Mol_PMB

Many thanks! Here’s a slightly closer view of the 6-wheeler: And some tenders: I would probably have taken more photos but I was distracted by the arrival of this: Which incidentally is a bit of a livery variation itself. For most of the supertrain livery era, loco numbers were low down on the bodyside behind the cab, presumably because the tablet catcher was on the cabside. There was a short period in the mid 1980s, after the tablet catchers were removed but before the white stripes were added to the livery. when some locos were repainted in supertrain with cabside numbers. This wasn’t common on the 001s, but there were a fair number of 141s with cabside numbers in supertrain livery. When the white stripe livery was introduced, the cabside became the standard place for the numbers on all classes.

Weathering stages on the corrugated wagons continue and should be complete tomorrow. Now that I've got the various kits to play with I should have enough parts to complete the alternative brake gear on one of them - a job for tomorrow. In the meantime I have started a project that may be familiar to many: an ex-GNR cement van. I've convinced myself by lots of scaling off photos that the van body of the GNR van is the same size as the BR vans - rather than the slightly shorter and wider Irish standard. That makes things easier! I'm using the Parkside PC08A kit as a basis, but I've swapped the solebars from a Parkside PC25 as they have the right sort of axlebox (but the wrong brakes). I needed to add extra V hangers anyway so that was no great problem, and the PC08A solebars have an alternative destiny... I've cut and sanded off the buffers and re-drilled at Irish spacing. I have some spare RCH buffers I can rob from a Cambrian chassis kit. The holes for the vents have been filled with a slice of plasticard and some filler which I'll deal with tomorrow once it's set hard. In the meantime I've added a load of little etched details to the sides, to replace the moulded bits that weren't quite right. These came from the Mainly Trains 'wagon detailing components' etch, the Cambrian etched tiebars, and the 51L 'Brake levers, V's and guides' etch BLGVB. I'll be using more parts off these later... Photo of a prototype from Jeremy Chapter on Flickr: I am considering getting some rivet transfers from Railtec to add the rivets/bolts around the edge of the doors. Many of these vans seem to have acquired strips across the roof, as in the photo above, but they weren't built with them and some survived to the end without. I'm quite tempted to model the one shown in Neil Smith's photo here, dated 1981. In this pair it's the H van that has the strips on the roof, not the GN van! The wheels supplied with this kit have a finer profile than the ones in the IRM corrugated wagon - the tyre width is 2.2mm rather than 2.8mm. This should mean there's no difficulty in setting them to 21mm gauge, except that I'll need to lengthen the axle. In fact the wheel profile matches that on the EM gauge wheelsets I bought. So I think I'll end up using some wheels of this type to replace the IRM ones in the corrugated wagons. Not the best photo but this shows the finer profile of the wheels in the Parkside kit compared to those in the IRM corrugated wagon: Anyway, more tomorrow.

Decades ago I tried to cut and shut some Triang Big Big Train Mk2 coaches into something resembling an Irish Mk2. I think that was about the end of my Irish O gauge project that never really got off the ground! These look much better...

Looking through my old Irish photos I found one of 'my' boxes at Limerick in the early 2000s: Even back then, this was one of the older MOL boxes with the original livery. MOL is of course a compound acronym where the O is itself an acronym

I've got several locos needing renumbering or a change of logo to represent my favourite ones. They are: Bachmann 181 class Murphy 141 class IRM 001 class Firstly, I'd be interested to learn from anyone's experiences of removing numbering on these particular types of models. Which methods worked best - IPA, T-cut, fine abrasive, careful scraping? Which methods attacked the paint? Secondly, what's the best source of number transfers to suit Supertrain livery? Railtec seem to do sheets to suit particular loco classes, but not these ones. There are two distinct styles of number: Side numbers on these classes are larger, with a serif on the 1 and with black shading. Front numbers are usually smaller, sans-serif and unshaded (you wouldn't see the shading on an 001 class because it's applied to a black background, but it's also missing on the 141/181 classes). Also, some locos had S or SA suffixes which were smaller and unshaded. My photos of 158 and 014 illustrate the different number styles: For completeness, I should note that the first few 141/181 supertrain repaints in 1974 used the larger seriffed shaded numbers on the front too. Here's one of Ernie's photos showing 156 in the late 1970s: The following locos carried this style in the 1970s until their next repaint: 141, 156, 158, 160, 173, 175, 182 to 186, 188 to 190. There may have been a few more. And finally, not part of the question, a bit of inspiration for those cases where you can't quite get the old and new numbers to line up, or the sizes don't match, or the varnish doesn't protect them properly... (all my pics, and in IE days so well after my modelling time period) Cheers, Mol

I'm going to call this finished, for now at least: To add a bit of colour, I got the baby GMs out of their boxes for the first time. These both need some work (renumbering, weathering, DCC chips, probably regauging) but I want to finish off a few more wagons first. 149 is from the current Murphy Models batch, and is in late 1970s / early 1980s condition with tablet catchers: Factory-weathered 190 is from the first Bachmann batch, and is in mid-late 1980s condition without tablet catchers, but with SA suffix to its numbers and electrification flashes:

I think that's a breakdown train van, that runs with the crane. Presumably they were operated by the loco department which only owned tins of dark grey and red paints?

Like the middle one here (my photo):

Lovely work! I look forward to seeing this develop.

Many thanks for your thoughts and experiences. I suspect this was a fairly rare livery - applied for a short time and only to those wagons that happened to need repainting. It's applied to 2-plank dropside wagons, but when you see whole trains of them there are only a couple of red ones in the mix. I have also found a few more images, though some of these show different views of the same wagons and the livery isn't always clear. This is faded red with black underframe, it appears to have been 24477 but has been renumbered 360A without a repaint. It's the same type (converted from cattle wagon) and same lettering layout as 24514 we saw previously: https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53570644103 Just in the corner of the photo, this is the steel underframe type 24051-24100, in red with black underframe. And again in the distance, same train: https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53511304476 https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53510410237 This is probably 24076, we saw it in the previous post from a different angle, but the same location: https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53511469593 This appears to be 1970s all over bauxite: https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53509338094 This one clearly has different chassis and body colour, but it's not red. Bit of a mystery: https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53509335364 Finally, although this is also a 2-plank dropside it's a different type of wagon with taller sides and it's in the 1950s snail era. The whole thing (including underframe) is a reddish colour: https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53570466216 https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53570823079 https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53570499236 https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53511622074 Cambrian kit C077 might be a good starting point for a model. It is 17'0" over headstocks (very close) with 9'6" wheelbase (not quite right). Rapido made one in RTR but it's sold out:

Weathering continues. It's a slow process as I have to do one side at a time, and let it dry throroughly before applying the next layer. I'd say I'm about half way there with them. One is particularly heavily weathered, the other two are more moderate. At the moment it's all too contrasty, but a dark wash and a light spray of dirt will blend it back together. I bought a couple of EM gauge wagon wheelsets which have a finer profile than the OO ones. I think if I swap them into the corrugated wagons, I'll be able to get the 19.2mm BTB without the wheels rubbing on the W irons. Of course the EM axles are the wrong length... I wonder whether IRM could be persuaded to sell replacement 21mm gauge wheelsets? In other news, some wagon kits have arrived, and there will be much swapping of parts to achieve the desired results! I have a Parkside PC08A, PC25 and PC65, a Cambrian C107, and C105, plus a selection of spare buffers and brake gear parts. I'm hoping these can be mixed up to produce a GNR ex-cement van, a CIE palvan, and two NIR ex-Courtaulds wagons. More on them once the corrugated opens are finished.

The vegetation on the photo plank is now almost complete. All the bushes and shrubs are in place, though I may still add a bit more localised texture to the grassy areas, and trim the edges. I am working on a fence for the top of the cutting but at present the holes are marked with cocktail sticks while I prepare the fenceposts. I also plan to fit a plain grey backscene so you don't have to look at all the mess behind!

This photo from Ernie dated 1978 shows a couple of the PWD 2-plank dropsides, one in unpainted wood and the other which I think is dirty bright red because it has a grey underframe. It could just be bauxite, but the lettering style matches the bright red ones. Inconclusive, but at least this shows the type of wagon that was red. Here's a closer look at the unpainted one, also on a grey underframe. At least I assume it's unpainted rather that a creamy yellow?

One would make a fine 'gate guardian' at Cultra!

I stumbled across this web page http://www.nwrail.org.uk/nw2407d.htm which has a nice selection of Irish colour photos from 1969, the rather monochrome period when all the wagons were grey and many of the locos were black! Certainly plenty of grey H vans and their earlier cousins to be seen here, no outlandish colours at all: http://www.nwrail.org.uk/dp2159.jpg http://www.nwrail.org.uk/dp2141.jpg http://www.nwrail.org.uk/dp2131.jpg