jhb171achill

Looks like it, Colin.....!

The one at Bray looks best. The "mustard" and also the unnaturally dark shade apparently shown in the pic at Ardrahan are not at all accurate. They are the result of in one case under-, and the other case over-exposure of the camera film. All three carriages are exactly the same colour. No weathering or wear comes into it; it's the photo in each case.

I footplated 190 into Ballina about 1979 and she was in Supertrain. I'm 90% sure 188 was supertrained by 1977, when I saw her on the evening Rosslare-Limerick with two laminates and a van. I think that was 188. From memory 145 and 147 were B'n'T quite late on but I don't recall details. Again, from memory 150, 151 and 155 were all Supertrain by at least 1976. I footplated 151 or 155 to Cobh on a local of dingy (and heavily "weathered") Park Royals. Cork-based suburban stock was by far the externally tattiest on the whole system, and the internally dirtiest. With one exception: the dreadfully shabby ex-AEC pushpulls in Dublin. They were just ghastly! The others you mention were all repainted in "the mid 1970s"; but that could be anything from 1973-77. Personally, I'm unaware of any information source giving exact dates for each loco.

I'm not trying to "plug" the books, but if you look in "Rails Through the West" and "Rails Through North Kerry", you'll see what I mean. All Murphy's models are correct, as all locos carried both liveries. The only difference between any two locos was on which particular date each one was repainted.

The earliest changes into "Supertrain" were 1972. The first locos I personally ever saw were that year - a pair of 121s about to leave Heuston with a mixed train of laminates, Park Royals and a few Cravens for Cork. Both were pristine new - the first thing I noticed was the sparkling clean orange cab roofs. I am unaware of actual dates when each particular loco was repainted, but as mentioned above, all were repainted over the next few years. I recorded 145 on the northbound goods shunting in Tuam in 1976, still in B'n'T, and an unidentified PAIR of 141s still B'n'T on the up Westport at Claremorris in 1978; days later I saw another B'n'T in Drogheda as part of a pair, the other being Supertrain. Unless you're modelling an actual year or month, and you're aware of an actual painting date for a particular loco, a mix of BnT and Supertrain is completely appropriate for any year 1972-80; this applies not only to the 121, 141 and 181 class, but (pre-1978) the extremely few remaining 101s, then only seen much on weedsprays and ballast.

Yes, we all have our preferences, and if I decide to buy some bubbles and repaint them tartan, it's nobody's business but mine, of course! However, in terms of "toy-like", I can confirm that the livery they're supplied in is exactly correct. If anything, a darker shade might be taken as resembling black, which in Irish terms certainly is "toy-like", as these "black-chassis-with-anything" model wagons certainly ARE toy like - they're a Hornby invention! While black chassis were the norm in Britain, they weren't here - and even in Britain they weren't universal. Well, Glenderg, I think I'd prefer to stand behind him.....

That's actually the all-grey, the original livery. If that pic was colour, it wouldn't look much different! All that changed later was the actual "bubble" becoming orange - the chassis stayed grey. Cement dust weathered bubble and chassis "cement-grey" which looked a bit darker when wet - in any livery. Once the actual "bubble" became cream, chassis became black (until covered in cement dust!). Nothing ever ran with black chassis and orange bubble. The "factory finish" (good description!) was just the ordinary wagon grey of the day.

How do you mean, Stevie....... All started life B'n'T but ended up in "Supertrain", then "tippex".......

Quite a few are, with many many others actually in existence, but buried under rubbish!

As I mentioned, I prefer the idea of it but chicken out of the idea of making it all. If something was available from Peco or the like, then despite the task of re-gauging everything, I think that would persuade me to go 21mm - and I'm certain others would too.

Almost all Irish turntables were in pits, thus surface ones rarely if ever authentic. The pits would usually be cement-lined, or stone for older ones, with brick edging in many cases around the top rim. And, from the 1960s anyway, even operational ones would have had a generous crop of weeds inside the pits!

Interesting..... that's not as expensive as I thought.

I'm looking at those backscenes. They could equally be Irish countryside. Does anyone know where to get, or how to go about getting scenes of actual places? I'll be looking for something that looks vaguely like West Cork or parts of Mayo, with rolling hills and fields.

Tara Junction has ten times more of interest than the entire current Irish railway system! The NIR duo look superb.

Stunning - absolutely superb job.

It's in CIE 1945-55 livery, Tony. The carriages are not authentically Irish, as they are re-liveried LMS stock, though with the commonality of Derby design, they're not unlike some ex-NCC vehicles. The loco would have run under both CIE and GSR banners. The GSR painted them the usual all-grey, and it was CIE that painted most of the class lined green.

Yer man's pipe is in the wrong livery.......

Interesting! See how even before being in traffic much longer than the time taken to go through a wash, the lettering "A60" (towards the end of the clip) is already getting worn off! These things, don't forget, weren't painted - bare metal. Hardly conducive to lettering staying put. Livery details too: on "silver" locos, numerals were pale green, while on unpainted carriages they were initially red. Never black, as I've seen on at least one model.

Excellent, Weshty, that was quick! I'll be along to you for some in the Noo Year.... Is it possible to do the stencil version of the snail? Weathering of wagons after applying transfers is of course feasible, but they used to get so bad, so faded, that watery wishy-washy grubby looking numerals and decals would also be a distinct advantage. Of course, anyone striving for visual accuracy in goods trains would need to weather the lot anyway! Yes, I was thinking of stock other than the IRM stuff. The ballasts are already sufficiently "used" looking, with accurate reproductions of ad-hoc repainting of just a patch to put a number on, as typical for many years. Bubbles, would of course be weathered within an inch of their lives, heartbreaking as it would be to stir a 3-pack of them in a bucket of watery cement*! What I had in mind were wooden open wagons, Palvans, old wooden goods vans, repainted ex-GNR stuff, H vans and the likes. (* Do not try this at home. No bubbles were harmed in the making of this comment. May contain traces of nuts. For illustrative purposes only. Terms and conditions apply.)

I've been continuing my research on a number of points over the last few days. I've come to my own conclusions - which will work for me, but not all, of course. I decided that it has to be 21mm - BUT. 21mm looks way, way better, and as David and others mention, why go to the bother of rivet counting on a tender, getting an exact style of bogie side or door handle - or LIVERY - correct to the letter, when something so elementary as the GAUGE is just plain WRONG, and obviously so. The "BUT" is the cost. I have the choice of making up all the track myself, which I don't relish, or paying beyond the means of a pensioner to get it done professionally, excellent though that job would be. I could live with converting the one J15 and the one B141 that I already own, though last night I ordered some more stuff from some of our illustrious suppliers. Thus, unless some way appears to get the track done cheaply, I am going to have to go for 00 gauge on this one. However, the idea is not dead; in the future, once this thing is finished, I am determined to give 21mm a go, perhaps some sort of shuttle thing with a CIE AEC railcar set. It could be something based on what Fintona might have looked like if it had survived. So, regrettably, in this case it's code 75 which at least looks better. We have seen major advances in Irish railway modelling in the last 15 years, starting with rudimentary re-branding of British stuff into garish orange and black (I know these are now in some cases collector's items, but I have to say I always thought they looked awful!) to the outputs of Murphy Models, IRM, Leslie's stuff, and others too. Carriages and locomotives can now be had to suit many prototypes. However, the glaring omission, and in which Irish railway modelling is still 40 years ago, is track. Nobody would seriously think that it's OK to build a 4mm scale Co. Donegal or Isle of Man layout on standard (scale 4ft gauge!) 00 scale track, but the Irish modeller has no alternative unless he is wealthy or at the upper end of the modelling skill set. Those of us in Dublin or Belfast or a few other places can join clubs and get some help, and indeed I can, but that's only the answer for some of us. The British have their P4 and EM standards, as 00 isn't even right for 4ft 8.5in gauge - whoever invented 00!! Even in the big market that is the UK, it's a niche market even there. That being the case, it'll necer be mainstream commercial here to have 21mm, but it should be! At the very least, it is worth emphasising to our intrepid model manufacturers, (some of whom might comment here?) that at the very least they might design their future models in such a way that a simple change of wheelset would facilitate re-gauging. I know that, for example, if I had an enormous layout with dozens of locomotives, and several hundred items of rolling stock, even if cheap 21mm track appeared, I wouldn't even dream of changing as it would mean a humungous queue of things to be converted. So; food for thought. Meantime, the planned offering should appear in some form in the new year, but it will be, for now and most regrettably, 00 gauge.

I'm just wondering aloud (partly in general, partly for our good colleagues here who make transfers) what chance there is of any of the following becoming available..... All too often we see pristine wagons with crystal clear snow white logos and numerals. This would virtually never be the case in real life, except for the day the new wagon left the building shops in Inchicore. Severe weathering and fading is what's needed to approach any degree of operational realism. So, what I seek are: Weathered flying snail STENCILS as applied to wagons after 1955 or so. Weathered sets of numbers of both the fonts used by CIE on wagons from the 1940s to the present day. Weathered CIE roundels both in all-white, and white lettering surrounded with tan "wheel" as used on H and Palvans in the 1960s. Thoughts? If these things were cheap enough to make, I'd get a quantity done and sell off what I didn't need. Letraset standard fonts, modern "arial" style gleaming white print just looks awful.

And now the 2700s are history (for the moment)...

Yes!

Great stuff, MikeO! Any pics? Incidentally, I had another thought. I had a notion the end windows weren't the same as British ones but I am not sure. I must check! The gangways were standard Irish, of course, not British Pullman type.

See attached; this, with gold lining, is the ONLY authentic "snail" for steam engines and carriages. Post-1955, in lighter green livery, sometimes without gold lining. In all other cases, with, same as green buses.