leslie10646

Hi JB Commiserations on the Burma experience - not surprised on any front - I've never been keen on narrow gauge, so I wouldn't expect much. I think that running tours in distant lands must be a nightmare for the tour operator. You should have come on one of my trips into China with the Hong Kong Railway Society (1997 and 1998). The second was to a ng line carrying coal. I'll look for a photie and post it! (So long ago you printed the things! The only digital thing I had was my stopwatch! At least your off-spring can give you accommodation near the second best narrow gauge railway in the World! The Ffestiniog takes some beating, but the Rhaetian Railway pips it for the top place! Jim, sorry that your experience was spoilt by NRs attempts at running the tracks over here! At least you should have enjoyed some serious noise from the Jubilee?

Hi Noel Three steam tours this summer, no diesel on the back, lots of 75mph running. It depends on the Promoting Company to some extent - Steam Dreams have a diesel on the back 90% of the time - usually to do with the route and the need to go off in the other direction (eg out of Weymouth where there's nowhere to turn). Fire risk is the other bugbear for we 100% steam men - some operating companies put a diesel on the train to reduce the possibility of sparks causing damage to vegetation - yet most locos have effective spark arrestors. Have a look on YouTube to see Leander roaring up the South Devon banks without aid.

MAQ03850.m4v The 800s, are sometimes equated to a Royal Scot - Well, if it is true, this is what one looks like at speed, the diesel is there for the airconditioning in the Mark 2ds. Great Scot at Goring? .......

Sorry, but the photo must have been taken after 1956/7 when the "Bulleid-bodied" AEC railcars were put into service (IRRS Journal No.20, Page 243 refers to their entering service). The REC, being Farnborough-based, with Mr Bulleid's pacifics racing past their door every hour of the day and night possibly requested the set specifically! After Mr B's fine coaches on the Southern Railway - they must have been a bit of a culture-shock!

The late Jimmy (?) O'Dea wrote an extended and valuable article in the IRRS Journal, Vol. 11, pages 127 - 139 and part 2 in the same Volume pages 170 -178. The article shows a G Class diesel at Clara on the Banagher Goods and a Sulzer B Class at Banagher itself.

Sorry, JB, I don't think it's Ardnacrusha - see attached Lance King's photo of the IRRS tour to there in 1962. PS, I thought that it was here as well, but the architecture is different! The REC is based two miles from my home, these days - principally a modelling club now - but important enough to have a "proper"sign on the main road! The photo could have been taken in Hampshire this year, it looks wet enough!

I must say that The Lads are doing this in style. If the container goes through Mongolia, it joins the Trans Siberian route at Ulan Ude, then running to the South of Lake Baikal, where there just happens to be a STEAM Shed at Slyudyanka: So your A Classes can be steam-hauled for part of their journey, just like the real thing ..... Splendid customer service!

Midland Man said - Love the front cover. It looks amazing it keeps the style of the original book [Rails to Achill] which I like quite a lot. Wait until you see the back cover! For UK only (sorry) £16.95 from The Syndicate, post paid. If Jim D will tell me how to send money to The Maam Cross Project - profits to them! Leslie

If you can't wait until Jonathan's launch - you can buy a copy from The Syndicate (supporting Irish railway preservation) for £15.95 plus a token £1 towards post and packing - UK only - sorry, postage to "Europe" is rather expensive from Brexitland! Either e-mail at lesliemcallister@aol.com; or drop me a PM. Great book, all congratulations to JB and his publishers for very good reproduction of a great book, which completes the story of a fascinating line - oh, for a Time Machine. Where did you get all those illustrations from, JB? Leslie

Kevin makes a very good point above. the Black 'n Tan era is of greater interest for the reason that the locos ran on a railway little changed from steam days - semaphore signals, freight trains with brake vans, , seldom two wagons on a train the same; still lots of sundries and mail traffic, which meant that passenger trains did not just cart people ......... Talks on the era always attract a good audience for that reason and thank heavens quite a few guys took great pictures which have recorded the scene - JB's books (with Barry Carse) are a case in point.

WARLEY OFF This won't surprise anyone? Warley 2020 (like the Olympics and Euros) was running a year late, but is now going to be two years late. I've just received an e-mail to say Warley in November has been cancelled. Now, do I leave my deposit in place until 2022?

Dear Jonathan, Squire of Achill Thon whitemetal kits ye ha' are nah tae do wi' me. Thon's yer man Jeremy Suter's. 9 ton van on order, expected soon - what's the address in Wales?

4 August 2021: Another Day, Another New Loco ….. (Or How I travelled behind a new Hungarian loco, built in USA – in Oxfordshire! The GW Society imported 6046, ex-USATC 2-8-0 for their Summer Gala on 31 July/1 August. The dates didn’t suit me, so I was delighted when the Society tipped off its members that they would be running her again today. So I took the opportunity to travel behind my 52nd Hungarian steam loco! Built in Philadelphia in 1945 by Baldwin, after service in France in WW2, 4046 was one of 500-odd ex-USATC locos purchased by the Hungarian State Railways (MAV). She became Hungarian (MAV) 411.144. I did see the class at work in Hungary on my visits in 1973 and 1975, but I certainly didn’t have a run with one – any I saw were shunting in goods yards! I must look out a photo, as I certainly photographed one in Kecskemet in 1973. As 411.144, she became a member of the Hungarian National Collection, but was mistakenly marked for scrap! It was then privately purchased and after a change of owner, was restored to working order on the Churnet Valley Railway. It has run on the NYMR, WSR and Nene Valley, where it suffered a damaged cylinder block, which has been replaced. Without a detailed check, I cannot be precise as to the changes made by her new owners, but the original loco would not have had that “BR Standard” look about her! A handsome machine. Appropriately hauling two 1940s GWR bogie coaches (7371 a brake composite - we sat in the luxurious First Class compartment and 536 a corridor third) she toddled up and down the GWR demo line: very slow reversing to Oxford Road in 3'25, 10mph max; 2'48 back to Eynsham, 15 max; second run yielded 3'18 to Oxford Road, max SIX mph and then 2'45 back 11max. Needless to say, that when I watched go by while we picniced, the new driver made a lot more noise and seemed to be going faster! I must seek her out on a proper preserved branch! I should add that MAV was not noted for steam speeds of more than 30mph or so!

I agree with Galteemore that the Park Railway is probably either the railway in the Prater Gardens in Vienna (where the Third Man "Big Wheel" is); or the famous railway in Dresden. As there are other Austrian scenes, the Prater seems more likely. I've travelled on both (actually, I've probably timed both!). JB, these are great pictures - I've pointed McLachlan to them, as he's in Spiez at present and can almost certainly give you chapter and Verse on the ones in Der Schweiz. I know someone who will go into orbit when they see the ancient "Innertkirchen Train" - possibly the last train Sherlock Holmes travelled on - getting off at Reichenbach to seek his foe Moriarty!

My dear JB, you're one of my favourite people, as yu have at least two dozen of my wagon kits built or building!

Terrific stuff, JB. First time I've seen my ex-GSWR 10 ton brake actually on a line. "Yer Man" has done a nice job building it. "Every home should have one" (well, every back of beyond CIE branch line, anyway). That's another Fiver I owe you .........

Very well done, Baseboard Dave - a real work of art. If you ever want a three month working holiday in England, we'll put you up, feed and pay you well, while you relocate Portadown Jct to a hut in the back garden in Reading! Beaumont - I owe you an apology (I think?) - did I not send you the Works Plates for your H Vans? If you send me the numbers of the vans you've got, I'll send you the matching plates. The wagons have been very nicely finished, by the way. Enjoy running your "line". I'm suitably jealous! Leslie

Jubilee under the Juice Wires? Vile evening in the Reading area - I had a long wait, including a torrential rainstorm, at THEALE for the ex LMS Jubilee Class 4-6-0 Bahamas running 50 minutes late (and in the DARK) tonight. This was the return leg of the semi-regular West Somerset Steam Express. Not great, but maybe worth twenty seconds of your time? Leslie PS heading from Taunton to Paddington MAQ03849.m4v

I must agree with Noel - I have in my possession an official CIE photo (in black and white!) of the Supertrain on Bray Head - and yes, it did look like futuristic. But, that said, a bit late for me from a modelling standpoint. Still contemplating a green "stripped" one! I must sell my hoard of Super Train coaches! It'll help pay for all these goodies!

WCR said: Anyone rolling in money? https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/114804659568?mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&campid=5338722076&toolid=10001 Ah, WestCorkRailway, it's your fault that when I saw this little engine advertised and then discovered it among the Casserley negatives in my hands, I decided that it "would do" for my 75th birthday present. Older readers will remember that my 70th pressie arrived 5 years late, but well worth waiting for. So, I've got No.5 in CBSCR Green, which even if it looks very GWR, it's a nice little engine (the box is three times the size of it!). It's with Kernow to be chipped, after which I'll post it moving in Portadown Goods yard. Remember what Lord White said - "It's MY railway and I'll run what I want on it"! Except you're a dab hand at kit bashing, I'm afraid that Irish steam locos ain't cheap. I can't suggest that they make a great investment, it's like everything - if you want it enough, you'll get it regardless. Obviously the VAT / postage thing doesn't affect me - modellers in NI can offer to bring it over the border for you in their pockets? It's outrageous what "The Leader" has foisted on us with this Brexit thing. Ah, J, you beat me to it!

Steady on, George! They didn't need chimneys in any case to belch out clouds of black smoke (sorry, exhaust). If the fireman had been doing his job properly, it would have been nice clean white steam ........

Normally, George, I would agree - but have you seen the track on the Trans-Sib? On the other hand, especially for you 21mm Men, they will already have endured a gauge change from Broad Gauge to Narrow Gauge - I'm told it's not painful! The only time i did it personally (going TOWARDS China), I cheated and changed from Narrow Gauge to Broad Gauge by changing trains completely at Brest Litovsk.

Shall I pinch a Chinese one going to Southampton (certainly empty for the UK makes and exports nothing)? - Loads of them through Goring every hour! One careful owner, Guv, yours for just .......

Reading my Modern Railways for June, there is a double page on Transport for Wales plans - which include Loco haulage back on Holyhead to Cardiff and services to Manchester - with BR Mark 4 rolling stock - they've bought an extra THIRTY Mark 4 carriages for haulage with Class 67s. A pity we're not allowed to travel to Ireland at the moment - and not much reason, with exhibitions off and no RPSI trains ........

If IE had been daft enough to buy Hitachi 800s, then they'd be delighted to have them when the cracks in the bogies appeared............ It's not just IE and NIR who run suburban units on express trains - GWR has used the Class 387s to Bristol - arguably a more comfortable ride than the 800s they replaced. Keep safe Cynic of Surrey