jhb171achill

Noel, this stuff is inspirational. Your in-depth experience and knowledge of the railway industry inspires what goes on at Tara junction perfectly - and of course, prototypically accurately.

Meant to add, if anyone is ever making a model, upholstery according to jhbSenior was red.

Wow - not a pay packet will remain intact all year! Great news, though..........!

The GSR had four of these, entering traffic in 1926 in Pullman brown and cream, which was probably the inspiration for the brown & cream colour scheme applied to many main line carriages between approximately 1927/8 and the late 1930s. Later, of course, they would be maroon, and CIE green in their final days. They were fully seated in later years with the snack bar removed. For modellers attempting a conversion, note the matchboard plank lower panelling, unlike British ones, and window spacing different from British ones.

Some more details on these unique vehicles, after which I’ll post a drawing of one If them in the scale drawings section of this website. All of these clips are taken from various issues of the “Railway Gazette” in 1925/6. Bottom pic is the 2nd page of top one….

The GSR Pullmans, from a 1926 article. They were tried out on the Sligo line and into Limerick, probably via Nenagh; one per train. They eventually “settled” on Dublin - Galway and Dublin - Cork.

Ah! Well, there we go - we might live in hope?

Possible easy re-livery job. Now, I preface this by saying that I know very little about buses at all, but I believe this one is a standard type, as its a 1950s bought model, now in storage in Malahide Castle. It's not Fry's - it was re-liveried for the castle layout in the 1990s, in CIE livery, though it's an old model - presumably owned by someone else. However, it is worth mentioning as yokes like this were commonplace in rural areas in the 1950s. My knowledge of buses does not extend to confirming whether this is an EXACT type used here, or one which is just very like one that did - nor can i say how common they were. In any event, one at least was based in Galway, it seems, as late as about 1961. I took pics of this one this afternoon as I was poking about in the castle looking for things, bits'n'bobs, and stuff. The CIE green is authentic for steam locos, buses, road lorries, station paintwork, and passenger coaches which were painted between 1945 and 1955. Would it be worth IRM doing a run of a 00 scale equivalent of these? This one is 7mm scale, or as close to that as needs be.

Correct. And it wasn't just when the GNR ceased to be. In "Rails to Achill", I have a photo of not just a GSWR wagon, but a DSER one as well - at ACHILL in 1934! I am aware of during the short period before the UTA stopped running goods trains, there were (albeit exceptionally rare - maybe one-off!) instances of UTA goods vans south of Dublin. As you say, wagons could end up anywhere. Consign a wagonload of linen from the Derry central to Cork, and you've a BNCR van in Penrose Quay. Not just wagons, though they seemed to have most wanderlust. In GSR & CIE days, MGWR six-wheelers migrated in huge numbers to Dublin suburban services, becoming regulars on the Harcourt Street line from the late 1920s. Larger numbers of them again went to Cork, where they were all over the West Cork system, Youghal and Cobh services, and the Valentia branch. There were a few in Limerick too. On the other hand, the MGWR and DSER became infested with GSWR stock - many Midland branchlines having lengthy residencies of GSWR composite bogie vehicles; these were regularly to be seen on the Ballinrobe and Ballaghaderreen branches for years, Loughrea in the 1950s, and Ballina on and off. Only Clifden seemed to stay true to old MGWR six-wheelers throughout its entire life. GSWR bogies and six-wheelers were regulars in Wisht Caark too. A GNR coach was seen on the Loughrea branch about 1960 and also as far away as West Cork - could have been the same one, an old wooden clerestorey-roofed one, and still in GNR brown livery to boot! Locos - Loughrea, Ballinrobe and Achill had visitors from the WLWR and GSWR with regular slots rather than occasional appearances. And one of the D16 "Achill bogies" worked the GSR Portarlington - Athlone line for a while in the late 30s, while a WLWR G3 (think it was 291) worked for years out of Waterford - and don't forget the three J26 MGWR 0.6.0Ts which emigrated to the Waterford and Tramore, with 560 ending up in Cork (Glanmire), West Cork and the Fenit branch before it was scrapped in the early 60s! Many, many, many other examples.

The Taras and a local train pass through Malahide on the layout today. Meanwhile a ballast train pauses at Mallow......

More common than you'd think! Once the GNR fleet was split between the UTA & CIE (October 1958), for about four years there were GNR wagons all over the place, with GNR markings, but with an "N" after the number. Coach 114 becomes 114N, wagon 3452 becomes 3452N, etc. Often the older number was still there too. By 1963, numbers of ex-GNR wagon stock had become almost extinct due to CIE's modernisation of their fleet - even building a whole fleet of new cattle wagons, so older types vanished rapidly or (for the few that remained) repainted properly in CIE livery. Older GSWR & MGWR types also vanished largely at this time - DSER & WLWR stuff had had their own pogroms in the 1950s, and CBSCR items were almost without exception just scrapped there when that system closed.

Even better news.

"None for all.........and all for none!"

Gerbil smoothies, anyone?

Several GSWR coaches, broadside showing lining and close enough for general dimensions. Plus a 1937 "Bredin".

The consulting engineer's report states that the first priority is the consumption of beers, I believe......

No wonder. The most utterly useless things ever known to man. I have a €20 one and I have tried using it to pay for €18 worth of food. Won't work, yet the website says it's valid. Very, very strong advice to all is avoid this scam-like nonsense.

I have the same problem. Was thinking about a tree, or a slight curve in the backscene?

Wow!!! Superb. I actually like that grey livery on a 121….

Well done!

I have a couple of these unmade - must dig ‘em out! These little beauties from KMCE are next for painting. And running around a friend’s layout (running in!) is what will haul them. IMG_2122.MOV

At Dugort, rolling stock work continues. This ancient kit (Slaters coke wagon, I think) is a high-sided open wagon in Britain, but can readily be converted to a reasonable approximation to an old GSWR “soft-top” by the addition of an open-centre roof. The roof sections shown are just bits of paper as templates to illustrate the point. Plastic pieces will be shaped and made, and a centre tarpaulin put in place to hide the interior, and what in real life, as an open wagon, is the non-opening part above the doors! The impression needs to be given that it has full-height doors, of course. Old relics like this, and the four KMCE wagons seen in the background, could still be seen in far-flung backwaters until about 1960 - well into the A and C class (“grey’n’green”) era. It’s just about conceivable that a grey 121 might have met one, but a black diesel loco is probably pushing credibility a bit far. Wagons like this will be out’n’about primarily when I’m operating steam. Painting next, followed by very heavy weathering. These wagons are intended to look as if they’re about to fall to bits. Meanwhile, A23R is shut down for the night. Those empty cattle wagons have to go to Cork in the morning on the back of the up goods What to make tarpaulins out of? I’m thinking very thin paper soaked in black water colour paint, which should give a distressed look, and perhaps dipped in varnish and hardened? Any other ideas?

Quite a journey!

Yes. Much as I like Silverfox Models - and I would recommend them as a good "quick fix" (I've several myself and more on order), their livery details need serious research. ALL silver coaching stock, like locos, also had silver bogies, silver roofs and silver gangways. The reason is that silver was not a livery as such - the coaches were simply in bare metal, not painted. The numerals on them should be in pale green, or in some cases RED, believe it or not; but never black. Similarly, many of their silver locos have black numbers or "snails" - also incorrect. Their green coach roofs are grey - they should be black. Their "G" class locos - the later G61X class were never green, only the first 3, G601-3 were ever green. Those three has a large cabside number, and no snail; the green livery with snail and small number is a DCDR thing, never carried by anything in real life. I must do out a diagram for "G" class liveries, of which there were three for the G601s and two for the G611s, as I don't think I've ever seen a model of a "G" correctly painted.........! Please nobody take this as a rant - just clarification for the sake of accuracy! So, for your silver van, yes, you'll need to respray the entire chassis and gangways. At least the roof isn't black! Mind you - for anything CIE and silver, in all reality the single most accurate "livery" of the lot is an exceptionally grim layer-upon-layer of grime, brake dust and general wear and tear....they looked truly awful after only a very short time in traffic and most were repainted green as soon as resources would allow! Should have added, for West Cork vans such as this are plain essential. You'll literally need one on every passenger train which isn't steam - though steam trains usually carried them as brake vans too. If I were you, and modelling West Cork, I'd be looking for three or four of them.

I’ve a green one and a silver one on order. They are very good to deal with, always answering emails promptly. Guidance on livery is needed though - they tend to use light grey roofs on the CIE green livery, which should be black; and white lining and “snails”, which should be light green. But you can point out what you want when you’re ordering.