Mayner

The Irish Three Foot Yahoo Group might be of help http://groups.yahoo.com/group/irish_three_foot/messages/7413?l=1. The Branchlines coaches are very nice I have a pair that somehow or other found their way onto the C&L. I am not sure if they are still available Backwoods Miniatures once did a very nice CVR 0-4-2T & a covered wagon http://www.backwoodsminiatures.com/00n3kits.htm.

There were 6 Burmah tank wagons 4 with Blue Tank Barrels and 2 with Red & White painted barrels for Class A traffic (Petrol) used between Cork & Limerick. The upper half of the Class A Barrels were painted white and the bottom half red or vice-versa. I haven't come across any photos on the web, Joe St. Ledger recorded anything that moved in Cork, there are photos in one of the IRRS Journals when the traffic started around 1972-3 and a photo of a blue wagon in Locomotives & Rolling Stock of CIE & NIR by Doyle & Hirsch if you can get a hold of a copy.

The N Guage is set in the late 60s/70s period mainly Delaware & Hudson, with LV, RDG & EL power sneaking in on run through and connecting services. The railcar is based on a set of Worsley Works with Black Beetle bogies under the powered unit. The cars were built 3-4 years ago along with a couple of Laminates and a Park Royal, and never got round to testing or fitting couplers.

I had great plans to strat building baseboards and finishing various modelling projects over the holidays but ended up painting windows and making a set of doors for a shed started over a year ago. The modelling highlight was testing out some 21mm stock over the Christmas mainly adjusting Kadee couplers and getting the AEC railcar set running. Having gotten over that bit of excitement there was a major move in shifting the 4mm dock layout to the shed and moving the N Scale American from storage in the shed into its place in the office. This was intended to be a temporary set up but could make a nice layout with some tweeking, I never got to properly display the diner and filling station on the old N gauge in Ireland. Then move some of the 4mm stock into a new display case (Christmas present from wife) in the office. [attachment=:name] I am not sure how this will fit in with the idea of a small station on the borders of Mayo and Sligo, a bit too similar to the American layout, possibly a scenic fiddle yard? John

I prefer MJT castings http://www.dartcastings.co.uk/mjt.php, SSM does Irish W Irons and single lever brake gear, if you are broadly minded enough to use Des's W Irons, I can sort you out with a set of OO wheel on 28mm axles.

I havent followed the thread in a while bloody amazzing!

Extending the crossing loop under the bridge into the fiddle yard is a great idea saves a set of points and more importantly space, the whole railway iss looking pretty good.

Its pure 80s technology Bachmann used individual powered bogies in its HO 45 & 70Tonners and Large Scale GE Diesel and Geared Steamers. I have one battery powered large scale loco with twin motor drive you tend to get surging or a jerking motion with the motors wired in parallel running downhill under load as the back EMF from one motor fights the other, wiring the motors in series reduces the surging but halves the top speed . Be interesting to see how kato got around that one

Great to see someone modelling such a distinctive railway, the bridge and railcar really look the part, well done! John

An old Triang http://www.tri-angrailways.org.uk/gwr.htm or possibly the current Hornby Clerestory coaches would be a good basis for the coach. The old Triang coaches used to be popular for kit bashing this style of stock, Tim Cramer wrote a Railway Modeller article on Irish Modelling in the early 70s which included a kit bash of a Triang Clerestory into an arc-roofed ex-GSWR 45' non corridor. While the bogie tank wagon was probably home made on a 45' ex-MGWR rail wagon chassis a Triang or Athearn old style bogie tank car would look the part.

Keeping well up-wind of the spray no flies on that lad! J & j Cottell's site have a photo of the guts of the train when it was stored at Ballybrophy http://jandjcottrell.zenfolio.com/p487224326/h2e392ac#h2e392ac basically a bogie tank wagon with a steam loco cab at one end & another bogie wagon with a shed at one end.

Why does a monopoly operator need a logo in the first place? The cleanliness and physical condition of the locos and stock say a lot more about the organisation than anything else.

Has anyone replaced the motor in the old Athearn diesels? North West Shortline (NWSL) and Micro Mark sell replacement motors, but I am wondering if its worthwhile. I have an old possibly MIR B201 Class on a modified F7 frame, the original builder, possibly from the Belfast area did a beautiful job on the build and weathering, but the motor is getting on a bit.

There is a photo of 780 on the end of a train at Bundoran junction in Desmond Coakham's Irish Broad Gauge Carriage book. much simpler outline without the vertical angle irons in the work photo earlier in the thread simple arc roof. Should be simple enough to do a plasticard box body with Evergreen Planking overlays on an old Hornby Stanier underframe, change the wheels to Hornby or Bachmann wagon wheels. Apart from the 16t cement vans and cement hoppers all GNR rolling stock was divided 50/50 beetween UTA & CIE so at least 6 should have gone to CIE even if they were never re-painted.

121s in multiple on the Sligo line reminds me of the good old days when they worked the Sligo & Rosslare passenger

Brian Flannigans Irish Rolling stock is a great resource http://www.flickr.com/photos/holycor...7629831107647/ but knocks a few assumptions on the head. Its difficult to pin down the date CIE shifted from grey to red oxide but may be more likely the late psychedelic than 60s pop era, certainly in many ways the engineers were ahea of their time in building specialist swap bodies to fit on standard chassis rather than specialist wagons. One of the photos shows 15903 an outside framed standard van in light grey with broken wheel emblem with what looks like the date 12-10-67 in the upper left hand corner. If this is a date is this the time of the last repair or repaint. There is no obvious sign of a tare weight or load but is the hand written kg5627 the tare or something else? There are two photos of the then modern 20T fitted flats introduced around 1966 that eventually ended up under the pallet cement and beet doubles both are grey, one with old style friction boxes appears to be in Guinness traffic with a grey open topped container, the other with roller boxes in fertiliser traffic with a new Back to Back container in red oxide. For me the most interesting was to see one of the ancient looking outside planked vans in the red livery . I once saw one of these wagons in traffic in the mid 70s and later chased down a grounded body near Athlone but never saw one in red. This type of van seems to have survived longer in traffic than the traditional outside framed vans like 15903 and the relatively modern steel framed GSWR vans like 15771 as the double planking may have provided a measure of insulation for meat and perishible traffic.

Its worth watching American E-Bay some sellers either split the contents or sell unboxed sets http://www.ebay.com/itm/BACHMANN-HO-GAUGE-IRISH-RAILWAY-TRAIN-ENGINE-CARS-WORKABLE-NEW-OLD-STOCK-/121048091447?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item1c2f074b37. I got a green Woolwich from a set the only drawback is that the shipping can sometimes be expensive as the model.

Georgeconna has recently published a build on an SSM Bandon Tank http://www.rmweb.co.uk/community/index.php?/topic/66331-studio-scale-models-bandon-tank-4-6-0/?hl=%2Bbandon+%2Btank The Bandon Tank B4 and GNR SG with their slot and tab construction may be an easier build than the earlier kits like the T2 & J26.

It a pilot was not available, it would not surprise me if a Limited or Mail simply propelled back into a siding to pick up or detach traffic. Whether passengers remained on board is another question. Although trains were dieselised and passenger stock relatively modern, operating patterns particulary on secondary lines were basically unchanged since the early 1900s, the railcar trailing a couple of wagons on the W&L or between Sligo & Limerick is little different from GSR or Pre-Amalgamation practice where a long string of vans on the tail of most passenger and mail trains was pretty much the norm. John Kennedy once said a HST would have been no good to the MGWR unless it could pull cattle wagons and mail vans, Funnily enough despite CIE fixation with the "no-shunt railway" short and long distance trip workings with older locomotives between major yards and private sidings is pretty much the norm in many countries. Our local yard consolidates traffic from about 5-6 railheads and industrial sites, while the trips are scheduled running is something of a lottery depending pretty much on balancing production with export demand.

Possibly CIE or BR timber or metal bodied furniture or meat containers on 4w flats rather than ISO equipment. http://myweb.tiscali.co.uk/gansg/5-unit/unitload1.htm. In the absence of fast freight trains urgent traffic would have been carried by scheduled Mail or Passsenger train. I suppose the big question is whether this sort of traffic was attached at intermediate stations by pilot loco or the passenger shunted the yard. The GNR seems to have started the ball rolling in the 1959s containerising traffic for Donegal which grew into the Derry-Vacuum and Guinness Traffic for Northern Ireland. These earlier container flats seem to have gone into Departmental service or were converted into sleeper wagons after the 20T flats were introduced in the late 1960s the accomodation units seems to be on one of these flats.

There is a great article in one of the IRRS Journals from the late 60s early 70s on operation at Limerick Junction in the Black & Tan era "A day at the Junction" I think the author was Herman Sherman, it goes into some of the operational oddities and train nick names, the Flying Saucer, The Soup and others As far as I remember B101s were recorded on the up and down Limerick-Waterford Goods, railcars were still used to haul freight and parcels, the 3 piece AEC set on Waterford-Limerick passenger arrived with a couple of container wagons.

It might be worth enquiring in the Gauge O Guild or through New Irish Lines most 7mm modellers tend to be Guild members or attend the Gauge O Convention. While most 7mm Irish kits produced to date tend to follow the steam era , (Northstar & Alphagraphix), a limited run of 7mm 071s was produced from a scratch built master in recent years.

C233 & 234 were originally re-engined in the mid-1960s with Maybach 1200hp engines similar to the WR Warships as at the time EMD were only prepared to supply complete locos. They were outshopped in the plain black with white eyebrow and small yellow warning panel, one of the odder features of these engines was that the porthole window on the opposite side to the main air intake at the No2 end was blanked out. The Maybach rebuilds were fitted to work in multiple with the B141 class and seem to have been used mainly on Dublin-Limerick passenger trains and bulk cement workings out of Castlemugnet. The GM re-motored B201 Class appear to have been used on main line trains out of Heuston to Cork and Tralee and Connolly-Galway & Sligo passenger services before being concentrated on Dublin suburban workings. With their push pull capability I always wonder what would have happened had CIE followed NIRs example and used B201 class to top and tail Supertrain sets on Heuston-Waterford and Heuston-Limerick trains. The Colourpoint book Irish Metrovicks covers most of the livery variations of the two/three classes. Oh! Nearly forgot 001 appeared with the centre section of the roof painted black (much more sensible than orange) in the Supertrain publicity photos shot on the Wexford line.

Permissive Society, the Beatles and the Stone,s GM diesels, the begining of a new era, I was a bit too young to enjoy the former sure enjoyed the latter. Talking about A6 there is a photo of a train in the new black & tan livery on what looked like the Kerry Road. Interestingly the train was made up of A6 a number of Park Royal railcar intermediates and the Persidential Coach. For many years there was a large print of the photo in the MRSI clubroom and it also appeared on the dust jacket of Michael Baker's Irish Railways since 1916. The photo looked like a posed publicity shot for the new livery, but sometimes wondered if the railcars were there to cover for A6 in the event of a failure?