Mol_PMB

@Horsetan, would you like me to send you a list of links/refs to photos of 560? It'll take me a little while to sort it out - I have them all but they're scattered in different places. Would be interested to hear of how you get on with the kit. I have an SSM one to build too, also 21mm gauge, and also as 560. Continuing with Midland kettle matters, Evri left my parcel on the front doorstep in full view of the road at lunchtime. Fortunately it was still there when I got home - perhaps there were no fences in Manchester that wanted an etched kit of an obscure Irish steam loco? An initial review of the contents and the instructions has identified that this version of the kit doesn't do the Belpaire 'Y' boiler version - I think John produced a different variant of the kit for this, but I wasn't sure which version I'd bought. That limits me to the round-top firebox options (unless I'm going to make major changes) but that's fine - 2 of the 3 preferred prototypes I had identified are round-top. Of the late survivors, my options are now 654 or 655. I've found around 30 photos of each in their final condition, including many in colour. They were both railtour celebrities. They were not identical and either would require some minor modifications to the kit - 655 would need the cab front changing while 654 would need modifications to the tender side sheets. I also need to review the dome and chimney heights to see how the model castings compare to those fitted to the two locos. All this feels possible, and although an MGWR 2-4-0 doesn't really fit my layout theme they are very nice locos and I could imagine a filthy one wheezing around the sidings at Quartertown Mill with a few trucks, as well as turning up with a railtour. A superbly detailed shot of 655 from the NLI collection on Flickr: Zooming out a bit and going back a couple of years, here's a more complete view of 655, from Ernie: 655 had previously carried a Belpaire boiler and retained the tall thin spectacles from that period, whereas 654 had much squarer spectacles. 655 had a squat dome whereas 654's was taller than both the chimney and the cab, giving it a 'camel' appearance. 654 for comparison, Ernie photo: These photos also show the difference in the shape of the platework at the upper front of the tender between the two locos. Another area to modify the kit. On both locos, note the plate sticking up behind the volute springs for the leading wheelset - this was one of the mounts for the original leaf springs. Some locos retained these after the springs had been replaced. A detail I shall add. Perhaps this will be a Christmas project?

I like the idea of Garret's works, how many lowmac wagons have you got for their products? I'm not sure that East Anglia has the right climate for growing dates I do like your approach of roughly mocking up the buildings to get a feel for the size and proportions. I need to do that for Quartertown Mill. My version will probably be to draw something rough on CAD and laser it into cheap cardboard. Then I can develop the CAD into a final version. I've got lazy with the scalpel since I bought the laser!

Is this one bigger? Or just closer?

It’s nearly Panto season, so “Oh no it isn’t”… I have collated lots of photo refs for this loco, including about a dozen colour ones. Mostly on the Fenit branch.

It hauled a railtour to Fenit in June 1961 and was well photographed then, for example this one from Ernie: I have a feeling it wasn’t fully replaced on the Fenit branch until the G611 class arrived the following summer. Then it languished at Cork for a bit.

Many thanks Enda. I'll send you a message later and hopefully can get a couple of 21mm-friendly versions from you. I've built one of John's kits and was very pleased with it, so really I'd be after something as similar as possible to that. I appreciate that you're using a different printer so there may have been some changes enforced by the manufacturing process. Cheers, Paul

Here's another view of the same loco on the same occasion, but from a different angle. Comparing to the van behind, it's definitely grey rather than black, but if you saw the loco on its own it might be harder to tell. I tend to model locos and rolling stock in working condition rather than pristine, and the weathering can have a big influence on the look of the colour. Partly because it overlays the colour of the paint underneath, but also it provides some contrasting shades adjacent to the main colour. Colours can look very different depending on the other colours they are next to. The issue of colour scaling and the influence of lighting is probably something for another thread!

Hi Leslie, Do you have a list of what you still have in stock from your own range of kits? I know you were running things down but did restock a few types. Is the website up-to-date for availability? How does Enda's Ranks wagon compare to John's? Is it still a kit and can it still be built for 21mm gauge? Will you be stocking them? Thanks, Paul

I guess there’s no room for this?

If I had to pick a green engine from Cultra, I think maybe B113? Given the choice you have, I’d pick the tram too! If it is to be a Queen, hasn’t someone done a 3D print that could be rescaled?

I’d pick the green one Isn’t the tram narrow gauge?

Ah, that’s brilliant, many thanks for the info. I hadn’t realised that black had been the ‘standard’ for a while, though in a time when few steam locos were being painted. I thought 655 looked quite black too, but as you say it’s often hard to tell. Good to know that it was actually black. 560 is another loco I plan to model and when it hauled a railtour to Fenit, the better-lit photos show that it was indeed a cleaned dark grey.

Hopefully my ebay ‘bargain’ loco kit (the 650 class ex-MGWR 2-4-0) will also turn up this week. I need to see which variants can be built from the kit I’ve bought. Having read through many of @Mayner ‘s threads on the development and building of the kit, I get the impression that the kit evolved and they may not all have offered the same variant options. The good thing is that I can choose between at least three late survivors that worked railtours (653, 654 and 655) which had different variants of cab spectacles, firebox, smokebox, dome and indeed a host of other details. I think 654 was one of the locos painted black (is there a list of those, @jhb171achill ?) but they all seem to have ended their lives in brown filth. Matching the weathering on 655’s tender would be fun! Here’s 654 which has surely been freshly repainted for its railtour duty: A comparison with a similar view of J15 193 also on railtour duty. This one is grey, but 654 looks truly black: (pics from Ernie - thanks)

The worm had moved along the motor shaft. I think I was relying on a press fit rather than any glue. I have got the loco running again though it doesn’t seem quite as smooth - possibly the worm wheel is slightly damaged. One of the hornblocks also seems to have stiffened up in the horns, and needs a fettle. Anyway, back on the layout I am having some of those undesired uncoupling events. I picked a different set of wagons to those I used previously and some are more sensitive than others. Partly due to how free-running they are, but perhaps also influenced by whether they have NEM pockets or Kadee draft boxes. More experiments needed! I may try adjusting the magnet positions. But I think all that is a job for the tail end of the coming week. I’ve got a few busy days at work coming up.

Well, some success and some failure. I’ve completed the point operating rods, and the microswitches for the frog polarity. I’ve had E410 running around the layout for a bit, initially with no problems at all. Then it got something jammed in a set of points, and it stopped with a graunch. I think one of the rail sweeps was a bit low and stuck in a checkrail flangeway. Now E410 doesn’t move and makes unpleasant noises. I think something has come adrift in the gearbox, or possibly a gear has stripped some of its teeth. I need to take it apart and see what’s wrong. So testing will have to go on hold for a while, as this is my only 21mm gauge loco at present. Frustrating.

Some of my uncouplers are on embedded track (set into concrete on the prototype). There's just no space, maybe half a millimetre between the coupler tail and the rail height.

Interesting idea. Tricky for Kadees because there’s almost no clearance between the coupler tails and the rail height. In my case I’m also hoping to avoid the hand of god appearing too much.

Wonderful! Those trains look perfectly at home.

Interesting to see the Lobitos oil storage tanks on the right. I don't recall seeing any photos of Lobitos rail tank wagons in Ireland, although they had some in GB. Later, Lobitos merged with Burmah, who of course did have rail tank wagons in Ireland, though the terminal was in Cork and I don't think they ever ventured north of the border.

I have found that the magnets can move a very free-running wagon in that way, but most of my wagons seem OK. Again I will do some more experiments and fine-tuning. Another solution is to give the very free-running wagons a little more resistance, e.g. with a small piece of foam stuck underneath, rubbing lightly against a wheelset. Not ideal for a large layout with heavy trains, but for a shunting layout with a maximum train length of 3 wagons it could be a fair solution. That would also help to keep couplings taut when trains are being hauled, thereby reducing the problem of unintended uncoupling.

That’s interesting to hear. I certainly want to do plenty of testing before fixing magnets in place permanently. The simple tests I’ve done with just a couple of wagons seem to work ok in all modes, but I can imagine if there’s a bit of bunching in a train being hauled then they might uncouple. I can play with various parameters including the number of magnets, the height they are set at, and the lateral and longitudinal spacing. I can do all of those by tweaking the dimensions of the plywood block in CAD and laser-cutting them. One more drastic possibility would be to physically raise and lower the magnet assembly on a lever. On another layout I used the Kadee electromagnets, which work well but they are huge and power-hungry. I’ve never had much luck with the flat plate magnet type that sits on top of the sleepers. I’ll post an update on how I get on with my experiments.

June 2025, vol 31 no 217

Interesting. There was an article about the Opera Specials in a recent IRRS journal. I only once saw the exec carriages in that livery, in a train at Heuston.

That could be a ‘when the real thing looks like a model’ thread. The trees are reasonably well modelled but only partly disguise the join between the layout and the backscene - the latter seems to have faded in the sun while the layout uses a very garish colour palette. There’s been no effort to weather the rolling stock, and painting a sheet of ripple glass a bilious yellow colour does not make a realistic river! On the plus side, the bridge is very nicely modelled, but it’s let down by the layout presentation with poorly-placed strip lighting.

Some layout progress to report from the last couple of days. Firstly, all the track is now fixed down and the sector plate interfaces completed. Under the board I have done most of the wiring. It’s just the switched feeds to the two frogs that I haven’t dealt with. I’m planning to use some simple dowel rods to work the points, and to have them activate a microswitch to change the frog polarity. That may be a job for tomorrow. Secondly, I had been doing some experiments with uncouplers for the Kadees using rows of miniature magnets (an idea I saw on RMweb). This seems to work quite well - here are a couple of photos of my trial piece (not on the layout, this is made from oddments). The magnetic field is stronger with a steel plate underneath to connect the bottom poles of the magnets. So for the production version I have made some little ‘dominoes’ (or are they licorice allsorts?). The ingredients are a plywood block with holes in (laser-cut), 8 little magnets, and a steel plate: When complete they look like this: By adjusting the hole spacing in the wooden block I can make them fit between the sleepers of the track: The tops of the magnets are level with the sleepers so once the track is painted and ballasted they will be unobtrusive. They are also cheap - 100 magnets cost me less than £10 including postage, and the other materials cost me nothing. I have a few more of these to make, and will then get them installed on the layout. By making them as separate units I hope I can fine-tune their position to optimise performance. Some time in the coming week I hope to be testing the track, points and magnets with E410 and a few wagons.