jhb171achill

Mine too!!!!

I have a bona fide address on a neighbouring island as well as here. I get stuff delivered to Neighbouring Island (no, it's not Achill - it's a bit bigger) OR to here, depending on which shower of tax-gougers I perceive i will have to pay less to. If the GNR drivers could smuggle butter, poitín and stockings in the 1940s, who am I to break an old railway tradition.

No, they're standard (darker) wagon grey, but covered in a patina of cement dust. Same colour as the brake van - BUT - the sun is shining on them and that also makes them look a bit lighter. Up close, they did not look that light at all. Very soon after, they started painting the bodies orange, though the chassis would remain grey for another generation until they started painting the "bubble" bit cream - and THEN they painted the chassis black - a rare thing!

Best evidence so far that U2 are railway enthusiasts!

TWENTY percent? I very much suspect that is blatant profiteering by some parasitic Bezos type in the USA. I have already vowed to boycott anything "amazon" on principle, even if it means I have to walk to Patagonia to collect a spare coupling for a Z gauge cattle wagon. Ebay are on notice now......... Trade between north and south cannot, should not and must not be infringed or interrupted.

That really is a mighty fine world for N gauge!

I note you’re keeping your Irish 00 stuff. Given the amount of money you’ve invested in both the stock and the track, if it was me I would try to use that. Maybe a branch-line type of 00 set up? You’ve more than enough space. Sometimes in terms of realism less is more - much more! No prototype in real life in Ireland has quadruple-track flyovers every quarter mile….

Two grey for me; one with snail, one with roundel.

I would certainly take a couple of those if they were a reasonable price!

OK, let me get this right - it's ON again?

I have to say I’ve always found Hattons to be superb.

So what now? Will this be back? Does this mean that the only goods trains now are the Taras, the timber and the Ballina - Waterford containers? (Yellow things don't count!)

Indeed; there will be enthusiasts (!) saying “Sure who’d want a RTR ICR - there’s nobody alive remembers them….”

Lost on me, DJ, a Mk 4 to me is a 1960s Ford Cortina!

€150!!

Galteemore, I had a look in my "stuff" but was unable to find signalling information. However, being the CDR, I doubt that whatever was there was likely to be "standard"!

I’ll look it up……

There were several stations in rural areas where crossing was done with a siding only - even with passenger trains, as in Inver, Co Donegal, where up trains served the platform then reversed back into a siding to allow a down train to arrive. Once it had proceeded west, the up train moved forward out of the siding and headed towards Donegal.

Ssssshhh! Don’t remind them it’s running, or they’ll find an excuse to close it! Rare daisies on the track, or a need for a Beauparc Greenway, or unsafe carbon emissions from 071s!

It's a B101; I omitted the "B"! As our transatlantic colleagues might say, "my bad"! (But, Leslie, we're chatting with young wans here who don't know what a steam engine is..........) Your points about Provincial Wagons are very true indeed! I've dozens of 'em now..........

I have said this before and I'll say it again. While it's true that Ryan has nothing to do with this suspension as far as may be assumed - I have heard straight from the horse's mouth that within both IE and the NTA there is a vehemently anti-rail attitude; for all we know, this may filter into Dublin Port. If Ryan is indeed behind the stay of execution on the South Wexford, and the enhancements in the Cork suburban area, fair play to him. If he is behind any talk of resurrecting the Foynes line, likewise. However, he was also a government minister who - and I stand to be corrected - made not one peep when a commissioned report on the WRC, absolutely RIDDLED with errors and omissions deliberately designed to make the Tuam reconnection look completely impossible, was published. I'm long enough in the tooth to remember the anti-rail policies of Stormont in the 1960s. There is at least a significant element of this type of attitude in governments in the south now, and has been for years. If Ryan can bang their heads together and actually get serious investment in HEAVY rail brought from opportunist empty rhetoric by gombeen men councillors who know nothing of the related economic issues, then I will vote for the greens....... I hope he does.

An excellent volume of information, which personally I would very highly recommend. As the authors suggest, there is a huge amount of information unavailable elsewhere. An absolute must for any serious railway historian.

Actual wagons still grey at that point......

Good to see you yesterday, Neil! That link doesn't work........

They were that colour when brand new, but a bit like a silver A class or silver tin van, or a steam engine in a light or bright colour, they got so filthy, so quickly and so inevitably that the actual livery they were painted in become lost under a layer of gunk. Pretty soon they were repainted in the standard brown colour; this concept also applied to other vehicles like the Castlemungret yokes. In the very few cases of Irish wagons having a livery other than standard CIE, almost inevitably while they LOOK "private owner", they are fully CIE / IE owned. The "bubbles" were branded "Irish Cement" towards the end, but were always owned by CIE - same with the Taras. Actual fully private owned wagons - we're going back decades, and then not many. I'm sure others will add to the list, but on the BCDR the East Downshire Co. had a few coal wagons, and oil companies had a small number of tankers in the 1950s and 60s.