Mayner

No pubic o WTT Railway Byelines Annual No 5 incudes a 12 page Des Coakham article on the Harcourt Street Line in the 1950s. Excellent selection of high qualty photos of steam and diesel (railcar) trains on the line, photos of Harcourt Street inside and outside the train shed and some of the intermediate stations. Services in the end do not appear to much different than what we would expect on a similar line today 100% railcar worked. Park Royal and Inchacore built AEC railcars, 3 car sets mainly with Park Royal and Laminate intermediate coaches. I had a look around Harcourt Street in the mid-1990s, at the time apart from the track lifting and removal of the Adelaide Rd bridge there was remarkably little change to the buildings or structures in the station or goods yard.

Good piece on putting two motor bogies in Hornby or Lima diesels http://www.emgauge70s.co.uk/model_omwb101.html simpler than trying to shorten a metal chassis with central motor drive to the bogies. The Lima Deltic bogie was close in overall length to the A Class.

Going back to modelling what we felt we were secure with in our childhood does not really stack up for those of us who grew up in the late 50s early-mid 60. Probably the reason why so many people model Continental, American or even the Big Four or the GNR in preference to CIE or UTA. As a teenager I was mainly interested in the GWR mainly from articles in the Railway Modeller, only started to develop an interest in contemporary CIE operation exploring the network on a Rambler Ticket after I left school. The new Supertrains, 1st phase of CTC on the Cork Line, new freight stock was exciting, but as I grew older the traditional steam age railway became more and more enticing. All this probably explains why have American G & N gauge collections and a mixture of Irish and BR locos and stock.

With ex-MGWR senior management at the helm and ex-GSWR staff in charge of things mechanical and civil engineering the GSR was very careful with money. Without a commercial need to establish a new brand you would expect that the GSR would only re-paint locos and stock following a heavy overhaul. Locos and carriages built/overhauled in the early 20s probably would not be due for an overhaul until at least 10-12, high quality paintwork from the Edwardian era with multiple layers of varnish would have lasted even longer. While he first Woolwich Mogul 49 was re-painted before the paint had time to dry from lined MGWR livery into grey and re-numbered into the GSWR, its likely that Broadstone would have continued to use up its paint stocks on locos and coaching stock built or overhauled in early GSR days. Both Inchacore and Broadstone were very busy in the mid-1920s as the railways tried to catch up with repair backlog from WW1 and to replace locos and stock destroyed during the Civil War. Both works were busy turning out large modern mixed traffic locomotives and mainline passenger stock. Although the GSR CME was opposed to superheating small locos Broadstone continued its superheating programme for the 19 remaining 650 Class 2-4-0 some of which may have ran in MGWR black into the 1930s. I am not sure if modern paints are better but in New Zealand we have some locos running in freight service that have not seen the inside of a paint shop since the early 90s that are still in reasonable cosmetic condition. Locos that either have a high level of reliability like straight electrics or non turbo diesels tend to put up higher mileage between visits to the works for a heavy overhaul or the paint shop as opposed to turbo-charged diesels.

You could be half right the cylinder seems to be part of "Cabs" lighting system. If the date of the photo is correct No.92 seems to have been really well cared for by GSR standards possibly something of a 'pet' engine kept in GSWR line green livery like 184 in the late 1950s-60s. No92 is part of the same family of small locos with carriage portions built by the GSWR including No90. No 90 lost her carriage portion and converted to an 0-6-0 side tank possibly for use on the Fermoy-Mitchelstown line in the early 1900s

Very rare and worth looking out for. "Irish Railways Today", Brendan Pender & Herbert Richards - 1967 guide to CIE & NIR lines, locos and stock operating in 1967. Larger format than Locomotives and Rolling stock includes photos of stations, locos, passenger and goods stock, numbering details and background information. There may be a copy in the IRRS Library.

Its probably better to go for double track rather than single track and concentrate on one station when building a layout in a small space particulary if you can have a bridge as a view blocker at each end similar to Dalkey. I gave up trying to fit Ballymoe a small Mayo Line two platform crossing station into a space 17' long, the two station and crossing loop took p nearly 10', the 3' radius approach curves on each end just did not look right for a station on a straight section of line in fairly open country

Micro Mark and North West Shortline in the US produce similar tools for cutting plasticard. The Duplicutter & Duplicate-it have an adjustable stop and is great for accurately cutting large multiple parts such as wagons sides, ends, floors. http://www.micromark.com/duplicate-it,9546.html I have also used the Duplicutter with an Offra Cutter for scribing planking on wagon bodies. The Chopper & Chop-it are guillotines with adjustable stops great for cutting multiple parts in plasticard or stripwood. http://www.micromark.com/chop-it,9547.html I have a NWSL Chopper & a Duplicutter both of which must be getting on for 20-25 years. When the hardboard under the blade gets worn with cutting I just fill the groove with plastic filler and keep going.

At one stage I converted to N gauge as an alternative to working in OO in a small space. By going for a spacious design, fitting in no more track and buildings than an equivalent space in OO, I was able to run 5-6 coach passenger and 15-20 wagon goods trains with reasonably large radius curves by gauge standards. At the time moving to N was no disadvantage as there was little or no Irish rtr available and N gauge locos and stock better than contemporary OO. I stayed with N rather than shifting up to HO when I my modelling interests shifted to American modelling, personally large diesels HO and long freight cars look totally wrong on tight radius curves.

The Waterford and Tramore was famous for only having doors on one side of its coaches as the platforms at Waterford and Tramore were both on the one side of the line. Curiously some of the UTA MPD units were built with drive on the RHS & some on the LHS. Placing the driving controls in a cubicle on the RHS rather than in a full width cab would have followed in W&T tradition and importantly allowed passengers to board through the vestibule doors at either end without major structural alterations to the aluminium body framing. Some of the 1904-1908 main line brake standards built in the early 50s were built with driving cabs for use on the AEC railcar worked Westland Row-Galway/Westport "Cu na Mara" express service to allow the train to split at Athlone. The use of the driving trailers was short lived as the train grew from a 4 to a 6 car set and Westport eventually got its own fast direct services.

Before Tara mines the Dolomite trains were the heaviest in Ireland usually worked by pairs of 141s. The Ballinacourthy-Tivoli oil magnesite-oil trains seem to have been an A Class job and were unusual for a train carrying bulk traffic to run with laden wagons in both directions. It would make sense to re-marshall the train at Waterford to have the laden wagons behind the loco and the empties at the back. While Waterford station was attractive with the elevated signal cabin and the rockface, re-signalling was long overdue the fact that the bay platform can handle all passenger services is proof that the signal cabin and mainline platform are surplus to requirements.

The Tramore line got 3 AEC railcars and 2 Park Royal coaches all with bus seating. Two of the railcars faced Tramore the third faced Waterford. The driving trailer would allow a service to operate if the Waterford facing car was out of service. One of the drawbacks was that on busy days busses were also needed to supplement the train even a 5 coach set seating approx. 500 could not cope with the crowds on busy days. The Tramore railcars were sent to the Thurles Clonmel line on closure then to the Dublin suburban operations. The Park Royal driving car seems to have been converted back to an ordinary coach, boarding passengers through a single doorway would have been extremely slow.

Excellent work with the MPDs Kieran very true to the prototype with the kitbashing of ex LMS coaching stock.

I found a copy of Tim Cramer's article includes a drawing of the station masters house and a platform shelter plus a couple of photos taken shortly before track was lifted. I will scan when I get a chance. Also found articles and drawings no No90 the Bandon & Midland tank locos working on the West Cork in the 1950s if you ever get a whiff of steam. Albert Quay in GSR or early CIE days would be a Corker for a layout There was a great article on Albert Quay including a track layout in one of the Irwell Press magazines and Ernie Shepherds CBSCR (Ian Allen Publishing) includes a lot of good photos of the system in both the steam and diesel era.

Waterfall could be a nice simple passing station for West Cork layout either historic or a station for Albert Quay-Bandon or Clonakilty local commuter services had the line survived. I always fancied the idea of a West Cork layout in a large space in N gauge modelling main and branch line connections at Clonakilty and Drimoleague junctions, perhaps with through railcar services to a from Cork to Clonakilty, Skiberreen and Bantry combining and dividing at the junctions similar to the Glasgow-Oban & Fortwilliam services in Scotland. Tim Cramer published an article on Waterfall including drawings of some of the buildings in Model Railways magazine in the 70s, the layout was basically two platforms a crossing loop and a short siding. I will send a PM if I can find a copy of the article.

Its a pity there seems to be nothing on the web on C & D of 1939 similar in styling to the LMS articulated railcar set of the same year.

My father great man for conspirancy theoies used to say that the Drumm Trains were "sabotaged" off the rails. I am not sure if he was thinking about the Sandycove de-railment or the DUTC shutting down Drumm train operation when it took over the GSR The whole saga of the Drumm Trains seems to have been initially tied up with the Shannon Scheme the ESB providing special discounted electricity rates and the Dail voting substantial money for battery development for trains A&B. Things had changed by the mid 30s with the ESB charging the standard rate and the GSR taking on the entire risk in building the final Drumm Battery Trains C&D. C&D introduced 1939 only lasted less than 10 years in service. C&D had a much more modern appearance compared to the earlier units with rounded cabs and steel framed bodies similar in styling to the Bredin main line and suburban coaches. The main draw back seems to have been short battery life (difficulty in obtaining nickel) though services were also affected by restricted ESB hydro generating capacity during the Emergency

Irish Broad Gauge Carriages is basically a concise history of the evolution the Irish railway carriage from the 1840s up to the 70 Class Railcar trailers the last Irish designed and built carriages. The ITG stock book is probably better source for the more modern stock than Broad Gauge Carriages. http://www.irishtractiongroup.com/shop.html

Keep an eye out for Locomotives and Rolling Stock of CIE&NIR Doyle & Hirsch. (3 editions) cover the 70s & 80s probably the nearest thing to an Irish version of an Ian Allen ABC spotters notebook with photos and details of each loco and most coach and wagon types. ITG published similar books covering locos and wagons only.

One of the attractions of building and operating a garden railway was that it felt more like the real thing. My garden railway The Jackson County found itself in a similar situation to Irish Rail in the early 90s needing major work on the track. The first sign of trouble was when the gauge started spreading in one area. The ties bleached out noticeably after about 6 years, the rail fixings then became brittle and spalled off. The engineers tried replacing every 5th tie to hold the gauge, a run-down short line money always tight, speed low, the mines and logging camps almost played out. County Surveyor and State Government start hearing complaints of standing de-railments an inspector is sent. Emergency re-laying Tie strip completely failed on some lengths. Recovery train propelling back over re-laid section. Replacement track panels for the re-lay. The little diesel is an LGB DRGW Switcher converted to on board battery RC, with receiver in cab control gear and batteries inside engine housing. The original track was Accucraft (AMS) American 3' narrow gauge track the replacement Sunset Valley narrow gauge. The bleaching and UV damage only became noticeable after about 6 years. Luckily enough I was able to find a suitable replacement tie/sleeper strip for the existing rails, hopefully the replacement ties will have a similar service life to the rails. The area where the track failed is exposed to afternoon sunlight although UV radiation is supposed to be stronger down here the Waikato is probably as sunny as the West of Ireland

I started setting out sleepers and point timbering on the curved approach track to the station. Track and ballasting for the station board is nearly read for transplanting to the layout. I have followed Iain Rice's technique in "An approach to building Finescale Trackwork in 4mm" in prefabricating complete sections of ready ballasted point and crossing work on a sheet of paper rather than assembling the track in situ on the layout. On this layout I am experimenting with Templot templates glued with spray mount to a sheet of kraft paper, the complete formation will in turn be spray mounted onto 6mm dense foam (ground sheet) on 18mm ply baseboard and hopefully result in quiet running. Approach crossover timbering I gave the template a wash of dark grey water colour to prevent the white paper 'grinning" through the ballast resulting in twisting and curling of the template and backing paper. Plain sleepers in ballast Sleepers and ballast are laid on white glue (pva) applied with a small artists brush. I found that it is easiest to work in a small area laying no more than 3-4 sleepers and completing the ballast as your go, otherwise its easy for the glue to loose its tack leaving bald spots in the ballast. White glue can easily obliterate the template markings so I first glue the area within the width of the sleepers, place the sleepers in position, then glue the area outside the edge of the sleepers (shoulder or 6') then sprinkle the ballast in place. I then usually place a weighted block of timber or strip wood on top of a finished section of sleepers which helps keep a level top and iron out any crinkling. The layout will be on an L shaped book shelf with the approach tracks to the station on a curve. The turnout from the main line to the loop is part of a crossover from the platform road either to an engine shed or possibly a private siding. I had originally intended to use up my stock of SMP (Marcway) flexible track on the plain track on the layout but discovered that SMP & C&L Bullhead rails have slightly different profiles with the SMP an narrower head. The plain track between the crossovers and approach to the platform and goods yard will be laid with C&L components to reduce potential running problems in this area. The layout is supposed to be the goods only remains of a light railway branch line, some where along the Welsh Borders between Hereford and Chester with quite a bit of influence from the Tanat Valley line near Oswestry but with a hint of the LNWR thrown in. The layout is mainly an excuse to run my British outline main line and industrial stock and a prod to finish some nearly complete loco and wagon kits.

Nice job on the Diner the North Atlantic coaches are so distinctive, a set in LMS NCC Crimson Lake behind a matching Mogul or U2 4-4-0 would be an absolute stunner. I like the idea of combining the Worsley Works sides with the Comet parts, hopefully the business will survive following the owner Geoff Brewins recent death

Just came across this on the Eiretrains web site. Mainly Bell and Liner traffic out of the North Wall 001s & single 141s working most of the traffic, a few surprises including the 62'9" flats on the Galway Liner

My first train ride was from Killiney to Tara Street in a black and tan non-corridor behind a black A or C class some time in the late 60s early 70s. Up to around 1972 CIE used to make up a rake of late GSWR/early GSR stock for summer holiday traffic on the Bray line. The Dapol/Airfix suburbans with their flush sides are fairly close in general appearance to late 1920s built GSR non-corridor stock.

The coaches in the pictures are in preserved condition at Tralee and Tuam the late 80s early 90s. The GSRPS restored several of these coaches in Tralee & Mallow for use on excursions and the Fenit Line some of which found their way to Westrail in Tuam and the last of these coaches is preserved at Dunsandle. JHB is probably the best to advise on livery, photos indicate that some early CIE built stock was painted plain unlined dark green without flying snail logo, repainted into the light green scheme with a single narrow eau-de-nil line at waist height before being painted into black and tan. Lettering in the green era seems to have been in light green (eau-e-nil)