jhb171achill

On the same day, a shabby looking B141 has the daily goods, shown here shunting, then departing for Castletown West. “You can just slide the sacks over and I’ll drop them into the wagon….” “OK……Did ye hear all that stuff ‘bout Vietnam on the wireless? I reckon it’ll be another world war, what with them commies an’all….”

Very much so!

Ten years apart. In June 1951, J15 No. 109 shunts at Dugort Harbour. In June 1961, A55 arrives with the afternoon passenger train. The rostered “C” class broke down. And in June 1971, A23R - straight out of Inchicore after receiving its new engine - is in charge of an IRRS special train, as regular passenger trains ceased in 1967.

Superb! I love the BR blue era and the bewildering multiplicity of all sorts of parcel-carrying vehicles of all sorts - and all painted the exact same blue. A collection of these plus an 08 to shunt would make for a very interesting mini-layout based on some sort of parcels shunting depot in the 1970s.

Very well said indeed, and an excellent description of the proceedings. As one who well remembers the 1978 Great Train Robbery filming, I am well aware of what goes on behind the scenes - even the two-part "Enterprise" programme which I assisted with last year involved a number of field visits and hours and hours and hours of doing one bit over and over again for the sake of 5 minutes on screen. So, very well done to all on the DCDR - as you say, text-book strict accuracy is not what the goal is - the comedy entertainment of "normal"* people IS what's wanted, and it worked a treat. Hopefully the DCDR made a few cents out of it too. That's the season's Tunnocks and Irn Bru paid for.....! Here's to the next one! (* = i.e. not railway enthusiasts!)

Within the limitations of my eyesight, brake hangers?

Same as happened on the Barrack St branch in Dundalk right until the end….

Answer to the last bit is that with only 3 of them, they were never all painted together, or possibly even by the same person! The differences you mention are almost certainly tricks of light or weathering.

Indeed - and while not the subject matter of this particular post, buffer beams on steam locos became weathered and dirty to a degree they were barely identifiable as red at times.

I have to confess I never saw any difference and I saw these locos almost daily for very many years…. If there were any differences they would have been very slight. Buffer beam red on all railways has been pretty standard from early steam days…. As for an actual burgundy shade, as in NIR maroon, the buffer beams wouldn’t ever have been that dark.

Red buffers would be same red as any others…. “Post office red” as those in Boristan would describe it. The yellow - just an ordinary mid-yellow, I would think. Dunno the codes though.

When new signals were installed anywhere, the old ones were removed as soon as possible to avoid confusing crews, so while you won't have a semaphore arm beside a new colour light one, you may well get a post, still with ladder, but with the old arm removed, or very temporarily covered by a big wooden "X" nailed onto it. The earliest colour lights go back to the 1920s, so for the best part of a century, depending on where you are, there are both; even to this day! The surviving examples today are at Navan, a couple of places on the Limerick - Ballybrophy line (the "Nenagh branch") and a couple of locations on the Limerick Junction - Waterford line. The last ones in Cork and Waterford stations only disappeared a few years ago, as did the last one in the North, at Castlerock. (Not IE / IR, I know!). Des Sullivan, of Studio Scale Models in Ennis, makes kits of Irish ones. Signals Studio Scale Models Semaphore Railway Signals (studio-scale-models.com)

Sean With a very small number of locations STILL covered by semaphore signals (e.g. Tipperary), you're fine with that. IE came into being in 1987, and at that stage there were many more locations with semaphores, including some quite large places (Cork, for example!), although colour light signals were indeed the norm. So if you want to do a 1990s layout with semaphores, that's perfectly within the realms of accuracy.

Some original fencing too - both GSR concrete and timber!

I love that Portadown layout - saw it somewhere a few years ago (Blackrock?). And the Fenaghy one is a gem too. Well done to all concerned.

Yes, Mountmellick.

Gerry Conmy, who put that together, would be the acknowledged expert on that unfortunately short-lived line.

Drooling duly carried out!

Yes, Mark. Companies like the Claremorris & Ballinrobe, the Loughrea & Attymon Light Railway, and quite a few others existed right up to the creation of the GSR, with the “large” company having entered into an operating agreement with them for a (usually very substantial) proportion of receipts. Liveries on stations buildings were as per the “large” company, as they used their own paint! In the case of the MGWR, stations were usually painted in a combination of bright red and either white, or possibly a very light beige or light greyish colour.

Very much a GNR thing; I'm pretty sure no other Irish railway had them.

While researching the history of the Achill, Clifden and Loughrea lines - starting over 20 years ago - I ended up reading through the entire MGWR boardroom minute books from about 1885 until it became part of the GSR. The thing that comes across VERY strongly is that the MGWR, with shareholders to please, had absolutely zero time for what Broadstone saw as small-town unprofitable schemes promoted by unrealistically over-optimistic local interests. They continually maintained an ultra-businesslike stance, refusing point-blank to even entertain local groups, promotors or committees unless they had some well-researched and well-funded proposal. In other words, idle chat and vague, bland ideas of "how great" something might be were off-limits. It was a case of "Show us the MONEY and then we MIGHT talk". This was a reasonable stance to take, as they knew perfectly well that these lines would never do anything but lose money; had there been the likelihood of a sniff of a profit they would have built the lines themselves. If someone else put up the cash, they'd start listening, but only after that became evident. As far as they were concerned, it didn't matter whether local interests, the British government, or the tooth fairy coughed up; it was no money, no deal, stop wasting our time. Frequent requests for financial assistance with quite a number of projects were turned down flat. Once funding WAS in place, and seen to be, they would agree to terms - but only if and when the entire new line was built exactly to their standards - and that included main line standard buildings. Even as Achill was opening, the MGWR were still picking holes in various issues in Mallaranny station, and had demanded major changes to that site once the extension to Achill appeared. Similarly, the Midland took issue even with level crossing gates on the Loughrea line, and the goods shed at Loughrea.... Harsh as it all sounds to a railway enthusiast, this is the way a well-run business operates; one must remember that the railways were at that stage private companies for profit, not state-owned as a social service as now.

Nope, you’re not reading too much - you’re spot on! The MGWR’s engineer of the day was heavily involved with these designs, and the MGWR dictated their broad specification to the local companies (e.g. the Ballinrobe & Claremorris company). The lines would not be accepted by the MGWR to operate until each and every detail was completed to their satisfaction.

Cue a track-suit claiming against IE for being stung!

Wow! That's amazing stuff, Dr Pan - reminds me of my teen years job on the Festiniog Railway way back in the day........... excellent realistic weathering.

Don't drink it all at once...........