Mayner

The Midland Cavan branch was very indirect compared with road for Dublin-Cavan traffic over 20 miles longer and served a sparsely populated area which probably contributed to its demise. The branch seems to have been built to feed cattle traffic from the midlands into the port of Belfast. The GNR is likely that the GNR would have closed the Dundalk-Omagh line and branches if it had been allowed to operate road services in Northern Ireland, it already had established a direct Dublin-Cavan-Enniskillen bus service an an extensive network of bus routes in Cavan, Meath and Monaghan There is a tale of a J15 arriving unexpectedly in Dundalk from Cavan with the CIE weedspray train at some stage after the 1958 take over, irate telephone calls & telegrams to the traffic people in Dublin. The last passenger train over the INW & Cavan branch appears to have been a circular IRRS tour by an ex GNR AEC railcar set going out over the GNR lines returning by the Midland. The A Class on the Monaghan GAA special may have arrived from Dundalk rather than Mullingar, some of the coaches seem to have been ex-GNR including a re-gauged LNWR coach. Cavan would be an interesting place to model beside CIE & GNR locos and stock UTA 4-4-0 No 81 Carrickfergus Castle was on hire to the GNR and regularly worked into Cavan in the early 1950s

Its an interesting one everything in the photo looks a bit to clean and well maintained for a railway in terminal decline in the late 50s. The track layout in the photo has more in common with the CIE rather than the GNR yard, the connecting line between two companies was laid in bullhead. CIE continued to operate the Midland and GNR Cavan branches as two separate systems up to closure, with Cavan served by a steam hauled goods and a diesel railcar mail train from Dundalk & a C Class hauled goods from Mullingar There are photos of GNR locos and railcars being turned on the Midland turntable & the WTT included whistle signals for working between the two yards so its not unlikely that a CIE loco would work into the northern yard to interchange traffic with the GNR. Cavan would make an interesting model if I had the space!! Possibly Roscrea stand of trees in background GSWR signal cabin and cattle bank sidings (long lifted) in the distance

596 appears to be arriving in Cavan, the location is fairly distinctive the train appears to be on the connecting line to the GNR yard. The Midland platform road and goods yard on the left, the diverging line on the right lead to the cattle bank, loco shed and turntable. In the 1950s Cavan was distinctly odd a CIE station with more GNR than CIE traffic. The Clones-Cavan line was still treated as a main line with a frequent by Irish standards service of through trains to Belfast, while CIE operated a daily goods from Mullingar. Looking the other 604 with train station and Midland yard in background. "A Decade of Steam" Photo Drew Donaldson?

Interesting one JHB oil burning ex-MGWR Cattle Engine J5 0-6-0 on the passenger rather than an Ex MGWR C 4-4-0 (D6 or D7), well dressed people at the station, good to see that everything wasn't in black and white those days well dressed people at the station.

SSM produced a whitemetal IRCH open wagon kit, good for the GSR/CIE & GNR(I) versions. Fairly simple to assemble. Alternatively the Hornby Dublo/Wrenn/Dapol 5 plan open looks close if you ignore the brake gear Provincial Wagons commissioned a run of Dapol opens in GNR livery & GNR with CIE branding .

Its difficult to see demand for a kit of an Irish model exceeding 100 units. The Irish market is predominantly rtr with a very small proportion of modellers prepared to assemble a kit regardless of quality or ease of assembly. RTR is dominated by high quality Chinese commissions by Murphy Models diesel locos and coaches and Irish Railway Models freight stock, and a number of smaller producers such as Provincial Models, Irish Freight Models and Silverfox Models who produce small quantities of rtr models using resin & 3 D printing techniques. The 1960-2000 scene in Southern Ireland (CIE/Irish Rail) is reasonably well covered by rtr models and kits, Northern Ireland (NIR) less so heavily dependent on kits The big gap in the market appears to be for models of locomotives and rolling stock introduced since 2000 and architectural models both north and south.

There was one batch of 47 footers 30279-30284 built for keg traffic in 1978, these wagons were used to carry containers when container traffic from Ballina to Dublin and Waterfrd Ports resumed about 10 years ago. ironically the 62' bogie log wagons in the background of the Ballina photos were originally introduced as container flats in the early 1980s and converted to carry logs after mail traffic finished in the 1990s

Haven't seen it personally Brian McCann built a CDR exhibition layout about 20 years ago in 3mm scale on N gauge track. Brian's modeling was/is to a high standard, think he modeled one of the villages on the CDR complete with station. The railcars were scratchbuilt in plasticard with Kato power bogies.

The HO sleeper size and spacing creates an illusion of making the gauge look wider and the distance longer than it actually is which works very well where there is a single track like in the last photo. The correct 4mm sleeper length and sleeper spacing tends to make OO gauge look like 3'6" Cape Gauge used in South Africa and my part of the World.

I understand that the RPSI considered loaning 27 to Westrail for use in the West of Ireland before IE embargoed the Athenry-Claremorris Line in the early 1990s. Apparently the RPSI & Westrail came very close to a loan agreement for the loco, but the plan fell through at teh 11th hour when Westrail lost their main line connection at Tuam.

Automotive paint suppliers like Vinny Byrne's can usually supply enamel or laquer in spray can or for brush application if you have a BS or RAL code or a sample. Usually costs about $17 (not sure what you would pay in Ireland) for a 350ltr spray can of a custom colour My local paint supplier has successfully colour matched existing models, no shame in bringing a loco or coach into a paint suppliers, they are only interested in keeping the customer happy and bringing in the money. Transfer/decal carrier film tends to show up on a matt finish unless you use rub on decals. A gloss or satin enamel is the best option for locos and coaches and finishing with a satin or flat laquer if you intend to apply decals or transfers.

The small GMs basically replaced locos like the J15 on the goods and D14 on passenger services with a little extra power to spare as a diesel would not stand up to the same level of abuse as a steam loco. In an ideal world it would be nice to see 184, 186 & Lough Erne given at least a cosmetic restoration rather than stored out of sight out of mind

Ballinamore hub of the C&L narrow gauge lines in CIE days. A very busy place when the coal trains from the Arigna mines were running.

Dave I wasn't sure if the master for the Marks Models 201 was produced by Noel Dodd or Tony Mirolo both highly talented modelers. Are there any photos that could be posted of Noel's Greystones layout an Irish & UK exhibition staple of the mid-late 1990s? For those that are not familiar Greystones was a massive exhibition layout that featured a near scale length model of the station and its environment.

Dave. Have you managed to acquire a Marks Models resin 201 Class kit? As far as I recall the kits were cast from a master produced by an MRSI member who produced a fleet of plasticard 201s that ran on lengthened Athearn SD45 chassis during the mid-late 1990s. The scratchbuilt 201s were built and finished to a high standard and close to the standard of rtr diesel locos available at the time. John

I came across my planning notes from around four years ago, it looks like I considered a multi level end to end layout and a layout with an island in the center of the room before deciding on a single level U shaped scheme. I tested the center island concept by dividing the with of the room into 1m units based on a 900mm minimum radius & 100mm min distance from the edge of the square, I later prepared a scheme using 1136mm squares based on a minimum radius of 1000 for 21mm gauge, with a minimum aisle width of 500mm. I abandoned the center island concept as my workbench occupies the centre of the room. The main station in the initial plan was based on Kiltimagh, the second a typical of smaller stations on the Limerick-Sligo line with a goods loop and single siding, though the diamond crossing crossover arrangement is similar to Ferbane on the Banagher branch, at this stage I still seem to have had fantasies about an upper level. Kiltimagh did not work visually in the space available with most of the yard hemed in between the two level crossing gates. I eventually looked at Tubbercurry which appeared to be a better fit for the available space & the bonus of a loco shed and turntable, Ballingarne Junction seems to have slipped into the plan though I don't remember if this was intended to be part of a multi level or island set up. Hopefully I will find time during the next week to draw out the block plan for the folded 8 scheme to scale to see if the concept can be made to work in an Irish context., I may need to widen the baseboard to fit a hidden line into the area behind the main station.

I have used the Wills corrugated sheets for buildings on various layouts, including a loco shed, Wills also do a thin translucent sheeting which is useful for roofs where you dont want a thick edge showing https://www.modelrailwaysdirect.co.uk/Wills-Kits-SSMP216-Corrugated-Iron-4-sheets-(75x133mm)-per-pack/ ii you want something more realisitic Ambis Engineering EIW Corrugated sheeting http://www.ambisengineering.co.uk/Products/Products_Index.htm. The main advantage of the Wills sheets over the EIW sheeting, is that there is no need for a supporting structure.

Gisborne Airpost still has an operational level crossing controlled by miniature colour light signals. The line carries steam charter specials in connection with cruise ship visits. Air traffic normally has priority with the signals released by a tablet in the control tower http://www.amusingplanet.com/2013/08/gisborne-airport-runway-with-railway.html

It looks like the was taken in the early-mid 1980s before the Bell Lines terminal was transferred to the Holyhead Yard and the run down of the Transtrack sundries services. Sundries traffic handled in the Midland Yard included a lot of high value urgent traffic including cigarettes, spirits, lubricating oil and motor parts which became a prime target for the growing logistic industry once road transport was de-regulated during the early 1990s. The sidings in the Midland Yard south of the Sherriff St bridge were used for loading/unloading general container traffic using large fork lifts, including scrap in open containers for the Galway Metal Company & grain traffic Up to the introduction of the IWT liners there was little direct wharf to rail container traffic through Dublin Port, the majority of rail borne container traffic through Dublin Port involved a road transfer from the Holyhead Yard to the container wharfs north and south of the Liffey. The Transtrack Store was built on the site of the old MGWR goods store which was destroyed by fire during the late 1960s. Most of track south of the Sherriff St bridge was abandoned in 2003 for the National Convention Centre and Treasury Holdings apartment developments and the remaining (Cork, Limerick & Ballina) container services diverted to the former groupage terminal on the north side of the Sherriff St bridge. The decision to run down freight and develop the North Wall site appears to have been as a result of Government pressure for CIE (Mary Harney as Minister of Transport) to cash in on its (under-utilised) assets to free up money for investment in passenger services. At the same time the closure of Asahi and failure of Bell Lines severely cut into the traffic base and profitability of rail while dis-functional labour relations within IE played into the hands of management and Merrion Street.

One of this years New Resolutions was to start some new builds along with finishing my un-finished projects. Top of the list were a pair of hooded vans for the mail and passenger trains as I did not keep any for myself when I released the vans in 2013. Following Eoin's example made a simple jig or fixture to temporary clamp the parts together while soldering the sides to the floor and ends. In this case I screwed the floor to a sheet of MDF and used a piece of stripwood to clamp the sides against the floor and ends until soldered in place. The ends on the JM Design 4w vans are designed as part of the floor and fold up into position to speed assembly, rather than assembled as separate parts.The doors are designed to fit into the recess, solder is locally sourced 139° with dilute "Ranex Rust Buster" (phosphoric acid solution). I usually use an Antex 55 W TCS Temperature Controlled Iron but I have recently graduated to a Hakko Soldering Station The vans were built on Bulleid Triangulated chassis with the usual Inchacore bufferbeam arrangement with the flanges facing outwards, tricky to form from flat metal parts. Designing a workable arrangement for the underframe was tricky as the axleguards/W irons usually fit behind the underframe channels, designing a headstock/buffer beam that would fold up easily was challenging to say the least. 1 Solebar one buffer beam. Folding up solebar flange in vice . The finished article The head wrecking stuff folding up the buffer beams! Fold 1 Fold 2 Completing the channel/fold 2 Completed buffer beam in position Van with solebars and buffer beams soldered in place. Solebar folded up and held in position for soldering An evenings work. Next stage running and brake gear

I have been working on and off over the past 10 years converting our garage into a model railway room. The garage like our house is timber frame and weather board construction dating from the mid 1920s probably intended for the owners Model T Ford. When we moved in the garage had a distinctive lean the timber (Totara) piled foundations had rotted away. Luckily the framing was generally in good condition and we were able to level up and re-pile and renovate the interior of the garage as a model railway room/workshop. Although I installed the baseboard framing nearly three years ago, there has been little or no progress on the layout, which had become a repository for rubbish and half completed models. This week I finally managed to clear out some of the clutter in the garage and start thinking about planning the railway. The baseboards for the 4mm layout are approx 1.4m above floor level above storage shelving and the Staging for the garden railway. The initial plan was for a U shaped layout around 3 of the walls, until I get round to replacing the roller shutter garage doors with a conventional doorway. One of the spurs for renewed interest in the layout was that we are likely to remain in Hamilton for at least another 7 years. I have a history of having to move once I make good progress on a layout. The original plan was for a single track point to point layout with a minimum of two stations running to hidden staging at each end, based on the Limerick-Sligo line. The option of building the layout as a continuous run opens up the idea of a looped 8 style tracklayout doubling the length of the main line and increasing the distance between stations, with what the Americans call "Surround Staging" where the staging is sited behind a scenic break around the perimeter of a layout rather than a traditional fiddle or staging yard. I used this technique on a N gauge layout where the 6 road staging yard was hidden behind a low backdrop at the back of the main yard. I am planning to build most of the layout using open top baseboards using a variant of the American L Girder system where the trackbed is supported on risers fixed to crossbearers, part of the layout is supported on L Girders salvaged from a layout I had started in Auckland . The staging track will be laid at a lower level than the scenic section, the Mail train is supposed to be posed on an embankment, the E Class and wagons in the staging. At some stage the folded 8 will have to cross over itself which will either involve a crossover very unusual in Ireland or an overpass to allow one line to pass above another with interesting grades. The current staging set up is based on a traverser which runs on kitchen drawer slides. This allows longer trains to be staged in a given space compared with using a turnout ladder, but 1200mm is short for a main line goods or passenger trains. Next stage is to rough out a block design for the main line to see if I can make the idea of "Surround Staging" work for a 4mm layout on 500mm wide baseboards & to clear the remaining clutter from the baseboard tops Irish stock MM B141 diesel Shapeways E421on Bullant chassis with my detail overlays, JM Design heating Van & 4w PO van, SSM GNR 30T Brake & modified Parkside BR vanfits The train in the second is part of an EM gauge minimum space Welsh Borders effort using "floating trackwork" which did not quite work. The loco is an Airfix Dean Goods on a brass chassis (with motor in the engine!) coupled to a City of Truro tender and a mixture of Cambrian, Parkside and Airfix wagons

I was planning to scratch build a C&L 4-4-0T and had even bought a set of driving and bogie wheels shortly before Backwoods Miniatures introduced a kit for the loco and other items of C&L rolling stock. Modelling the C&L suddenly became a lot easier in the mid 1990s thanks to the combination of Backwoods Miniatures, Branchlines & Worsley Works, loco, coach and wagon kits. 2L formerly Kathleen now preserved in the UFTM Cultra ()etched brass/whitemetal) 8L (Queen Victoria) as running late 1950s. Van 22L rebuilt Tralee & Dingle brake 3rd as running on C&L in mid 1950s (etched brass) Convertible wagons (Brass & Whitemetal) The convertibles had a whitemetal body on a brass chassis. The wagon modeled by Backwoods was unusual in that all 4 sides were different, the prototype wagon had lost some of its louvers and had a planked door on 1 side C&L 4w passenger brake. (brass) Backwoods appear to have taken a bit of modelers license with the paneling on passenger brake. Paneling was modified/simplified as vans were repaired/overhauled during the GSR/CIE era and eventually re-clad in aluminium sheeting. The coach is a Branchlines CVR 3rd

The lack of commercial success of the Backwoods Miniatures 4mm Irish kits may be a bigger factor affecting the re-introduction the kits or the introduction of the range in 7mm than any issues alleged issues involving the artwork I bought and assembled a number of Backwoods Miniatures Irish narrow gauge kits and spoke to Pete McParlin the designer/owner of the business on a number of occasions during the past 20 year Pete not consider the Irish kits to be a commercial success and focused increasingly on the OO9 and On30 American market including commissioning rtr on30 brass locos from China. Backwoods produced the Irish kits to special order since around 1996-7 presumably ordering the etchings as required until until their stock of castings, wheels gears and motors ran out. When we last spoke about 4-5 years ago Pete told me that he failed to sell a single CVR 0-4-2T kit since its introduction in 1993-4. The display model of the CVR loco looked very nice, with skirts raised on one side to display the joy valve gear. The loco kits were reasonably priced for complete kits including wheels gears and motor. Backwoods used a combination of on-line and magazine advertising and attending specialist narrow gauge and major model railway exhibitions including a display of painted and assembled kits including the CVR 0-4-2T. In retrospect Backwoods made the mistake of overestimating the level of interest in OOn3 models of Irish locos and stock following the early success with the OO9/OOn3 County Donegal Railcars and simply introduced a very diverse range of Irish OOn3 locos and stock that the market could not support. John

Hi Tony Have you considered using a lifting bar flap section immediately inside the door for your continuous run? This would allow you to both maximise the length of the continuous run and extend the length of the headshunt at the Northern end of the yard. I have sketched out a rough block plan based on Omagh North with a bar flap just inside the doorway, it might be worth building the layout as a double tracked layout as there is no room for a crossover on the curve at the Portadown/Enniskillen end of the station with a min radius of 34" through the platform roads. The 28" grid is based on an American planning tool to work out whether a curve will fit within a given space. (24" minimum radius plus 4" allowance to outer edge of baseboard. This would allow you a lot more operational flexibility than with the bridging section half way across the operating well, the ability to have two trains running continuously or the operational complexity when the Irish North West was in operation with through Belfast-Bundoran excursions in addition to goods and passenger traffic from the Irish North Fitting in staging with a conventional turnouts would be difficult on the opposite side, one solution might be to build a traverser style fiddle yard https://www.google.co.nz/search?q=traverser+fiddle+yard&rlz=1C1CHBF_enNZ752NZ752&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjf4s6eqZjZAhWMVLwKHVOfA6wQ7AkIMg&biw=1366&bih=662 This would work nicely if you raise the trackbed on a raised sub-base with most of the viewing side of the station on an embankment.

Probably build the RGS from Placerville to Rico & the Telluride Branch in 1:20.3 (if I hire an Antonov An223 to shift my large scale collection from Hamilton to Fargo) there is enough room and plenty of provisions in the basement. Would be an interesting foil on You Tube to Bill Scobies RGS in Canada https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvuhJqMNJqc Model shops in the state only appear to stock BNSF, though being me would probably model some obscure shortline or offshoot of the CP or Milwaukee Road