GSWR 90

DCDR stated on its social media that it would post updates regarding the vandalism when relevant, which hasn't happened yet. Based on the helpful link that you posted, most of the potential outcomes would require the perpetrators to contact DCDR, so I assume that no formal decision has been made by the PSNI/Youth Diversion Officer/whoever makes that decision.

I am very supportive of taking a holistic approach to societal problems like this; however, the answer to dealing with vandalism is certainly not doing nothing, which seems to be the current approach taken by the authorities (PSNI/Youth Diversion Officer) and the children's parents. Whatever the reason why they might do this sort of thing, DCDR – a volunteer-run charity which has faced pretty extreme difficulties over the past few years – and donating members of the public are paying the price even though they did nothing wrong. According to a mutual friend that I have with the perpetrators, one of them said himself that he did it because he was bored; another is an Andrew Tate fan, which suggests a high degree of narcissism and arrogance and an extreme lack of empathy. The perpetrators have also expressed to their friends that they are very pleased that they likely won't face any repercussions for what they did. Contrast this with the 100+++ hours that volunteers spent scrolling through and recording CCTV footage, emailing/phoning/showing around the police, spending tens of thousands of pounds on security upgrades over the past few years, cleaning up broken glass etc, measuring and ordering five replacement windows, travelling to Dublin and back to pick up glass, putting up wood hoarding and making the three coaches watertight, repairing the broken door, making new tables, etc.

Thankfully the railway reopened since that was filmed, it started operating with the 450 on Halloween trains the weekend before last. However, a huge amount of money and work is still needed to repair and replace everything, particularly vital tools like rail grinders, sleeper drills, impact drivers, etc. It will also be a good few months before we have the steam loco operating again

Downpatrick & County Down Railway has opened an online shop on Shopify, so you can buy DCDR merchandise any time of the year and from any place in Ireland or the UK. We currently have some mugs, tea-towels, and badges (including the much sought-after 90 badge) available online, and we will be adding more stock in the coming weeks – feel free to have a browse. downrail.myshopify.com/ As always, 100% of the profit made from selling our merchandise will go straight back into the railway – so please do treat yourself to something nice, as you’ll be giving us a hand with our flood recovery in the process

Yes, it had two toilets in the middle separated by a diagonal partition. Not sure about the history of railway bathrooms but I think 33 had them from new. The first modern toilets appeared at the end of the 18th century, e.g. Bramah and Cummings toilets, so I suppose that makes sense. The toilet in 33 would have been Jennings 'thunderbox' style, we have the top part of the wooden 'box' but we're looking for Jennings-style a bowl and handle, as well as a folding sink. Unfortunately there isn't an end drawing, the drawing of 33 was made by the same volunteer who is designing the underframe. There are a few things that might be different between that drawing and the real thing, which will make it look more like the UR coach in this photo, e.g. the coat of arms will probably be a maiden harp with wolves as supporters instead of a normal harp with unicorns we're hoping to have the toilet windows frosted with the UR coat of arms I think it might have had very small metal steps below the doors as per the photo instead of a larger upper wooden one I think there was also a bit of debate about steps on the end of the coach We'll try to get the font of the numbers, letters etc as close as possible to that in the photo The photo of it being lifted was taken in 2013 before restoration started, I assume the ends were removed and replaced with something cheap in the 1980s since they were rotten. Here's a more recent picture of it with end moulding. I will see if I can upload some other original UR drawings at some point.

Iarnród Éireann made a few bum bags out of Dart moquette to celebrate the 40th anniversary Maybe not extremely fashionable but will make a nice museum piece at DCDR – it’s the closest we can get to preserving the real thing!

Yes! Just an idea that has been batted about – it had two toilets, so one would be a (non-functioning) toilet and the other would be a museum. I think that would be more informative/interesting/better use of space than just another toilet. Even if we don't do that, would still be nice to have some more UR artefacts.

I will start going to greater efforts to get UR stuff once we have agreed that the toilet is becoming a museum... Would be a pain to acquire stuff only to have nowhere to put it I think we'd mainly be looking for non-paper items, as the humidity in the workshop and the gallery unfortunately tends to make paper go soggy after a while

By the way, if anyone has any Ulster Railway railwayana I'd be very interested in speaking with you. Some of us have discussed turning one of the toilets into a small museum about the Ulster Railway, as very few people know much about the UR even though it was the first railway in what is now Northern Ireland. However, it can be very difficult to get artefacts from a railway that closed 150 years ago

In 1862, when 33 was built: They stopped making groats in 1855 so they probably still used them in 1862 Bismark became PM of Prussia and Germany hadn't been invented yet Italy had been unified the year before, but it didn't include Rome yet (which was still under the control of the Papal States) The American Civil War was still going on, and the US emancipation proclamation hadn't been made yet The famine was closer to 1862 than the troubles is close to now The first confirmed landing on Antarctica didn't occur for another 30+ years Funny enough, if they had measured it in mm they might have noticed that one side of the coach is 12mm longer than the other!

It's amazing how far it's come from being a container to store seats not so long ago. Length of underframe is 7045mm, width is 2285mm. If you are planning to make a model of it, please let me know, as we've done quite a lot of research into what it should look like

They had some in stock yesterday! Hope that this story provided some good advertising for them. I’m confident they’ll make more at some point, we’re talking to them about printing some other stuff for us too

Based on the drawings that we do have, I think only the wagons had UR plates (see bottom pic). However, we are after Joseph Wright works plates to either make resin replicas of or to scan for 3D printing.

We got ours from Titan Forge 3D and you can buy them on Etsy. The older version is a replica of one supplied by the Ulster Folk and Transport Museum

Harland & Wolff are currently constructing an underframe for the Downpatrick & County Down Railway's oldest coach, Ulster Railway 33. When we got 33 in the late 1980s, it had been out of use as a railway carriage for about 60 years. The interior fittings had all been removed, it suffered badly from various forms of rot, some idiot (not me) had hit it with a digger, and it didn't have an underframe. It was wrapped in tarp and used to store seat cushions for a long time out the front of the yard, until about 2013 when the old horrible-looking fence was replaced by the current brick frontage. One of our volunteers designed a metal frame so it could be very carefully lifted onto a donor brown van underframe which was built by Harland and Wolff in the 1940s. Volunteers removed the cushions and started to carry out some remedial work so it didn’t fall apart. The more they pulled out the fittings from its life as an office and on a farm, the more original panelling they found, and the more they realised that they had something special on their hands. With most of the bodywork restoration completed between 2018 and now, the main problem became getting an underframe sorted. Although the original drawings for this particular coach didn't survive, one of our volunteers along with two master's students from Queen's University designed a new one from scratch, using other contemporary drawings in the hands of Birmingham City Council for guidance. They spent hundreds, if not thousands of hours measuring the coach and the parts we have, and creating and testing CAD models. I wonder what the craftsmen who built 33 in the 1860s would have thought of that? We thought we'd be pushing our luck by asking H&W to fabricate the underframe, but the opportunity couldn't have been more perfect for both of us – they have over 100 apprentices who are constantly looking for projects to work on, so this is a perfect opportunity for them to learn unique new skills. It should hopefully be delivered for Downpatrick in the next few weeks, where the wheels, brake gear etc can be added. This is the first time that a new underframe has been constructed from scratch for a preservation project in Ireland (and we even got 3D printed H&W works plates) – and hopefully not the last...

Here’s a test piece based on the sample of UR paint found on the coach

That was quick! Exactly what I was looking for, thank you so much!

Hello, Does anyone have any photos of any other bilingual/Irish language signs used by the GSR/CIÉ? I’m looking specifically for a relatively large metal one that the GSR might have used. Thanks

Someone mentioned to me that the English font for GSR running-in boards is Gill sans or something very similar to it. The Irish is in bunchló GC, which seems to have been a pretty standard + very gorgeous seanchló from the 19th century. It, or something similar to it, seems to have been used in at least some CIÉ carriage signs until the 1950s. You can download it here at gaelchlo.com, along with keyboard extensions which allow you to use poncanna séimhithe and other interesting things – e.g. ṁ, ı, and ⁊. There are several stylistic sets included in the font, including new and old versions of the tironian et, as well as new and old versions of 's' (ſ) and 'r' (ɼ). You don't need a licence to use the font to write in a Celtic language. Here are some samples:

Thank you, good idea. Will see what we can do

Found some of what is hopefully the original livery on the coach

Thanks – they were able to provide the colours for our BCDR and GSWR coaches, not sure whether that was because they provided paint to them themselves or because they have the records of another company. I emailed them a while ago and I think their records only go back to the start of the 20th century

The people at Downpatrick are thinking of colours for the Ulster coach... does anybody have any ideas on specifics? We know that it was 'brick red' but that's not very helpful! Would anyone happen to have the RAL numbers for e.g. the Indian Red on the Manx or Furness locos?

Would anybody have any details of the interior of 900? There was a photo online I think of it after withdrawal but I can't find it. GSWR 69 at Downpatrick is being rebuilt to a configuration similar to 900 and I'd be very interested to see some photos of the inside of the original for inspiration.