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Horsetan

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Posts posted by Horsetan

    Narrow Gauge

    in Questions & Answers

    Posted

    Since you will be using BEMO HOm coaches, make sure you've got enough money to fund them. At about 40 quid each (or more), they're not exactly cheap.

     

    General rule of HO or HOm is that, if buying new, anything Swiss outline is going to be very expensive.

    Narrow Gauge

    in Questions & Answers

    Posted

    The selection of Irish/Isle of Man 4mm (OOn3) loco and rolling stock kits is quite limited.

     

    Backwoods Miniatures dropped the Irish 3' range several years ago. Sales of Irish models was poor compared to OO9 & American narrow gauge kits and imported brass rtr models. The owner Pete McParlin had not got around to updating the OOn3 section of the web site and may have retired and sold the business.

    ....

     

    Now that's a real shame if the Irish 3' range has been lost forever. If you were modelling the CDRJC in particular, Backwoods kits were pretty much your only option.

     

    Pete always did say on the website that the kits were only produced to order, and he didn't normally keep stocks of them on the shelves. That's exactly what happened back in 2001 when I ordered a kit for the Class 5 to build "Drumboe" - it was a matter of waiting a couple of weeks whilst Pete got all the parts and wheels together.

     

    Think I might send Backwoods an e-mail to establish what the actual situation is.

    The Official Irish 'Might Have Beens' Thread

    in General Chat

    Posted

    A very obvious "might-have-been"; when the Ulster Railway was narrowed, and the Dublin & Drogheda widened, what if the British government had said "we're going 4ft 8 1/2, so Ireland must also"?

     

    The Ulster's 6 ft 2 was going to go anyway, so everything here bar the odd narrow gauge line would have ended up the same standard European gauge.

     

    Cue an Ireland like a giant Isle of Wight with all manner of second hand British pre-grouping stock all over the place. Stanier tanks and Black 5's all over the NCC.... Inchicore never building anything but maintaining into the sixties fascinating but motley collection of old GWR, LNWR and NER locomotives..

     

    So what would have we had instead of blue 4.4.0s on the main line? What would we have today on the main line system (probably lots of Mk 3's, for starters!)

     

    There might still have been the problems of fuel supply during The Emergency. The ability of Big Four engines to run on pitch, duff, briquettes, turf, etc. is unknown!

     

    Dundalk would still have been building nothing bigger than 4-4-0s, but they'd be things like "Schools" or LMS 6'9" Compounds.

    Mac - El Capitan

    in Letting off Steam

    Posted

    ....The ZX81 - that was considered the height of modernity and luxury back then compared to the stuff we started on - colour, and remember the screen flickered every time you pressed a key. But it was the 1st affordable 'micro' computer of that era dominated by Commodore Pet, Apple II, and Tandy TRS80. . . .

     

    The ZX81 was resolutely black-and-white, like its predecessor the ZX80. Its flat keyboard was unaffected by drinks spilled on it and it came with 1k RAM as standard. You could get a plug-in 16k RAM module that went in the back of it. It was no feckin' use at all.

     

    Colour didn't really come about properly until the ZX Spectrum, Commodore VIC-20 and C64. Also the ORIC-1, plus contemporary BBC Model B and Acorn Electron. There, I'm showin' me age now, so I am.

    Claremorris Goods shed

    in Questions & Answers

    Posted

    It was indeed, Horsetan, see the likes of Jimmy O'Dea's photos in the fifties....

     

    Seen those. There are probably enough photos to create a jigsaw of the track layout, and I'm sure I have a signalling diagram somewhere, albeit after the Ballinrobe branch was closed.

     

    I often imagine what the likes of Monaghan, Clones or Enniskillen - or Albert Quay - would look like now had they survived. One look at present day Mallow, Athenry or worst of all Portadown can answer that!

     

    ...or Mullingar.

    Das Model: Auferstanden aus Ruinen

    in Continental European Modelling

    Posted · Edited by Horsetan

    It was Ivan. I think they raised the bar for out door gigs on that tour. It was a multi media show as well as musical. I think Larry Mullen said you can go to a gig and watch tv at the same time, how bad.

     

    I still have the album somewhere. I look back fondly upon those days, those rare oul times before Bono became holier-than-thou.

     

    Can you just imagine the endless list of health and safety vetoes to so, so many aspects of the German "plandampf" if it was staged in Ireland!

     

    I'm not sure we have sufficient working engines to maintain an Irish Plandampf, never mind the H&S :((. You'd need to build a few more WTs, J15s, K1/K1a, B1 and B2, plus V or VS, to run a worthwhile service.

    Tmd/ssm mgwr "e" / gsr j26 / cie 551 0-6-0t

    in Photos of Models

    Posted

    You're heading well down that road, Horsetan!

     

    If it's Tramore you're modelling, so be it.....

     

    The J.P. O'Dea collection at NLI turned up this 1959 view of 560 at Cork:

     

    http://catalogue.nli.ie/Record/vtls000304698

     

    Depicted out of service, with rods removed, and displaying the "garden shed" cab which itself is showing obvious signs of being attacked by the tin worm. Cast numberplates still retained.

     

    ....out of the many hundreds (thousands?) of Irish railway photos he took, it looks like only two involve J26s!

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