jhb171achill

Thank you, Patrick. It'll be small and simple, just like Banagher, Skibbereen, Westport Quay or Baltimore in 1960! Discussions with Baseboard Dave satisfactorily concluded now. J15, 141 and two laminates in stock, and orders in with Provincial Leslie, SSM and Worsley.....

Do you mean loco or coach or railcar, Tony? While it's not cheap, you can get a kit of an AEC railcar fro Worsley. It would need suitable motor, bogies etc.

Ahh!!!! I'm quoting CIE colours - but I forgot it's meant to be in Britain! D'oh.... (mind you, if it turns out to be based in Ireland, the above applies!)

Yellow and other bright colourings of brake wheels, levers, handles and other bits and pieces, and yellow walkways etc etc... are all a modern phenomenon. Generally, you're well into the mid / late 1990s before they start appearing.

Directions?

Or "looking in the mirror and seeing a rail-car"?

W O W W W !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Outstanding!

With space and budget undoubtable considerations for either young people, or the increasing number of single parents, I suspect that layout may become "online" more. This, while regrettable to the likes of us, may be the way it'll go. "Virtual" locos could be bought / downloaded, with "virtual" layouts on computer screens, like the popular game of "Sims" of such complexity that the same thing in real life would cover a few acres.

I'll certainly take a standard open.

In that case, Sean, we're looking at the following. Internal: Dark leaf green painted walls, with dark cream upper panels separated at waist level by a 1" black line. External: Painted walls - be they wood-panelled or perhaps painted concrete finish - light grey or light cream colour (cream if wood). Doors, door frames and the like, weatherboards, gutters and facias, the same dark green (CIE pre-1955 darker green / CIE bus green / CIE steam engine green). Tanks on water towers usually the same, though occasionally galvanised silver / grey. The actual glazing surrounds on windows are white. Station signs: If of ex-GSR origin, enamel signs with bilingual white lettering on black background, but the white will not be pristine - you'd need to weather it to off-white. Or - if it appears to be newly painted, a new CIE plastic sign or a repainted pre-GSR one, the opposite: white background, black letters. I'm assuming you're looking at CIE lines. If you're thinking of GNR or UTA, whole different ball game, though the UTA was also fond of dark green and cream! Your model shown above looks like a rendered cement finish wall. If that is correct, a very pale grey stone-coloured finish (if not a cement-like finish: many cement walls WERE bare unpainted then, but were only painted by IE years later). The corner stones are highly unlikely to have been picked out a different colour, though I think (but stand to be corrected) that a few buildings would have been - if so, dark green, but probably same stone colour. Facia boards dark green. If those window surrounds on your drawing are stone surrounds, unpainted bare stone. If they are wood, dark green, but the actual frames round the glass inside them - white. Wooden doors - solid green.

David, once this is finished, I'm definitely going to have a go at a 21mm thing - probably a Holmanesque imaginary offshoot of the Blessington tram...... long term.

Hi Sean I can give you more detailed info if you let me know what period you intend to represent.....

Vote early and vote often!

Nice! Bear in mind the colour scheme on the oft-seen model of Carlow station displays the modern IE colour scheme of cream and grey. In the 1990s it was red, white and blue; while in the 70s / early 80s, it was white, black and two shades of grey. Prior to that; from the dawn of time (GSR, early CIE) into the 1960s, cream with leaf green door frames and white glazing bars.

In the late 1960s / early 70s, it was about ten shillings (50p) a gallon. Pre Feb 71, prices in shillings and pence. After that, when decimalisation did away with the shilling, which was 12 old pennies, or 5p, it became 50p a gallon. Litres were many years later.

Her hair is the wrong shade of livery!

I bubbled. Good luck, gentlemen; an award would be well deserved and also assist in the launch of your narrow gauge endeavours in the People's Republic of Brexit!

I'm looking forward to the scenic side of it. I had a great meeting with baseboard Dave today (thank you very much for your time, Mr. L!), and we discussed the whole project in detail. Understandably, he is very busy and actual construction won't start immediately, but the collection of rolling stock will. David Holman, yes, I hear you! - and it had occurred to me to maybe base a terminus on something like Glenties (SHORTER Donegal railcars!) or Ballyshannon. It would run on 00 gauge track and the model would be an appropriate scale to use it as 3ft gauge. However, Railcars 12-20 would need a fair sized turntable and running them backwards wouldn't be an option. Another one on that scale might be one of the mine offshoots of the Ballymena, Cushendall & Red Bay Railway; a couple of converted Isle of Man tanks and a few short wheelbase coal trucks - the passenger train being a twice-daily one-carriage affair. However, what I'm focussing on now will resemble Westport Quay in some details, and Valentia* Harbour in others. The idea is that of a "branch off a branch" extension. Perusal of old timetables shows that Valentia was operated more as a shuttle from Cahirciveen, where the main train terminated, while Baltimore was operated as a further extension of the main line train which went only as far as Skibbereen. Equally, Westport Quay traffic tended to operate only to and from Westport Station. The idea here is to allow very short trains in a terminus setting which is way smaller (and thus shorter) than most - while retaining absolute authenticity. If Murphy Models ever get around to doing a RTR horse, Fintona would fit this bill absolutely exactly. One might allow a little licence here, and assume the GNR pogrom never happened, and Fintona survived until, say, 1968. Had that happened, it would almost certainly very quickly have become just a goods siding, as freight into the town was still quite busy; but had a passenger service been retained, just watch UTA buy the Sligo Leitrim railcar from CIE, or transfer in a double ended thing like NCC 1 or that old GNR Gardner car which used to do the Derry - Strabane locals. It looks, thus, as if this year will be spent gathering locos and rolling stock. The eventual idea is that there will be three separate sets of locos and rolling stock. One will span the 1940-50 period, all steam, with older wagons, many cattle, and convertible "soft-tops". Half a dozen six wheelers, maybe a few each in GSR maroon and original dark CIE green, will fulfil the passenger requirements. Another set of stuff will utilise some of these, but Park Royals, laminates, McAllister "H" Vans and "C" class diesels appear. Tin van heaven... Finally, a motley collection of maybe nothing more than one each laminate of several types, a Craven, Park Royal, Bredin and an stray old GNR K15, a three-car Worsley AEC set (LONG term!!!!!!!!!!!!!) and along come the 121s and 141s; this lot all black'n'tan. Don't hold your breath folks; Rome was never built in a day, and the above will take a good while to build up. There will be wallet-related matters to consider too, of course, plus hopefully successful applications to the Dept. of Domestic Planning, Tidiness, and Fiscal Approval..... The major card I have to play in my planning applications is this: 12.01 Please describe the major benefit of said application for the Construction and Housing of a Layout to the overall domestic economy, with particular reference to the back of the upstairs sitting room. It'll keep him off the streets It will keep me occupied, thus preserving peace and quiet downstairs. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ (Administrative use only. Please do not write below this line) Decision: Application Granted. M'lud, I rest me case. I'm off for a cup of tea. Over'n'out. (* The GSWR, GSR and CIE almost invariably called it Valencia).

Ok, Phil, maybe you might pm me with details? Many thanks!

I'm looking for a couple of these, if anyone wants to sell one or two each of the heating van and the luggage van.

It tried to give me the option to "open in a spreadsheet".... ????????????? In truth, Bantree, you can never weather anything too much. Pavements, fenceposts, buildings, sheds, track, ground surfaces, locos and rolling stock in REAL life are ALWAYS weathered. Tha building looks fantastic. Look at any layout that strikes you as especially realistic scenery-wise, or in respect of the trains running, and I'll guarantee you that weathering has been liberally applied to everything. For those aspiring to accuracy, it's actually a much underrated aspect of our hobby, I think.

At last, a new year and a new layout, after a gap of many years with a garden railway dismantled some 6 years ago, and the Austrian 009 in boxes for longer. I'm really starting from scratch here, and plan to show bits and pieces as this develops. It truly is at start stage now, as all i have are two coach kits, a signal cabin kit, a 141 and a J15. The layout will be based on an imaginary GSWR outer terminus, something like Valentia Harbour, inspired by Westport Quay, Baltimore, and the like. The idea is that there's a long branch from somewhere civilised, where the Dublin trains arrive, and this outer outpost was probably built in 1890 with thoroughly unrealistic expectations as to how busy it would become! Result - it's become a backwater off a backwater, surviving only because of beet and maybe (like Westport Quay) to bring an oil tank full of diesel for CIE buses down every so often. It's the mid 60s, and the line hasn't long left - it will eventually succumb to the 1967 round of closures which killed the Mallow-Waterford and Thurles-Clonmel lines. That's the setting. I had agonised for quite some time as to whether to resurrect my 009 stuff, as German and Austrian narrow gauge has always been a big interest of mine. Using 9mm gauge would have allowed a significantly sized terminus for long distance trains - a Corris-type thing with a few tiny slate wagons was never of much interest to me personally. On the other hand, as Leslie, Murphys, SSM and others here brought out more and more "proper" Irish stuff, I became tempted. Trouble was, like so many others here, space was at a premium, and the only way to do a "round-and-round" 00 gauge was to go into the garage. This place is used by daughter's car, so it would be necessary to have it on some sort of electric hoist when the car was in. After some consultation with one of our experts here, it became clear that this is only going to happen when i win the Euromillions. Since I don't buy tickets, I have to concede that this is unlikely to happen any time soon. So it was back into the house. A chance conversation with someone in the 009 Society (of which I am a member) suggested selling the lot of Austrian stuff - in fact, I advertised them here too. I am also a member of the Austrian Railway Group, and I advertised them there too. So it was back to the area once reserved for an 009 layout. It became clear that a shunting / fiddle yard layout is all that's possible here, so there it is; the genesis for the idea. What it will lack in operational possibilities (in terms of a continuous run and terminus shunting), it will hopefully make up for in other ways. Small outer termini like those referred to above tended not to change much through their lives. We see Arigna Road, Bantry and so on - you could put stock dating from typical scenes in the 1930s there, and 1960s, and neither would look out of place. Thus, to provide interest, I intend to eventually have a set of stock around 1945 (GSR maroon gives way to CIE dark green era), another set to deal with mid to late fifties; this allows laminates, early diesels and Park Royals to appear, and by degrees, we're out of the grey'n'green era into the black'n'tan. So what it lacks in operational variety, it will hopefully make up for in rolling stock interest. Things like J15s and six-wheeled coaches will span all of these periods, as will many wagons. I'm currently in discussions with Baseboard Dave and others - updates will be posted as things develop during the year. I post this initially as I'm aware that there are others here with issues about space, and thoughts on how to deal with it. I did consider N gauge, but until and unless there are a good range of high quality kits, or better still, RTR stuff, this isn't going to happen for either myself or many others. Maybe, in ten years time, there will be enough N stuff - for example, one might expect 3D printing to improve drastically in quality, but we'll see. I intend to have this finished to a high exhibition standard and displayed. But that won't happen overnight, and will involve me perusing in great detail the scenic works of a number of maestros, like the Holmans of Arigna, for example.

Tis a mountain railway, Broithe.......!

I'm no expert on buses, so I seek guidance. Current layout in preparation involves a rural location mid fifties to mid sixties. So a double decker with "Drimnagh" or "46A" on the destination blind won't cut the mustard! The old half-cab single deckers in rural areas - were they P class? - where would I get two 00 scale models of these, one in CIE green and one in red and cream; also an E class as seen in late 1960s in rural locations?

Got it! But it won't download..... keeps going on about loading it into Dropbox, then nothing happens.....