leslie10646

Bantry gets better and better. Now, where did that Ivatt tank come from? Has someone been scratch-building? Nice to see the SSM Bandon Tank "at home". Keep it up, gents. Great work.

An interesting prototype to choose - I wonder when the last of them ran! A lovely piece of work, young man. I'm surprised that Midland John hasn't reacted - he must be busy tidying up the garden railway before winter!

I'm sure that you have made the right decision Edo. No use having wagons if you have nothing to pull them with! That said, I'm older than Roderick by more than a decade ........... I hope that you enjoy running the loco - as I've said before, mine is on a train of bubbles with a GSWR brake upstairs! Now there's heresy.

Gents Thanks for the positive feedback, which encourages me to continue. Feel free to add to my list - as I say, I can't hold you to numbers, but it's useful to know who's interested - they can get the first pictures, first! Leslie

Ah ha, John, piccies from the famous Garden Railway. It (they) look very nice. Out of season for you now? Leslie I sent my J15 over to Neil @ WheeltappersDCCsounds to get his J15 sound project installed plus a pair of head lamps. She sounds great. Looking forward to running here back at home next week. Some nice extra sound functions on this project simulating a rake of loose coupled wagons starting off with cascading coupling snatches as the slack is taken up down a rake of wagons, and the reciporical cascading buffer clashing on stoping as each wagon closes the gap behind the braking loco. Thanks for posting the video, Noel. Almost convinces me to fit mine, although it is only intended for very occasional use. Anyone got any thoughts on a good sound chip for a small-wheeled two cylinder 4-4-0 (the U Class being my thoughts). Of course, I should fit sound to No.171?

I suspect a J15 commissioned from a brass kit to the same standard as an 00 Works would probably cost at least double. Well said, Noel. I've never paid less than £250 to get a brass job built and they usually needed a lot of tweaking to get them to run well, so by the time you'd paid for the kit, motor, gears, etc - you are invariably looking at £400 plus. Roderick's engines generally run well, out of the box. Not cheap, of course compared to a diesel which is made in the thousands.

Were they in brown as well as grey? And will it be a resin kit? Hi Popeye, anything I've seen suggests grey, although many were clearly fitted (the GN painted fitted stuff a bauxite shade, but not sure about CIE where cattle was concerned. No doubt Comrade Beaumont will sort me out! Yes, a resin kit. Thanks for the interest. Leslie

Apparently, I'm "dotty" - too many dots in my e-mail address! Thanks, Richie, I've fixed it!

This is a bit cheeky, but before I invest a couple of thousand quid I don't have ...... Recent sales have been disappointing (obviously I'm doing something very wrong!), so before I produce another damp squib, may I ask? My next planned wagon, intended for launch at the Blackrock Exhibition in October, is the 1950 CIE Cattle Wagon. My logic is that now that one can buy a RTR Class J15, folk will need something to pull behind it? So, what did they spend their lives pulling? - endless cattle specials from Fairs the length and breadth of the Republic. The choice seems logical (with one of my GSWR brakes on the back, or even front and back!). But is it? Any takers? I can't hold you to any number which you might buy, but it would be useful to know, please! Maybe, if you're interested, you'd e-mail me, please, on lesliemcallister@aol.com Thanks for your forbearance with me. Leslie Photo: Courtesy Jonathan Allan

I promised pictures of my GNR Class Y5 van, which has been available for over a month now. The vans were originally built about a 100 years ago as Bread Vans, but were subsequently rebuilt for use as luggage / sundries vans. The obvious big change was the fitting of sliding doors, a feature beloved of the GN. The vans were to be found hanging on the back of passenger trains, especially on secondary line passenger lines like the that from Dundalk to Omagh and Bundoran. Latterly, they were quite a feature on the much-lamented "Derry Road", often hauled by AEC and later BUT railcars. They lasted through to the 1960s and at least one was repainted in CIE green. The kit comes with transfers for several numbers in the series and costs £35 (roughly €40) post paid. As usual, if you are ordering more than kit, I'll knock off a little as I save in postage. Leslie

Just an update on the 00 Works J15. I was speaking to Roderick this morning and he told me that he had built some extra locos on spec for sales beyond his order book. He has some of each type left - GREY or BLACK. He does NOT rerun locos, so if you want one, now is the time to strike! ACT NOW!

Hi Wexford Super photo. It should be easy to date thanks to having the name of the ship? I have a copy of "Edwardian Enterprise" at home re GWR's early 20th century improvements, which included Fishguard - or Ernie Shepherd's book?

Oddly enough, I'm with AClass007 on this - a "Supertrain" A class with a rake of air-conditioned coaches in the same livery is pretty striking - remember the superb CIE publicity shot on Bray Head? I'm very lucky in that I have a lot of what I want, having been collecting Irish for twenty years now, BUT.... A really good model of GNR(I) Class VS No.207, capable of going round my rather tight curves, and, more importantly, able to take ten mahogany coaches on an All-in Rugby Special or for the Horse Show in Dublin. I'm with "ttc" on the No.85 front. Patrick, Old Boy - dream on - you're one of the handful of people wanting to model the BCDR - but all power to your elbow - your suggestion re Queens Quay with the Golfers' Express departing is delectable.

Coach 47N was a GNR(I) Class J11, built as a Tri Composite Brake with two compartments - one of six First seats, the second of eight Second seats and finally thirty Third class seats in an open saloon. PLus TWO toilets (one at each end of the passenger section) and a brake compartment. Went to CIE at the dissolution of the GN and this was her last year in service, big withdrawn in 1970. By this time she was a First / Third compo, I suspect, so some lucky guys on the tour had First Class seats.

I have heard that the Casserley negatives were offered to an 'organisation' for £20,000 which sum was somewhat beyond their means, but it will give some idea of their expected Auction value. Yes, Ernie, I suspect that that would be a figure for "the lot". As he (they? for Richard was a prolific photographer also and as Jon has said, very helpful to authors) took double figures of thousands of non-Irish topics, the Irish element, if the collection was split, should be at a manageable price. Again as young Jon has said, they have been widely exposed in print and many people have prints from the collection - Henry certainly sold copies during his lifetime. Getting back to the possible figure for the total collection, I cannot think of any society with that sort of money to spend on a collection - most photographers leave their collections to a club they had been a member of.

My giddy aunt, John, it's not the foreground that made my jaw drop it was the neat "filing system" of drawers for this and that behind. I wouldn't DARE post a picture of my railway room, or the dining room table where I am typing this.

Spot on Lambeg re the Brain Boru visit to Limerick. A memorable tour (for a lot of wrong reasons). The tour was the first since No.171 was overhauled, but unhappily she blew a gland on the way to Dublin (although not without doing 70mph before that happened). So, No.4 (straight off working on the spoil trains) ran solo to Cork, where she contrived to derail her pony truck in the shed yard. 171 worked to Cobh and back, having run Dubin to Cork light engine. Next day, we returned via Limerick as already reported and guess what? No.4 lost her pony truck again in the shed yard - trapping No.171 inside. So there we were with no loco for the trip onwards to Dublin and Belfast. The Inspector, the late Paddy Gannon, simply asked our rail tours officer ( the late and estimable Drew Donaldson) - "What do you want to do"? Now Drew once famously threatened to lie down in front of an ailing 400 class on a tour, to ensure that the tour did not continue with a diesel loco, so not surprisingly asked Paddy to muster a team and rerail the offending truck. A bunch of local pw men did it in double quick time using the most modest tools (including a few sleepers!) and we were back in business after an hour. Well done the Limerick men! No.171 set off on her own, but very weakly, due to that blown gland. At Ballybrophy, while she took water, it was discovered that No.4 was right behind her on the block, so she came forward to pilot. What followed was a piece of folklore - for that meant driving her over a facing crossover from the down line (she had running bunker first because of the dodgy pony truck). The CIE driver declined to have the honour of taking No.4 over the crossover - who could blame him with the Sunday rush hour about to begin and the possibility of blocking both main lines? As it happened, the NIR inspector, Frank Dunlop, was on the train to advise the CIE guys on the handling of the tank. So he volunteered to edge her slowly over the points and in front of No.171. After that, it was relatively plain sailing - I've forgotten how late we were back into Belfast! Wouldn't have missed it!

Very nice job, Tony. Keep it up. You'll need an awful lot of wagons for that shed! Come to think of it, I know a guy .........

Nope!

Never a truer word, David. The Fleischmann stuff I bought for a German layout which was never finished would fetch VERY little these days - fortunately, most of it was bought in the days when the D-Mark was 4/5 to the pound! As Noel says, don't speculate, enjoy them. I have a glass case full of locos which have never / will never turn a wheel - but are happy mementos of trips in many a foreign land (anyone want a Hungarian Electric, or a Chinese one, come to think of it?)

Hi Ken He's been sent the link, but may be away from the Internet, having a real life away from railways! If he doesn't bite the "fly" quickly, I'll use a different bait! Leslie

To my shame, I must admit that this is the first time I've noticed this thread. Really terrific, skilled work Ken. To say "Well done" doesn't start to give you the credit due. Thanks for posting the photos of the locos and rolling stock in native brass - I have always thought it showed off a model really well. When I had a Class AL built from the Northstar kit recently, I particularly asked the modeller to photograph it for me in brass, before painting it - a bit like the "real" railway works who photographed their locos in "Workshop Grey". Great to see the DSER modelled - i'm only aware of one other person doing it - and I'm about to send him the link!

No, nor can I. As far as I know, Eoin doesn't put outside couplers on his sets (oops, sorry, that's the DART!!!!!).

IF No.85 is the only available loco, then I understand that she is too heavy for the Waterford - Limerick line.

I particularly liked Mayner's photo of the Celtic class coming out of Broadstone (am I right?) where Luas now runs!