jhb171achill

Indeed - you and I will recall them well. You could have more than three on a mail train especially, often a few at the front and a few at the back. One of Barry Carse's pics shows the daily Limerick train about to leave Ballina. The consist, as far as I remember, is two different laminates, a tin van in the middle of the train, a bogie brake standard (converted laminate) and another tin van. You'd get them in the middle too, once in blue moon, especially if an extra coach was added on at the last minute. In the grey-121-era, standard practice was usually a four wheeled heating van ("hot water bottle") at one end of the train, and a "LV" (luggage van) type at the other. In reality, for us modellers, the thing is that some sort of "tin vans" are needed on every train, otherwise it has no heat or light! AEC cars had their own heating boilers in the power car - one at least on each set - but even STILL often trailed a tin van to carry parcels. In this guise, "tin vans" covered the whole West Cork system, and invaded the UTA where they were commonplace the whole way to Belfast, and were also to be seen on the Derry Road; photos show them in Foyle Road, Strabane and Omagh. I woild imagine they may have reached Warrenpoint. Needless to say, long gone lines within the CIE network saw them EVERYWHERE: Tralee - Valencia Harbour and Kenmare, Tralee - Limerick - Sligo, Mallow - Waterford, the North Kerry line, Kilkenny - Port Laoise and so on. I've never seen a picture of one on the Cavan branch, and if they did get to there it would have been only just after the very first ones were built, and on a goods train. There is even an OUTSIDE possibility (David Holman & Galteemore Alert!) that an early one MIGHT have got to Enniskillen over the SLNCR, as the very earliest ones were setting out and about then - though to be fair its unlikely, and could only have been within a goods train. CIE goods stock was often to be seen, for obvious reasons, along the SLNCR, and many pics show newish "H" vans as quite a contrast to the SLNCR's run-down, runcible and crumpled antiques still carrying goods! Tin vans in GOODS trains? Not really - but there's an exception to every rule, isn't there? I saw one in a goods train between Dundalk and Belfast one time about 1970. I've no idea why - it may have been carrying parcels, or it may just have been worked back to Dundalk, maybe having been a "cripple" off the "Enterprise". On NIR, they were regularly to be seen on early morning Portadown - Belfast railcars, their smart black'n'tan quite a contrast with by-now-tired NIR maroon and grey AEC railcars. I would be interested to know if a CIE "tin van" ever got near the Larne or Derry lines. I very much doubt it, and have never heard of it, but the Larne line in the 1960s had very considerable mail and parcels traffic, and you could get the UTA equivalent, the NCC brown vans - up to maybe SIX of them, tagged onto the back of Belfast - Larne railcars. Very much CDRJC operations- stick a few wagons at the back of a railcar set!

I suppose I've mentioned it before, but I tend to prefer the practical, in the sense of what is currently missing in RTR and kit form, and would be absolutely essential for authenticity in a given period. With growing interest in the "grey'n'green" era, me being one of 'em, practicality absolutely dictates a RTR CIE 20T or 30T guard's van, several types of laminates, Park Royals and above all - tin vans in all three liveries, and of all types. With a tiny few exceptions (e.g. the Loughrea coach), quite simply ALL passenger trains in the sixties and seventies had a generator van. Four and six wheeled ones up to 1969, exclusively, with the Dutch added in 1969 and BR in '72, and of course after that the Mk 2 and eventually Mk 3 ones. But we're talking here aboyt the sixties, so the 4 and 6 wheeld ones are an absolute necessity. The OTHER absolute necessity for main line passenger in the 1950-65 period is the AEC railcars, as ubiquitous and commonplace then as ICRs are now on main lines. These things are a must. There was scarcely a line which didn't have them, in many cases as much a "staple diet" as ICRs on the Midland today.

Those would be good too, indeed. And obviously a WCR / CDR Walker railcar.

If EVER a narrow gauge prototype was done, something which ran on several lines would be the most viable. This indeed, or T & D stuff which ran on the T & D, WCR and C & L. While only one home, a Donegal 2.6.4T also....

Just one locomotive for sale and nothing else? Does he still make models or advertise any range of rolling stock?

Tigers?

As long as the partridge is in the correct livery.............

Anything from 1955-65! Or, at a stretch, a "Jeep"........... Something STEAM!

I believe that they make locos in batches, and once they're gone, they will wait till orders build up before doing another batch. Or something like that. This will sometimes mean that a particular model isn't immediately available by return. Anything that may not show will, I'm sure, be back soon - but probably best to email them.

Wow! That's interesting to a "livery nerd" like me...... But it begs the question were these carriages which were later amended (window-wise) to fit these sets (but not repainted)? If so, that's ALSO something I was unaware of...... I'd be interested to see the pics. Thanks for the info!

I'd be interested to see the pics. The control cars certainly never ran like that, as the "tippex" livery had arrived before they entered traffic. The older stock were air-con, so this would have meant two a/c coaches running within the set? Certainly a new one to me!

THAT one looks more like most Irish ones. It seems to me that most (but not all) Irish ones had "plain" legs rather than the very "latticed" design on the Faller one. If no alternative can be found to buying that huge one, you can always imagine that CIE had decided some time in the 1970s to build one huge container yard to replace all the other goods yards and facilities all around Dublin.......gives an excuse for a freelance yard as big as you want it!

Let's hope there isn't a similar rule for model railways......... I knew one enthusiast who saw his 103rd..........he's gone off to the "sunny uplands" now where the 12ins = 1ft scale "Woolwiches" he used to drive are everywhere.........

Good thinking; yes, both two-wheeled and four-wheeled versions of this were commonplace on all passenger platforms from the late 1960s (replacing older platform barrows) to the 1980s.

The Mk 2s will be locked off and unavailable to passengers. Yes, vacuum braked but corridor connections between the Mk 2s and the older stock (BR vans / Cravens / Laminates / Bredins / Park Royals) were impossible. The loco is a 141 in black'n'tan, so the pic must be taken circa 1973/4/5. Not before '72. The train is the through Dublin - Limerick, carrying mail too, and is composed of typical stock of the time (Mk 2s excepted). The genny van will be noted as being absolutely filthy. This was commonplace with these and with the various types of 4 and 6-wheeled "tin vans" - but passenger-carrying stock was always kept pretty clean except from memory on Cork - Cobh locals!

Curious question: what is the origin of this bizarre British classification of goods stock? Was it wartime codes or something like that? (An ICR would have to be a "spider").

Ah....the Festiniog! One of my favourite railways since a teenage summer job on a track gang there......... (Me, a teenager; now THAT was a while back).

Nearer the time, Aldergrove, contact the DCDR's Chairman, Robert Gardiner, who is always very helpful to serious enquiries. Naturally, at the moment the place is out of bounds due to covid.

That's the former NCC one, now preserved as a static exhibit at the Downpatrick & Co. Down Railway. The livery is NIR maroon with quite a few black bits too. Chassis black. Crane and match trucks maroon bodies. Nowadays, maintenance stuff is all yellow for high visibility. This was not the case in the past; most breakdown cranes were black or grey or both. The UTA inherited this one above, plus a GNR one. The GNR one got a red repaint in UTA times, but the above NCC one remained black. The GNR one was withdrawn in the late 1960s and went to Whitehead, still with badly faded red paint and UTA crest. It remains there. In GNR times, I believe it was plain black and grey. GSWR / GSR / CIE steam cranes were always wagon grey. The NCC one above received a coat of NIR maroon, plus the NIR logo, around 1970 or thereabouts. The yellow ones seen in the 1990s at Inchicore were second hand British Rail cranes, which actually ended up seeing very little use indeed. The GNR one is now at Whitehead; available to measure and photograph by arrangement once the Covid-Pox has passed, I am sure.

Can't make it out exactly, but is that R N Clements below the "G" of "Sligo"? Counting the photographer, just 19 people - bound to have been more. I suspect Cyril Fry was also among them, and the Murrays of the IRRS, perhaps! Jimmy, you'll have to get the hang of posting them the right way up - took me a while, but if I can, anyone can! :-) Interesting wagon on the left - is it an NCC one? I suspect its one of the LMS vans brought over by the NCC when a good lot of their stock was converted into splinters by German bombs in Belfast. One of our weathering experts here would have a field day modelling the GN van on the right; it hasn't had a proper coat of paint since it was built, by the look of it - and indeed, this was not at all uncommon then.

A well-brought-up child! Here's hoping that he will get many, many decades of pleasure out of the hobby. When he's the age of some of us, he'll be modelling a preservation society with an "old ICR" in it, and telling his grandchildren that yes, he remembers actual diesel trains, and locomotives, just as an ever-decreasing number of US recall STEAM in use! Well done, Jack_Dunboyne!

That's correct. Surveys were done by the NCC. Re the map above, now we see it - as Galteemore says, it was PART downloaded; they've still left out Castlederg, but we'll let them away with that just this once! My comment about government policy is therefore not applicable to this map - though it was, sadly, in general!

I think I saw Sam Carse, James Boyd and Cyril Fry taking pics too - the latter two being kept well away from each other by the former! If jhb171Senior was watching, he'd watch the train go past, have a flask of tea in his car, and go home.... without bringing his camera! SUPERB scenes, John.

Amazingly realistic weathering on the loco....

TOP class as always!