Horsetan

2 hours ago, Paul 34F said:

...., creating drawings of various CDRJC, GNRI, locomotives and carriages.  I have collected numerous original diagrams and work from these and photographs to produce my work.  

Currently, I’m updating my diagrams for the PP 4-4-0.  Initial basic diagrams are now being updated to include as much detail as possible, (where I have the information).

I have collected material for several other Irish companies and over time hope to produce detailed drawings for some of these too.

Would members of this forum, be interested in purchasing PDF files of my work? 

Presumably this isn't duplicating any of Richard's extensive drawings work at the IRRS?

28 minutes ago, Paul 34F said:

....As for the image of number 5, it appears to have been dismantled for overhaul?  The boiler and smokebox have been lifted out of the frames.

Nothing has changed there in the last 20 years....

On 22/1/2024 at 8:50 PM, irishrailways52 said:

....would it be worth wile for Irish rail to build some sort of a wind farm ....

If they could tap the guff coming out of Daíl Eireann, I'd say they'd have an inexhaustible supply of wind.

On 2/2/2024 at 1:13 AM, WRENNEIRE said:

Some more Black (J15)

 

 

 

 

 

Ultrascale wheels on this one - they're very distinctive.

2 hours ago, DERAILED said:

You need to have been involved in it to understand and there's no way it can be explained adequately to an outsider. As for Moyasta, I won't mourn its passing - it was always going to end this way run by an arrogant SOB. I know from first-hand experience of dealing with the individual concerned. Blennerville was hijacked by a coterie of local business interests and Tralee UDC and was always doomed to fail once they drove off the enthusiasts. As for the other well known project...what goes around comes around and I won't be shedding any tears.

On 26/1/2024 at 7:34 PM, derek said:

Really "constructive " replies on here now- not!

All helping to make your buildings more, er, contemporary....

On 1/2/2024 at 3:01 PM, DJ Dangerous said:

As of right now, all eight packs are in stock and available to buy.

Must have been a large cancellation by @Fowler4f when he shut his wallet.

 

 

I'm just after putting in an online order for the RPSI trio set. Paid by PayPal. Hope there's enough left....

On 10/1/2024 at 10:58 PM, jhb171achill said:

They'd be much the same - if that modern - as any of the glass-and-steel-and-concrete things you'd get across the water in Kingcharlesland. I daresay some of the British manufacturers might therefore have something suitable?

For extra authenticity, you'd need some of the modern buildings to show signs of mica damage....

On 11/1/2024 at 8:00 PM, Broithe said:

I won some tickets in 2013, so I felt obliged to go.

I found it to be a bit of an ordeal, but it certainly was worth going....

I went in 2000. It was the first and only time I ever attended. There were so many people that the only thing I can compare the crowds with is Bombay's main railway station at rush hour. Teeming humanity, and all too human smells.

Never dared go back after that.

On 4/1/2024 at 8:03 PM, David Holman said:

...., even the full sized version had issues with wheels and splashers because of the broad gauge.

Wild Swan's LMS Locomotive Profiles book mentions that, rather than cast new wheels, they turned the existing driving wheel castings around so that the backs were now the fronts, with a flatter face than previously. This had the side-benefit of automatically rendering the converted wheelsets suitable for the wider gauge, with just the tyres to be fitted in the normal way.

On 4/1/2024 at 11:45 AM, Blaine said:

Love to know how this has already got to 2 pages - you have a better chance of seeing Concorde take to the skies again or a total cure being discovered for cancer

...or everlasting peace in the Middle East 

On 31/12/2023 at 4:48 PM, 16miller said:

Is the chimney a separate casting? What you're saying is exactly what I said. I doubt if the chimney is built into the smokebox, it'll be a casting bolted on. Rather than say 'It can't go under bridges', say 'what can be done to get it under bridges?' 

Maybe you might want to develop the idea proposed by Pilot Developments years ago, when they were asked how they would get something the size of Flying Scotsman to pass under the M11 motorway, if the engine was to run on the Epping-Ongar line in Essex. Pilot thought the best way was to - in their words - "hinge the stack", so that it would swing away from the smokebox in order to gain the clearance necessary. 

6 hours ago, Mayner said:

Another factor is the absence of wealthy sponsors/owner operators ....

The likes of J.P. McManus et al prefer to put their money into racehorses, the GAA, etc.

46 minutes ago, jhb171achill said:

This is it, yes! It's a different culture here, I suppose; we do ourselves a disservice comparing ourselves to the railway enthusiast / preservationist / even modelling, scenes in Britain, particularly England. England alone probably has more railway modellers, preservationists, railway museums and preserved railways than most of the rest of the world put together.

It goes with the longstanding culture of being able to extract something for almost nothing wherever possible.

I'd say Germany runs Britain pretty close in the heritage stakes, and they have loads more steam locomotives to draw on mainly because they built standardised classes in the hundreds, and some in the thousands. 

On 29/12/2023 at 12:51 PM, jhb171achill said:

This, unfortunately, is and has been the reality.

For some twenty years, before the Santas reached their maximum effectiveness (or even existed) the May Tour was the raft the RPSI floated on.

My annual RPSI budget calculations, and those of my predecessor, were largely determined by what profit it made.

At most, enthusiasts from all 32 counties would have filled one coach - ANY year - meaning that without the English market this annual outing would not have been able to run. Some years the entire Irish contingent might have only filled half a coach.

”It’s too expensive!”, we used to hear. 

Yup, it wasn’t cheap. But the English, whose basic level of disposable income wasn’t HUGELY above ours, came in their droves, not just paying the fares, but paying for hotels, flights and ferries, on top of that.

We’d do a raffle. The English folks would buy ten tickets and throw a fiver on top as a donation. Not so our own good folks here - we would buy one, or none, or look out the window!

Such, boys and girls, is life; we are grateful to our neighbours from GB - without you over the years, it’s very possible the RPSI might no longer exist, such was your level of support!

The Irish market, such as it is, has deep pockets....and very short arms.

28 minutes ago, leslie10646 said:

....Bearing in mind the colossal cost, why would anyone want to restore her to run on the Cork line for just a few runs a year? At least the GNR 4-4-0s can run almost anywhere?

I know that Ken and Rob would love to take her for a spin down to Cork, but .........

Would make more sense to export her to the Victorian Railways network in Australia. She'd get the run of herself over there - something that was never quite possible in Ireland.

It's an island off Galway, "near to where they're dumping the oul glow in the dark", so there wouldn't have been a railway link to it. An isolated island line might have been 3ft gauge at most.

Would the line serve that whole Chinatown area?

Remember also the whole West side of the island broke away in a storm, so there isn't actually a West side anymore.

On 16/5/2022 at 9:54 AM, jhb171achill said:

MORE "edgy" than Strabane?  ...ye gawds...........!

I'd say there's hot competition from North Inner Dublin.

57 minutes ago, Northroader said:

That’s the feller who went on to be a bishop, wasn’t it?

"DON'T CALL ME LEN, YE LITTLE B*LL*CKS!!"

On 10/12/2023 at 8:23 AM, Mayner said:

....Branchlines have the advantage of lovely old fashioned printed catalogues/leaflets and Irish and Manx models in 4 and 7mm scales

Available in PDF form, at no charge.

On 6/12/2023 at 12:30 AM, jhb171achill said:

NOW ye're talking!

If Ireland had migrant-only parties such as

- Hizb-ut-TahrEire

- Hezbollix

- Brasileiroo

- NigeriEir Advance Party

those would go some way to breaking the cosy hegemony. Until then, there's only SF.

Do you not have a quartering jig?

2 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

........the gobdaws and gombeen men we elect ....

In many ways, they reflect much of the electorate. Maybe if there were immigrant parties, that might set the cat amongst the electoral pigeons...

On 3/12/2023 at 12:01 PM, spudfan said:

I hope that rope has the CE certification mark.

Alternatively, another example of modern slavery.

42 minutes ago, jhb171achill said:

2042???? Are they seriously having a laugh? Any other country would have built 200km of track between now and then. Well, any that the (UK) Conservatives weren't involved with, anyway - or Fine Gael Fail.

TWENTY YEARS to deliver a few miles of track largely along an existing alignment!!!

That's probably to allow enough room for future governments to kick the can even further down the road.