is it held on to the severed half of the plastic bogie? Also, the brass etches you've made yourself, can the MJT ones be used instead? Is there a reason why you didn't split the original MM Cravens bogies and regauge those using plastikard? I've also read something about Bill Bedford bogies. Any information on those wrt 21mm? I'm thinking I may go the "middle way" and use the 21mm EM. I like the idea of 00 tolerances on my diesel stock but what if I want to add a kit built steam loco or two later on and I've built a helix to a too tight radius for any slightly longer steam engine to get around. I'm thinking it would be safer to bite the bullet now and re-wheel my RTR stock with EM profile wheels and accept that I need larger curve radii on Helixes and curves in general. Cheers, Phil

I'm not sure but like Jonathan I haven't noticed any issues on any other sites. It's not something that makes the site unusable or anything but it is noticeable.