jhb171achill

VERY interesting. The design of this does not correspond with anything I’m aware of, though the flat sides vaguely suggest the Cork & Macroom Railway, or if narrow gauge, Cork & Muskerry. What length and width is it?

The one at Cultra is of a later build, I think?

I remember seeing an old laminate-era dining car in use as a passenger coach on a Dundalk - Connolly local in the early 1980s....

The one with the two IR logos! There was that one coach. Something suggests there may have been two coaches with that on them, but I am not sure. Certainly no more. It was short-lived too. Claremorris to Ballina, Waterford to Rosslare, Rosslare - Limerick and Limerick - Nenagh often, if not USUALLY had a train consisting of a single coach plus genny van. Latterly this was a Craven, though in the 1970s / early 80s it could be a Park Royal or an old laminate. It would not have been a snack car though as none of those services had one. The shortest consist WITH a snack car was probably the snack car, plus genny van, plus maybe four or five other coaches. It would not be worthwhile putting a snack car on a service with less, unless it was closed up as such and only used for extra passenger accommodation.

"This type of video file isn't supported"............no vid............?

The “eval ITG” (deliberately misrepresenting-spelt) came about as a humorous skit. This followed the appearance a few years ago of a Facebook page whose aim was to discredit the DCDR. At one point the ITG were described within this as “evil”. The FB page was mis-spelt, with poor grammar too. This led to banter between various people who knew the story, privately making fun of this FB page, along the lines of “Iff them Eval IT’G typeS do& nOT Restire theStesm Engin, We Will @proTEST....” etc etc.....! ......all written in that style!

Small point on the “transitional”. Being transitional, there were exceptions! I saw one loco (141 I think but can’t recall) with the new “set of points” on the sides and ONE end but not the other.

Indeed, Very probably (I can’t recall) though a very small number of Cravens made it past 1990 also in their original livery.

I’ve an idea that the last “pre-tippex” carriage was about 1993-4.

It went round the ends just a little bit, maybe 6 inches or so.

Mine is "Dugort Harbour".... Dugort is a real village on the north shore of Achill Island, where there was a one-time and short lived proposal to extend the mgwrs Achill branch to. Such a line would have been commercially about the biggest flop possible in railway history; highly scenic, though! The village has a population of about 30 people...... I chose this because my initial idea was to build something like a scaled-down Achill terminus, or scaled-up Westport Quay. However, the absence of kits, let alone RTRs, of MGWR coaches of any type, and the absence of anything which could be kitbashed, put me off. Thus, I kept the name, but now it's a somewhat run-down looking remote terminus extension somewhere in West Cork or Kerry, as there have been RTR J15s, courtesy of Roderick Bruce, and kits of GSWR six-wheelers, courtesy of Des Sullivan. Thanks to Mayner, a G2 has joined the gathering, in case Midland 6-wheel kits ever appear. I picked up two Woolwiches a couple of years ago which will join once chipped, and accurately filthied. So what I have under way now will be based operationally on somewhere like Baltimore, Kenmare or Valencia Harbour. The name will stick, though; many childhood memories playing on the Golden Strand beach at Dugort.....

I'll take four luggage vans and four hot water bottles....

Another few worth looking at, where the narrow and 5'3 were adjacent but separate would be Ballymoney and Skibbereen, and the dual gauge transshipment sheds at Dromod, Ennis and perhaps Ballymena.

Check out Larne Harbour for track ideas - the station had both gauges for the BNCR and the B & L narrow gauge....

I forgot to say earlier - there's a font you can download called "bunchlo" which is the best available equivalent to the font the GSR used for the bilingual station nameboards. CIE just used plain Roman script, with black letters on a white background. All of those old black signs with "white"* letters were done by the GSR. (* In model form, use cream, as the white - if it ever truly WAS "white" - was discoloured by CIE days to an extent that would make actual white on a layout look unrealistic).

The NCC had no lining - plain black. The UTA livery was very attractive with its lining, crest and red coupling rod.

I can’t be certain on this, but the black ends start appearing about the same time as the white lines - maybe one a bit before or after. In reply to the question about the width of the white lines, about 3 inches.

The ends were black, yes, but the day-glo squares were a later addition. Yes, adding white lining would be suitable. You’d need the “intercity” writing too, though initially many had got the white stripes but not yet this writing. I think Railtec do the writing. Somebody does....

The "Tippex" livery came into being along with the "set of points" IE logo in late 1987. it was the same, exactly, as the "Supertrain" livery, with the following exceptions: 1. Replacement of CIE "roundel", which was ONLY a On the ends of locomotives, with the new "set of points" logo on ends AND sides of locos. 2. White lines, hence the "tippex" nickname for the livery - as if they'd just gone along the side of a train with a "tippex" pen. NIR would soon copy this; in 1988 white lines would start appearing on the light blue and light grey NIR "Enterprise" carriage livery. 3. On carriages, the words "inter city" in a sort of "joined writing" style would start appearing in hitherto blank carriage sides. Many coaches still sported the older livery over the next two or three years, but as Hexagon suggests, they seemed to add the white lines fairly quickly.

Very many thanks, gentlemen. I have just emailed him. I mentioned the "flying snails" above; I have also enquired about alternative numbers for Murphy B141s in the original livery, as I have six.

For some time, the Railtec website has been saying that email contact is currently unavailable. How do we contact Steve with a query about producing a new transfer? Anyone know? I want to see if he can do some wagon "flying snails" of the "stencilled" version seen from the late 50s to the time the "Roundel" replaced them. Indeed, if anyo else is interested, a combined order might be do-able.

You're doing it in silver? That will look amazing!

Ulster Railway, 1865 Engineer’s minute books. I like the way these old volumes are bound.... Many of those who wrote these book up had, as others have mentioned, a very neat and stylish type of writing. As you can see here, there were certainly some exceptions of barely legible scrawl (see last pic!)...

Thought so. John's stuff is magnificent in itself.

From the 1985 Working Timetable (which I didn't think I still had!), this might be of interest to modellers who wish to have authentic numbers on wagon stock. If this is of interest, I have some from earlier years too - PM me if you want me to look something up.