jhb171achill

And another of Barry’s photos in “Rails Through the West” shows cattle being loaded from the up PASSENGER platform in Ennis about the same time. Cattle traffic finished finally in 1975. By 1976 most of the remaining cattle wagon fleet, some not even 20 years old, were in Cork goods yard awaiting scrapping.

Some dud stuff on there too - a supposed "antique" sign (modern forgery) and some sort of supposed "wagon plate"....not railway at all.

Yes, that ties in with what jhbSenior spoke of - seeing the shunting in Enniskillen in "early evening". Also, there's no way they'd have allowed cattle trains to get in the way of the evening commuter trains along the Lagan Valley. So anything heading to maysfields was probably very late evening, which for over half the year is in the dark. Hence less (or no!) photos.

Quite possibly Charlie Friel is the man to go to for pictures of cattle specials anywhere on the GNR. There WERE quite a few. Senior used to talk about busy cattle days in Enniskillen and Clones too, and I believe the Oldcastle branch had busy enough cattle traffic at times. As did the Banbridge lines.

Possibly - but still a dearth of photos! You think of all the "spotters" along the Lagan Valley, and all the pictures of all stations Lisburn - Belfast, and not a picture in sight. I remember seeing the remains of the cattle platform at Lisburn. I think someone told me one time that they would have "watered" the cattle there occasionally if the thing was running late........

That is OUTSTANDING!!

That’s looking amazing, Steve. You’ll be joint top of the Q with me when IRM bring out their AEC railcars!

You're absolutely right on the dearth of photos - maybe it was whatever time of day they went through places east of the bann, where people had cars and cameras! However, as jhbSenior would have attested, cattle wagons - mostly of older CIE (GSWR / MGWR) or Provincial GNR / SLNCR varieties, especially the latter - very definitely rattled over the derry Road and down the Lagan Valley; he saw the "Shipper" from his office on a daily basis. As I've posted here before, he was watching it shunting one evening in Enniskillen, and the loco hitched up to a Sligo Leitrim wagon. As it moved, off came the buffer beam of the wagon - it was in such a bad state. Unload the "beasts", find a GNR replacement, stare suspiciously at any other SLNCR wagon on the train, and away ye go.

Perfect branch line for a model!

I would also ask a question - what's the best type of varnish to be used for rivers, streams and puddles, which looks realistic enough and can be had in suitably small quantities for layout - I don't need a five gallon drum full of the stuff.

Yes, that's more like the lighter CIE green. The UTA green was much the same as the ahde used on the RPSI's Whitehead Mk 2s - in fact, that was done deliberately so, to look "UTA-esque" but with the RPSI's own style and colours of lining. If someone here knows the RAL number (or whatever it's called now) for that green, that's the one to go for. Maybe our IRM clleagues might know the reference number for that? The maroon is a slight bit light too, but nothing that a bit of (very prototypical!) weathering won't solve. I should have added, very dark grey roofs.

Brown for those, yes. I doubt if any ferts ever had black bogies - I think the last examples were gone when the black bogies appeared.

171? Almost certainly not….. 131, maybe.

Excellent!

A few items I’ve had for years, and which cost me a possible total of £15 all together, now in the process of conversion. I’ll comment on each individually. First, a rake of four coaches in 1950s green. The type of model will be well familiar to all here. I need to get some "wooden" stock for 1950s use. First, these are very definitely in the "two-foot-rule" category. The ones nearest and furtherst away from the camera are those old GWR brake thirds. These, provided a FLAT rather than clerestorey roof is fitted, are the closest resembling anything Irish - there were two Waterford, Limerick & Western brake thirds (Nos. 937 & 938) which were very like these indeed - except that they had one less compartment. The one nearest is in the pre-1955 dark green, deliberately matt to look worn. The furthest away one plus the two in the middle are in the 1955-62 lighter green, same as applied to A, C, G601 (not G611) and B101 class diesels. They need to be lined, and three of the coaches, having had their clerestorey roofs removed will need to have flat-curve roofs made. (That's in hand). Lining, of course, will be the double pale green lines, one above and one below the windows, on the leading coach, as per the older livery, with "snails" added. The other three, being the lighter green, will have just the single thin line, waist level. I am trying to put together a generic wooden rake to go with my six-wheelers when they arrive. The six-wheelers will work on the branch - these things above will have to do, along with a green K15 and a green Park Royal, for the main line train until or unless a credible GSWR bogie model is made by anyone. The nearest coach will be WLWR 937. Roof, snails and new wheels needed - the existing ones are coarse scale and bump along the sleepers. Next, this coach may keep its clerestorey roof, albeit with the glazing in this part painted or sheeted over. There were a few GSWR clerestorey types kicking about even into the early 1960s, but this design of vehicle which is Midland Railway (England) in origin, is not REMOTELY like any GSWR clerestorey type, but it does look the part; a temporary solution to a dearth of wooden bogie coaches. being a 1st / 3rd composite, it's the sort of thing that could have been found on a mixed train on a branch with just the one coach - 1950s branch lines which had dispensed with six wheelers often had a vehicle like this with a six-wheel full brake or six-wheel brake 3rd. If this thing didn't have these curved-in ends, which in Ireland were only to be found on a handful of WLWR stock and nothing else whatsoever, it would look a good bit more GSWR-ish. The above WLWR-esque vehicle in the dark green was actually one of the very, very few prototypes which did. A short break from carriages; picked this little low-sided wagon ages ago. Gawwd knows where I got it, but its a GWR wagon from Brexitland. However, repainted, but with the "G" of "G W" deliberately showing, it can be an GSR wagon with CIE's paint wearing off. A distressed looking "snail" and CIE number, and weathering, will make it look about right. Another of what will temporarily run on the Dugort Harbour local train, as a GSWR relic. Lining and snails to follow. It would look more realistically GSWR with a flat roof, but I think I'll leave that one. Can't do much about these pesky curved ends though without a lot of major surgery which really isn't worth it. This came with the others. With curved ends, it has to be assumed to be a WLWR vehicle, but that compant never had any vehicle at all close to ths design; however, beggars can't be choosers. It'll do for a while. Needs new wheels too. The darker green one. Lining above and below windows on this. Plus, of course, a roof. The lighter green one the same; this will be WLWR No. 938, the above one 937. They were built (as far as I recall) 1896 or so, and withdrawn in 1954 and 1955.

Interesting! Should be good!

He was indeed an interesting character. I toured India with him in the 1970s and he had an encyclopaedic knowledge of a number of (long gone) narrow gauge systems we visitied - all steam, of course. Very droll, dry wit and great company, as was his wife. Had a huge interest, as we all know, in all things narrow gauge especially; the T & D and CDRJC were personal favourites of his.

Not originally. Snails on delivery….

Trick photo? Garda vehicle with a British numberplate????

Actually, those are not at all unlike one style of GSWR design! They’re actually the best fit there is of anything ready to run that there is. And at the equivalent of €155, not too hard on the wallet. I’m planning to get one of the full brakes myself.

Sheer artistic genius; nothing less. Faded Post Office signs too - perfect! Yes, beet wagons don't look at all right clean, and nor do these things - nor, come to think of it, do steam engines any time after 1955! (Senior recalled looking at loco buffer beams on some locos, which were painted red (at SOME distant time past) in the 50s and noticing that they were indistinguihable from body colour (dark grey) given the level of filth.......)

Outstanding stuff, Ernie.

Wrong livery an'all..........

Hi Johnny! OK, your questiions: all trains had to cater for 1st, 2nd and 3rd class passengers. Companies in Ireland started abolishing second from 1914 onwards, so that by the GSR era (1925-45) there was only first and third on most lines. The MGWR had already done away with it, but the GSWR kept it to the eamalgamation, but the GSR abolished it everywhere in 1930. If you're modelling in the GSR era after 1930, you won't have to worry about 2nd, nor fiddly liveries, as you'll have plain maroon with simpler lining on coaches and plain grey on locomotives and wagons. So, they would provide accommodation for each according to deman. On many rural lines, almost nobody travelled first class, whereas third class was the choice of the vast majority; a few bowler-hatted travelling salesmen and better-off farmers would be in 2nd. Therefore, carriage accommodation reflected demand. Almost never was more than one first class coach needed - even on the main lines. One second usually was enough as well, with as many thirds as needed making up the rest of the train. Most companies had a stock of carriages of each class, so that a branch or secondary line train would typically have one 1st, one 2nd, and one or two 3rd class. However, there were many "composite" coaches, or "compos" as the railwaymen called them. A compo could be part 1st / 2nd, part 1st / 3rd, or even part 2nd / 3rd. A TRI-compo had at least some accommodation for all three classes. There were certainly 1st / 2nd FOUR wheeled compos way back on GSWR lines. So you might get a line where the powers that be took the view that never in all time would there be enough first class fares to fill more than a compartment or two, so they'd put a compo or tri-compo on that line, with maybe two compartments of each class, and string this along with a couple of thirds. As far as the van was concerned, this again was adapted for likely use. Most companies had a stock of coaches with a guard's compartment and brake plus a large luggage space, with no seating at all - plus a stock of vehicles with maybe half or a third of the coach given over to the guard and luggage space, and two or three first, second or third class compartments at the other end of the coach. So a coach with guard/luggage at one end, and lets say two 2nd class compartments, would be a "brake 2nd". There were brake 1sts, brake 2nds, brake 3rds - and yes, brake compos; even brake tri-compos, where you've a need on a lightly used branch line for very little passenger seating. They might stick a full 3rd with a brake tricompo, the latter maybe having only onle compartment of each class, plus the brake. So a full brake has no passenger accommodation at all. In GSWR terms, most designs had the guard's compartment in the centre, with double doors for parcels or mailbags either side. A brake 3rd will have one set of double doors, a guard's compartment, plus (with most GSWR designs) either two or three 3rd class compartments. I must add that in all of the above, I'm referring to six-wheelers, though the precise equivalent (albeit with even MORE variations) was very much the case as the railways changed over to bogie vehicles. All six-wheeled passenger coaches were either non-corridor, or in a very few cases on the MGWR and GSWR, internal-corridor - that is, you could walk up and down a side corridor inside the coach, from one end of its 30ft length to the other, but not from it into the next vehicle. Now, all of that reprseents a truly bewildering variety, which is actually the best way of illustrating the substantial lack of any standardisation. Within a fleet of only a few hundred vehicles, there could be fifty variations.... so how do we convert that into your model? The answer is simple, and good news. If you're planning a GSWR layout, you've two choices. One is to spend a lifetime obtaining definitive information on which vehicle ran where, obtaining drawings, making models of each yourself, etc etc etc.... OR, going freelance, which is quicker and cheaper and has no rules to stick to! I see you're doing the latter (you'd need to live to be 120 to do the first), so your four wheelers and various repaints of "old-looking" coaches will make a very satisfactory start. The GSWR did indeed have "lavatory" coaches. Most were 1st and 2nd, few were 3rd. I guess that 3rd class passengers just had to cross their legs. Toilets were being fitted in carriages on some lines going back to the late 1870s, though in earlier coaches only in 1st class areas. The GSWR introduced their first "lavatory" coaches in 1882, these being 6-wheeled 1st / 2nd compos. No six-wheeled 3rds, even those which lasted into the 1950s, ever had toilets. Unfortunately for the modeller, there is no British design of cattle wagons which is even remotely close to anything Irish. Most are too long a wheelbase, and all are of utterly different designs. Really you're looking at kits there - while there isn't one of a specifically GSWR design, Provincial Wagons' GNR or SLNCR cattle wagon - inexpensive and very easy to build - is as close to a GSWR design as is necessary for you. With cattle being a very large part of rural railway traffic in all areas and on all lines in the past, cattle trucks are as necessary to create the right scene as a locomotive is to pull a train. The reason that second class coaches are elusive is that they were disappearing from many lines a century ago and more. The LMS(NCC) was the last company to retain 2nd class, right up to the 1940s. I hope the above is helpful.

Nice little yoke, indeed. Often thought of a small BR blue shunting layout, maybe of a parcels depot with an 08. Been looking at pictures of the quite bewildering array of BR blue parcels vans ever since!