Mayner

I am looking at the feasibility of using lost wax brass or whitemetal for the internal framing, probably a rectangular rather than a channel section, both to add weight and to save the builders sanity, though I will be happy to supply the fully etched version. These were my initial thoughts for the standard 20' chassis 2 years ago, some of the local kit designers prepare their patterns using rapid prototyping technology which may be an option. Talking about weed killing trains how about this? http://jandjcottrell.zenfolio.com/p487224326/h2e392ac#h2e392ac

Its good to see someone having a go at these coaches the Laminates & Park Royals make a nice contrast to the modern fixed formation stock.

Looking very good Magpie, how did you do the roof? The Worsley Works coaches are fairly basic but fairly simple to build http://www.worsleyworks.co.uk/NG/NG_NIL_Art1.htm.

I am not sure it was dirt from sheer hard work or my imagination but the 071s seemed to be in a much darker richer shade of orange when first introduced than other stock. I think only one or two 071s were fitted with snatchers those fitted had gone by the early 1980s. By the early 80s the mounting bolts and cover plates were removed and the hole plated over.

The Midland introduced IRCH wagons before the amalgamation including hard and soft topped version of the standard IRCH van, the 5 plank open and flat wagons all basically to the same design as GNR stock, in GSR/CIE days these the wagon number wagons carried an m suffix. In MGWR days there was also had a Guinness (private owner?) version the modern IRCH patten van, so there is potential for MGWR/GSR/CIE versions of these wagons the only problem is in assessing the potential demand. John

Assembled from the test etches, everything basically fitted together as planned though I need to make a number of minor adjustments and finalise the brake gear . The solebars and top of the underframe channel folds up from one piece of brass to provide a rigid chassis, with rest of the detail fitting by tab and slot construction, assembly is time consuming than difficult. The chassis is designed for 21mm gauge however I can supply OO wheelsets with suitable axles. I am not sure if the lack of weight is going to be an issue, but the model is very free running it belw away a couple of times while I was taking the photos.

IE had to be seen to be getting the best return possible for the MK3s before disposing of them for scrap. I think IE invited submissions of interest before they were withdrawn and more earlier this year. It may have been a bit like the West Clare Diesels the asking price was too low.

Its funny fast forward to 30 years to present day Auckland rebuilt 1st generation GM export units being worked to death on Push Pull suburban trains.

Typical I wonder who will do the Official Wagons!

Brendan G!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! MM 071, SSM Meabdh, Leslies IRCH standard van now the Guinness Iron Lung what next? I think the GNR originally may have carried 3 containers staggered on a standard 17'11" flat, then CIE used a 20' 11'wb wagon with 3 containers in line.

Very nice any idea of price and if Leslie is doing an unlettered version? The MGWR had similar hard topped and convertible vans which lasted into the late 1950s with Flying Snail and numbers with an m suffix.

Fair play Frank with all those industries you have managed to create an Irish outline American or Australian layout . Maybe the Distrrict Manager's brother is running a Short Line on the side when no one in Cork let alone Kingsbridge is looking? CIE was know for its clean locos and stock in the 60s and 70s the rot set in with IE in the 80s. Any chance of a closer look at those sheeted opens?

The Shale had much the same unloading arrangement with a gravity run off as the Mogul traffic at Foynes just much larger wagons http://irishrailwaynews.multiply.com/photos/album/48/Golden-Days-at-Foynes#photo=6. Paul Shannon's irish Railfreight Video has interesting footage at Castlemugnet, building an operating tippler would be the easy bit

Alexandra Road Dublin. http://maps.osi.ie/publicviewer/#V1,719569,734771,7,4. CIE fuel oil depot on left, ESSO in middle, Irish Tar and Bitumen with double line connection on left, the B&I container terminal was served by the partially lifted loop East of Breakwater Road, the Asahi Terminal was on the opposite side to B&I. I think the cut of 6 wagons in the Ortho 2000 view may well have been used for static storage. Has anyone a photo of the depot? All you ever wanted to know but were afraid to ask about Bitumen http://www.irishtar.ie/itproducts.htm

Tar seems to have been carried in 45Gal drums in open wagons up to the 1950s, then carried in anchor mounted tank wagons up to the introduction of de-mountables and liner train operation. Gruesome Tanker Galway 1980? Some of these wagons may have been used for storage at the Alexandra Road depot up to the end of railborne traffic. Besides Sligo, Oranmore, Cahir and Mallow there seems to have been depots at Ballingarne, Clarecastle, Cork, Ferns, Lixnaw, Tralee most of these closed with the ending of wagon load. Some depots like Ballingarne and Cahir had two storey buildings that presumably housed the heating plant and Council offices others like Tralee (Rock st) a simple structure housing the heating plant for transferring bitumen from rail to road tankers. Most only seem to have dealt with one or two wagons at a time Ballingarne had one extremly short siding. Tralee Rock St

I have had some progress and a few setbacks with getting the narrow gauge up and running but at least I seem to be moving forward. I have two Donegal railcars, four CIE steam locos and a little Bemo tractor the only reliably. The locos, railcars & were assembled from kits about 15-20 years ago. I was going to fit one of the railcars with a Bull-Ant but decided to try and persevere with the original Fleischmann Picillo N Scale drive. Fitting the Bull Ant would have required some work and the old whitemetal body mouldings seem to be getting brittle and may not survive the re-build. Brand new Bull Ant diesel shunter perhaps? Donegal/IOM Railcar This was built from a whitemetal kit dating from the 1970s 20 years ago, cracks appeared two of the cab window pillars when I started to do some work on the body to fit the Bull Ant, one of the cab sides then broke away from the roof, the joys of superglue assembly. The main problem with this car has been the wheels so it may be simpler to buy some better quality wheelsets. I decided to concentrate on the steam locos and managed to get the two Hunslets nicely, they both made it from the station to fiddle yard and back and actually managed to pull a train without a derailment:banana: In the 195os the old C&L had really clapped out locos and stock but the track had to be in first class condition for the many coal specials No 8 Queen Victoria based on a 1950s colour photo Built around 1996 painted and weathered with a Badger airbrush railmatch dirty black, not sure what I used on the smoke box, matt varnish finish. The bogies on these are a bit tempremental, combination off design, plastic centred wheelsets and my track. In must build a cradle to protect the paint finish while working on what are now fairly old models. In this case I have replaced the original wheels with a set of Parkside OOn3 wheels, and altered the bogie pivot to the classical trainset swing link arrangement. Now de-rails in only one spot, probably a combination of tight a radius and a track fault. The biggest on going problem is getting all rolling stock wheels up to standard and sorting out the couplings. Its impossible to determine whether a problem occurs as a result of the vehicle or track unless all the wheels are to a set standard. I have started to replace the worst wheelsets with Parkside, most of the wagons were supplied with loose wheels and axles which you had to fit yourself, many of which do not run true. I used kadee N scale couplers but coupling is not reliable mainly because of excessive sideplay with kit built stock. It may well be a matter of first sorting out the wheels and sideplay before looking at the couplers.

The 3/4 front view of the model certainly captures the same massive look as Glenderg's screen saver. If you ever get round to the D17 I will definitely have one maybe two to keep my J15s company 2 built, one in the works, 2 more waiting!

CIE used to use a rectangular board with the speed limit in black at the commencement, with an arrow below the speed limit for a diverging route at junctions, this arrangement seems to have dated back to the 1950s. The main thing to remember is that speed through junctions is largely controlled by signalling, unless a junction is designed for high speed running a train taking the diverging route at junction is running under restricted (yellow) signal aspects, and is prepared to stop at the next signal as until it clears the junction.

Impressive looking model. Its strange how odd proportions the 800s were compared with locos from the same era http://www.tower-models.com/towermodels/ggauge/tower/g1tl/scot/index.htm and GNR VS http://www.flickr.com/photos/75395133@N00/4597796405/ Any chance of a Vs Des?

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Frank Looking good you are a fast worker, that CIE District Manager must have had connections in high places saving the line and managing to hideThe a Woolwich Mogul. The closure of the Boat Train Route was a pretty close run thing at one time there were plans to mine Dolomite at Lombardstown on the Kerry Road in addition to the Bennetts Bridge deposit and rail it to Ballinacourty. Without stretching things too far you could run a couple of daily Lombardstown-Ballinacourty Dolomite trains 20t hoppers and pairs of 141s and a Ballinacourty-Cork Tivilo Oil & Magnesite Train 001 with tank wagons and covered hoppers, plus a daily Cork Nort Esk-Waterford Bell Liner.

Alan The GSWR built large 4-4-0s the 321 later D2 Class in the early 1900s but had to use very light framing and tapered boilers to keep the axle load down to 16 3/4tons, these engines were later re-built with heavier framing in later GSWR/GSR days and eventually all received large parrallel boilers. The problem was more acute with goods locos the 355 Class 0-6-0s of 1903 were quickly converted into 2-6-0s and the GSWR introduced its first 4-6-0 in 1905 in an attempt to produce a more powerfull locomotive within the 16 ton limit. The problem seems to have been resolved by the time Mansell introduced 341 Sir Basil Goulding in 1913 arguably the best Southern 4-4-0 with an axle load of over 19 tons. The GSWR locos of the early 1900s had a very distinctive modern but elegant styling, distinctive from the archaic styling of the earlier McDonald/Aspinal/Ivatt era and the later re-builds with large parrallel boilers and more modern cabs which largely spoiled their appearance. By contrast by 1903 the MGWR had strengthened the Shannon Bidge at Athlone and upgraded the Dublin-Galway main line to accept an 18 ton axle loading. The time the A "Celtic" Class 4-4-0s & B Class 0-6-0s were the heaviest and most powerfull locos in Ireland. After 1900 the MGWR basically adapated a large engine policy and introduced mixed traffic 4-4-0 & 0-6-0 Classes which could basically go anywhere except the lighter branches and light railway sections. Going back to track although I have a stock of ply sleepers and rivets, I have used PCB for flatbottom and C&L plastic chairs with plastic or ply sleepers for trackk construction. Some local users use a 1:5 ratio of PCB to ply sleepers or varients of the American spiked construction. I do not have a sleeper punch but my local track supplier who models the Lynton & Barnstaple in 7mm has suggetted using the Micromark or NSWL Sensipress. He has also suggested using exhausted ink-jet catridges as a source of sleeper stain using Isopropyl Alchol to extract the remaining ink from the catridge. Pen-Y-Mount Junction July 2002 Work in progress photo of building a turnout in situ to form the crossover between the existing WHHR and the future Welsh Highland Railway main line. The turnout in the distance was supplied assembled in 50lb/Y material the WHHR turnout is in 75lb/Y material once commonly used in British Military sites and Industrial railways. 1. Put kettle & frying pan on gas rings. 2. Position the sleepers using a long tape. 3. Position and then screw down the right hand stock, diverging switch and check rails. 4. Cook Fies up large quantity of eggs, bacon, blackpudding, sausages and fried bread 6. Adjust as necessary using crow bars. 7. Position, gauge and temporary screw down diverging stock rail and straight switch assembly. 8. Breckfast/lunch break 9. Measure up, cut, drill, position, gauge and screw down straight closure rail. 10. Check alignment, adjust, pack with ballast and test with loco. 11. Position, gauge and temporary screw down diverging check rail. 12. Measure up, cut, drill, position, curve, and screw down curved closure rail. 13. The interesting bit curve diverging stock and check rails using Jim Crow until the desired radius is achieved. 14. Gauge and screw down diverging stock and check rails. 15. Rough pack crossing timbers. 16. Test with suitable loco or piece of rolling stock. 17. Tea Break and muffins. (If successful otherwise its going to be a very long day/evening/night) 18. Line and lift with rail jacks. 19. Ballast and pack with kango hammers or point and crossing tamper. 20. Clamp and lock switches. 21. Inform Traffic Department work complete and lift posession. 22. Off to Pub .

Stephen. Judging by the look of that loco you will need some serious ventilation in the attic The smoke was from a clapped out 141 climbing to Cabra not 230.

Great looking point I am thinking of having a go at ply & rivet construction at some stage. I have worked on full size narrow gauge track & we basically follow much the same sequence of assembly working from one side to the other gauging the opposite check rail off the crossing, finally fitting in the gut or closure rails in the gap between the switches and crossing assembly. We even use similar gauges, there is a great sence of releif and achievement when the first loco safely crosses through the turnout. If you are trying to achieve such a high level of accuracy have a look at http://archive.org/stream/railwayconstruc01millgoog#page/n339/mode/2up William Mills the GNR(I) Engineers 1898 text book on Railway Construction. Mills was lucky to have started with a clean slate with the formation of the GNR in the 1870s was able to develop his own standards rather than the GSWR where the Engineers were dealing with an engineering legacy dating from the 1840s. While both the GNR & GSWR used BH on the main lines in tthe early 1900 they were very different the GNR used inside chaired rail like the English Midland, the GSWR seems to have gone straight to outside chaired rail, but while the GNR & Midland introduced large 4-4-0 & 0-6-0 locomotives in the early 1900s without too much drama, the GSWR operating department had to jump through all sorts of hoops to keep it heavy passenger and freight locomotives within acceptable weight limits, including tapered boilers and additional carrying wheels. The GSR spent a lot of time and money in the 1920s rebuilding relatively modern GSWR 4-4-0s with heavier frames and large parrallel boilers. I think the main thing that should not be forgotten is that PW practice does not exist in a vacuum, in the early 1900s the GSWR would still have the odd section of 1840s Bridge Rail in the odd siding or yard, by the 1950s the GNR had largely eliminated inside chaired bullhead from its main lines, though it was still used in stations and on secondary lines, 95lb jointed flatbottom with elastic spike fixings was going in on main lines and 85-90lb flatbottom similar to that used by CIE was going in on secondary lines. Its really worth while seeking out historic photographs, up to the introduction of mechanised track maintenance centre cess drainage was often used in cuttings and away from main lines the sleeper ends were not always "boxed in" with ballat. I recently found a photo of Shankill Station in DWWR days the up road from Bray laid in outside chaired BH, the down road in FB both with centre cess drainage. The main advanatge of the Pandrol Clip and Elastic Spike over traditional spiked or bolted fixings is that it allows the rail to flex under load with less maintenance hammering back loosened spikes and tightening fixings. CIE originally cast concrete sleepers with a wooden insert to accept an elastic spike. Maany of thee leeper ended up in the outh Eatern Coatal defence between Kilcoole and Newcatle I am not sure about Ireland but in the UK GWR chairs with cast in through-bolts were used with Domac sleepered track, which is very popular with preservationists.

I tried to bore everyone to death on the old Newsgroup with a series of threads about a small Narrow Gauge layout I started eight years ago as "quicky" project to maintain interest when we first moved to New Zealand. I have been working on the current phase for two years and last night I finally got something moving my little Bemo Tractor http://www.bemo-modellbahn.de/produkte/schweizer-bahnen-h0m.html?tx_userbemocatalogue_rubriclist%5Bitem%5D=182&tx_userbemocatalogue_rubriclist%5Baction%5D=show&tx_userbemocatalogue_rubriclist%5Bcontroller%5D=Item&cHash=d92143e96b8cec56fbf9375ebd7b014c [attachment=:name] The basic idea is to model a fictional extenssion of the Cavan & Leitrim in its final years complete with decrepit locos and stock. The mainstay of the loco fleet are a pair of Dingle 2-6-0T and a pair of C&L 4-4-0T backed up by a pair of Donegal railcars and said Bemo Tractor. Before leaving Ireland I had fitted the two Dingle engines with DCC Decoders which seemed to work fine, but prooved too unreliable so back to DC control on this one. I finally finished the wiring on the two station sections plugged in the controller and action, the Dingle engines made it from one end of the line to another but for some reason would only push not pull a train. Time to have a serious look at the pick ups. The railcars faired even worse, one an Anbrinco whitemetal model of the final Donegal caars 19 &20 with a butchered Fleischmann drive refused to run at all, so I have placed an order for a new Bull-Ant drive from Australia. The motor of the other car a Backwoods Miniatures model of the earlier No14 literally went up in puff of smoke, which did not appear to bad after nearly 20 years, but the replacement motor was nearly 1/3 the cost of a Bull-Ant. All appeared well when I fitted and tested the replacement motor, but later noticed the drive would sometimes jam. The Backwoods chassis is similar in principal to the Bull-Ant and old Minitrains OO9 drive a near bullet proof system, where with spur reduction gearing between the motor and a layshaft that transmits the final drive to the wheels. On closer inspection the lay shaft was flapping around between the frames, one of the bearings that supports the shaft had come loose and wore an oval slot in the ssupporting frame spacer, maybe I wouldd have been better to order another Bull-Ant or take up stamp collecting. At thiss stage the tractor is the only thing that runss reliably I am not sure to dresss it up as one of the GSR Drewry Railcars http://www.worsleyworks.co.uk/Image-Pages/Image_NG_Irish_WCR.htm or possibly something like Phoenix http://www.madeinpreston.co.uk/Road/atkinsonsteam.html