Horsetan

Ah go on. Hardly revered! Kit is just after arriving. I like the contents already. Very neat resin body moulding that's just asking for some decent glazing in the screens. Very clean detail etch. The LEDs are tiny!! Instructions are in Des's usual "house" style, and include four sample three-quarter views of the real things - maybe a photo of the model, with numbers showing where the etch parts go, might be an idea for those who are not fully familiar with the Sulzers; makes life a little more understandable. Decals are included, though I'll have to ask Des whether he could do up a special sheet of numbers for B103, since "3" "4" and "8" are the digits that are not on the sheet! Now.....what sort of paint scheme should B103 have.....?

Think the EB110 was a much better looking car. And it actually looked like a car, unlike the Veyron which is basically an aeroplane engine pretending to be a car.

No 16.5 here. I started on 21mm. I'm continuing on 21mm.

I'll get one of my pair of Heljan Hymeks out, and see if there'd be room in the bogie gear casing to run a centre axle through.

Someone did....

It wouldn't pass in 21mm, but.

The plates were not polished?

Agreed. "Rails Through The West" is a superbly useful book.

I'm coming around to the idea of building the kit as 560, which kept on working after the Tramore line closed. The photo of it on a railtour in Fenit shows that it even kept its plates, which are part of the kit. Might as well use 'em, and the garden shed cab.

Just after securing an "original run" SSM Sulzer, with the LEDs in it. The A1A bogie has a 5'3" x 5'3" (or 21mm x 21mm) wheelbase, so that's 10'6" (42mm) overall. Drivetrain options are a bit mad. Obviously there's the Railroad 55 that's been mentioned earlier. But could the bogies from a Heljan Hymek or Bachmann Warship (42/43) be adapted, since their wheelbase is the correct overall 42mm anyway? The Sulzer "only" needs an unpowered centre axle; can one be run in the middle of the otherwise 4-wheel bogie? Here's a look at the Heljan Hymek bogie:

Time to read up about the Sulzers. At least B103 is still with us.

Yes, I own it now. Another 21mm gauge challenge. Another one to have a go at.

It's called Weymouth. I've been there.

Who really knows what Kader are thinking? I thought they had troubles of their own.

This is the sort of kit that I'd like to see more often in 4mm scale. So far, it's only Brassmasters and Finney who have provided working inside motion kits. Anything for Irish locos has to be made up from scratch or improvised.....

Let's hope that the boiler / firebox is not a solid casting all the way through! Could be a problem hollowing out enough space to fit a motor.

Probably part-funded by eBay sales......

Ah here, ye can't be sayin' that type of thing

...and some of it may go on an onward journey to the land of eBay....!

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.

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.

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.

Not fifty?

Suppose we'd best order some copies, so.

aaarrgghh can't resist