jhb171achill

Sorry to hear that, Andy. RIP. It was good to meet you at Cultra, and I thought Castlederg was easily the best layout on show that day.

Me too, Tony! I only decided to go on the spur of the moment late the night before! And I had to be gone by 12!

Interesting shot! Charles has made a masterpiece of research into this little known subject.

The Castlederg one was truly a work of genius. So incredibly realistic, despite the smallish scale. For this type of layout, Andy has very much set the standard. I hadn't met him before either, so that was a privilege in itself. Great to see you and family again too, Patrick.

Superb!

Great to meet so many of our small community at Cultra this morning. I had to meet my cousins in the afternoon (non-negotiable family event!), so I left Dublin at 8 a.m., drove to Cultra (hardly any traffic!), and spent the best part of two hours there. The drive back, punctuated by a 20 minute catnap in a layby and coffee in Applegreen, had me home by 3. Great venue, except that the 12ins - 1ft exhibits are far too close together; photography is quite impossible. Equally, all the things in glass cases like the GSWR dining car model, or Drew Donaldson's locomotives, are also impossible to photography because of the glare on the glass. You can't even see them properly. The model of the 500 class (was that one of Montgomery's?) is hidden in a corner, impossible to view properly. The curved pathway makes a journey to the loo into a major expeditionary voyage. But the layouts were great! And some of the static models were truly outstanding. Looking forward to the next one!

These models tend to be challenging. They require a great deal of maintenance and can be unpredictable. Running is often pretty smooth, but can also be off and on, rough and breakdowns are inevitable. It is always advisable to keep them well oiled.

There's always plastic surgery, Jason......! A new chassis and couplings could be fitted, and the whole thing clad in a new livery. Donald, for example, has accurate IE tan, though I'd be worried about where the Tippex stripes are.

Didn’t ye know that, Brassnut? He also presided over the closure of many, many other lines including the entire West Cork, the Tramore line, and the remaining narrow gauge.

Anyone got one they’d like to sell? Looking for original 1963 livery only. Weathered or unweathered. DCC ideal, but either will do.

Which livery?

I have just ordered three of these beasts, following a visit to IRM Towers (and their Esteemed Teapot), during this afternoon’s monsoon. The lengths we go to. So I braved my way home through monsoon, tsunamis, floods, plagues of locusts and typhoons in Rathfarnham.

CIE.

Probably the single most important missing link for the 1950-85 (35 years!!) period missing now is the AEC railcar. This is the only thing which spanned the steam era, the green’n’grey era, the black’n’tan era, and in the form of push-pulls the Supertrain era. By the mid 1950s they monopolised many CIE main line services, if not most in some areas. They even made it to West Cork, Tramore, Omagh, Enniskillen and Newcastle. They ran on the Dublin to Belfast, Dublin to Cork lines, the entire MGWR, and Sligo to Limerick to Tralee and Waterford. An AEC is as essential to a (main line) GNR setting as steam engines are. It is EVERY bit as essential to the CIE scene as green six-wheelers, “H” vans and J15s. It is as irreplaceable to this entire period as a DART is to a model railway of Connolly Station in 2018, or a 141 and 071 and Mk 2s to ANY 1980s layout. Any ex-GN area UTA or NIR based layout of 1958-74 period needs them too. For such s long period in railway history, comparatively few liveries are needed. 1. GNR dark blue & cream 2. CIE green - darker with simplified lining 3. CIE later green 4. CIE black’n’tan 5. UTA green with wasp stripes 6. GNR livery with UTA markings ** 7. UTA lighter blue & cream - narrow cream band ** 8. UTA lighter blue & cream - broader cream band 9. NIR maroon and light grey. 10. Black-ended black’n’tan for pushpull cars in CIE livery. (** Versions 6, 7, & 8 were both extremely short lived and in all three cases only applied to a few examples, not (and nothing like) the whole fleet.)

Probably IRM have offered to print “MasterCard FINAL DEMAND” on your package. With a choice of liveries, you also have a choice of messsges. Other variations are: CAUTION - Live Spiders Marks & Spencers Charge Card Bill Bank Statement (Bank Debt Recovery Unit) .......yer woman will NEVER open them!

If there was such a thing I’d be on it for a long term future project I have in mind.

IRM have offered to print “MasterCard FINAL DEMAND” on your package. With a choice of liveries, you also have a choice of messsges. Other variations are: CAUTION - Live Spiders Marks & Spencers Charge Card Bill Bank Statement (Bank Debt Recovery Unit) .......yer woman will NEVER open them!

Lonely farmer aged 71 looking for nice wife. Must be able to cook, clean, dig and stack turf, sow, dig and cook potatoes. Must be able to bear and raise ten children. Must be able to repair stone walls, re-thatch roofs, help with building and funding the layout, and help with calving and the lamb season. Must be able to sow and harvest crops. Must be able to drive the tractor. Please enclose photograph (of tractor)..... Kadees or other couplings?

It would be interesting to know the last six, which presumably included 3, 15 and 39. I think - but can't be certain without delving into IRRS journals (and I've no time this morning!) that the final six went more or less togetherness? Great to see 3 & 39 preserved in working, or near-to-working order, thanks to the tremendous efforts of the ITG.

That is indeed the reason that about six A class were retained longer than they otherwise would face been - Tara.

Suitable rolling stock could vary from GNR K15s in green or black’n’tan, to (new!) Cravens, a few surviving wooden GSWR corridor bogies, various varieties of laminates and Park Royals, and surviving Bredins and CIE 1951-3 stock (broadly modelled on Bredins).

I remember watching a train with a tin van at each end, and eleven bogies in between on the main line once, headed by a pair of 141s, I think. Within the consist were two or three Cravens, not all together, at least two varieties of Laminates, Park Royals and one other - I can't recall, but it was either an ex-GNR coach or a Bredin..... that was common, indeed, the norm.

@jhb171achill might know if this was an early freight livery or it was just pre Black'n'Tan after Green. An A class would look well too, especially as its pre-rebuild without the head light box. Yes, it was silver, then green, then black from about 1963 onwards for these beasts. Some at the very start got Black and Tan. Some, but not all of them acquired yellow patches during the all-black era, as above. You're looking at about 1964 (I'll check when I get a minute; might be 1965) until new engines 1969 onwards, after which they all reappeared with black'n'tan livery with low tan band. No loco of A, C, B101 or any class at all, ever had yellow patches on any livery other than all-black. So no Black and Tan with yellow patch. From memory, and photographs, my guess would be that maybe a third of the A and C class fleet would have had yellow patches in the late sixties. Maybe a quarter. I have no recollection of ever seeing a B101 treated this way, and be reasonably sure that none did carry yellow. Certainly, no 121, 141 or 181; no D, E or G, ever had yellow patches. It seemed to be an "A & C class thing".

Correct, flange. Never turned a wheel! The livery was indeed oddly attractive. I think it may have only been painted on one side.

The logo on the front is vaguely reminiscent of one used by PJKA, the Indonesian railway authority, in the 1960-80s period. But neither the loco, the livery, or the markings are any more Indonesian than they are Cavan & Leitrim. I would guess it’s a “makey-uppy” thing, like some of those early “CIE” models of crude British outline locos and coaches in even cruder “Irish” livery.