jhb171achill

The items I have had diverted via Daughter have ranged in value from £3.50 to about £40! The issue with these is postage costs rather than customs or duties.

I should add to that the fact that recently a British supplier of bits and pieces told me that one small item I was thinking of buying, value some £10 stg., would cost £5 or so to post within the UK; and something like £13 to post it to here. Madness. I don't need it that much. No deal done.

"....You're measuring it? What for?" "I'm making a model of it, with an electric motor..." "Really? Well, measure away, she's being withdrawn at the end of next month. Last of 'er class. We're getting a new "C" class diesel when they've built them all...."

Is there a difference?

I get everything I order in the Republic of Brexitstan, sent to my daughter in Wales nowadays, and she brings them over in her jeep, along with the dog, whenever she comes to visit. Tomorrow I set sail on an aeroplane to London Heathwick for a family wedding over the weekend in Deepest England. I will come back with a few odds and ends which have been posted from some supplier IN England, to Wales, then brought by Daughter Dear up to London by circumventing Welsh sheep, choirs and rugby players, and handed over to me. In with the dirty socks they go en route back here. So, to the Commissioners of Customs, Inland and Revenue, I'm saving you paperwork. No need to thank me.

They are run by a community group rather than a local authority (like the ill-fated Tralee project) or a railway enthusiast group. As Airfixfan says, the location can be an asset in one sense and not in others. It is still open just one weekend day and Tuesdays, somewhat bizarrely. Unless I am unaware of some local issue about Tuesdays, one would have thought that both weekend days might have attracted a better audience, given the remoteness - and it IS remote; as others say, too many thousands of km away. While only my guess, I suspect that the number of people operating it is limited, and maybe maintenance knowledge is also thin on the ground. Sound commercial knowledge might also be sparse; however, one way or another, it is the only preserved operation on this entire island apart from Dromod which has its own original station, and it scores top of the league for having an operation "train" which is actually original, plus a spectacularly scenic location. The sensible way ahead is for the trustees and owners of the railcar to come to a sensible and practical operational agreement with them as to the operation of the railcar, in line with its own best interests and proper CRR and Safety Case oversight and compliance. With government funding for any sort of scheme like that now thinner on the ground than ever before, a one-off engagement with a professional fund raiser or "grant finder" might be productive; properly run - if in such a location this is possible - will result in a very unique and valuable asset to the area, and to railway heritage in Ireland overall. Long term they cannot expect to rely on one railcar, irrespective of how hard-wearing and easy to maintain a Gardner engine is. They would do well to get a couple of cheap Hunslet Wagonmasters while they're available, paint them red and cream, and get a Dromod-style modern coach to give the railcar a rest from time to time. I wonder (I don't know) to what extent a long-term view such as this is to be found among those who run the thing. I had dealings with one man up there years ago in terms of a joint grant which I was involved in applying for. This was from the "Peace Money" and related to "cross-border" schemes, so I invited the Cavan & Leitrim and Finntown to join in with the DCDR to apply as an "umbrella group" called "Ulster & Connaught Heritage Railways" for a grant, on the basis that this "UCLR" was a cross-border thing; we gopt the money and divided it amongst the above-mentioned. My understanding is that the share that Finntown got was put into extending their line to its present extent. The guys at Finntown were most co-operative, though I only met them face-to-face once. At THAT stage, at any rate, they were a community group funded, I think, by FÁS or some such agency. The owners / trustees of the railcar have every right to keep tabs on the care of their railcar; it's unique. Should circumstances ever arise when it is not possible for this thing to be given the care and attention it needs, then it makes sense for Finntown to find something else to run.

The yellow doors with red diamond pre-dated what you call the "teal" line - and that came about in the late 1990s after NIR became the railway arm of "Translink" in 1996. Prior to that, of course, the NIR livery was the same except that instead of the turquoise / "teal" line, there was the well-regarded black-white-black-yellow lining there instead - but also, with the "teal" line livery, the blue went right up to the roof line, no grey line above it. When the 80s were introduced, the end doors were the same maroon and blue livery, and then at one stage they were all-maroon with a light grey diamond - this "door livery" appeared with the light grey with maroon waistline livery. The yellow things with red diamond appeared as these were beginning to be repainted blue. Personally I thought the older colours looked better - for all the advantages that yellow has in visibility terms, it matches almost nothing!

B165 is busy with wagons as B147 sits at the platform with the local train, a spare branch passenger set laying over in the cattle siding….

..........And that's just how the layman could tell them from original 80-class stock.

I think in later days quite a few ex-1970 Enterprise coaches ended up within the 80 class fleet.

A highly respected late RPSI volunteer and I were having a conversation about dialects in Quinn’s in Drumcondra years ago, after an RPSI meeting in Connolly station. He was a native of Larne originally, born and bred, and he referred to somebody who was being unnecessarily awkward or cranky as “thran”…… he would use that term himself. He had a huge vocabulary of what he said the “Ballymena and Larne men from out the narrow gauge” might have been familiar with. Wish I could remember them all, though few were printable!

80 class released along with a “C” in the accessories pack?

Lovely little scene.

Yet again, Eoin, you've absolutely excelled yourself! Absolute masterclass, superb stuff!

“What are the guards doing, meeting the train?” ”New crate of paper clips delivered, probably…” ”Maybe they’ll arrest yer man and send him to Dublin on the 11:40…..”

Quiet moments at Dugort….

Didn't know that - I will inform my learned source as well! Thanks for the info. Ditto! Thanks, folks!

“What’s wrong with you all of a sudden?” ”Yer man has me back on nights on the goods.” ”Sure ye were complaining ye hadn’t enough money last week…” ”Yeah, but it means 4 a.m. at Limerick Junction. Have you ever been at Limerick Junction at 4 a.m.?”

Ken, you've done a truly amazing job on what is clearly - as you show so well - a truly awful initial product - certainly not worth the €100 that Shapeways want for it. I had considered getting some of their MGWR six-wheel coach bodies at one time, but was firmly warned off by someone else who had bought some other carriage body from them. In this day and age very bad value indeed, and your experience tends to amplify what others have said. That said, your have done a (typically!) amazing job in making a silk purse out of a sow's behind quarters! May I ask, is your model "0" gauge? If it is, it shows that to expect a decent result in any smaller scale would be folly indeed, even for those of exceptional skill!

I checked with my sources for any further details of NIR Mk 2s and their travels beyond Dublin. Seems there weren't any, beyond extremely rare forays to Dún Laoghaire, so that's that; when NIR wanted to send a train deep into IE / CIE territory, it seems that they always used 80 class sets. So no rare visits of Mk 2s to Tuam, Mullingar, Limerick Junction, Kerry or Waterford!

“I had a first class return from Dublin - which is the first class part?” ”No first class on this line the past ten years - only from the junction….”

As often before, my own contacts from within those areas of governance and railway management whose thoughts would be the final arbiter on anything that happens in the future, suggest that nothing in the following has changed: 1. The Green Party taking a leading role ion anything but Dublin bus lanes and cycleways; no interest in railways. 2. At best apathy, at worst hostility; but in both cases and rather worryingly, a total lack of knowledge about railways, amongst NTA persons. 3. No more chance of Fine Gael ever promoting rail transport than there is of Arlene Foster joining Sinn Fein, Donald Trump uttering an articulate sentence of truth, or Boris Johnston becoming a communist. Little better chance with Fianna Fail. The above is especially the case when it comes to rail freight. So, like before, more taxpayers' money to consultants to produce a weighty volume made of half of a rain forest, which will languish on my own shelf along with all the others, to be sold on ebay in 2035 for €1.16 plus €45 postage.

In terms of where these coaches went to, I am still delving, but a learned and long-standing friend contacted me today having seen these posts, and advises me of certain interesting movements they had. On 10th February 1994, the RPSI's No. 4 hauled one of the Mk 2 vans from York Road, via Antrim and Lisburn, to Belfast Central Services Depot, at the former BCDR Queen's Quay station. he also suggests that a set of Mk 2s also reached Larne Harbour on an MRSI excursion in 1997. So there's a bit more information; at least one of them was hauled, on at least one occasion, by a proper steam engine instead of an infernal combustion machine.....!

Yes, I think it’s the printers not being the best, from a number of comments I’ve seen on a number of sites.

That’s when NIR’s track was beginning to resemble what my father encountered on the Lough Swilly in the upper shot!