jhb171achill

I was aware of 141 and A class locos making it into Omagh - wasn't aware of (presumably CIE) AECs. Obviously, routine services were largely AEC anyway by the 1960s, but these were simply ex-GNR AECs repainted in UTA green. One might therefore expect an GNR set which had gone to CIE to make a return visit in its new livery, but 2635 would have been a CIE car. An interesting photo would show one of the UTAs ex-GNR AEC sets crossing a CIE AEC set at, say, Dungannon! Off the top of your head, can you remember where you saw the photo of 2635?

I have lately tried to post images of things (naturally, upside down!) but I have been unable to upload them for the same reason - "too large to upload". I'm puzzled - I've been able to do this before. Anyone got any ideas? Sorry; off post........

The bulk of it to Belfast, by far, Leslie, especially in latter days. I am not sure when the large GNR cattle yards at Maysfields were built, but if they were comparatively late, then it's possible more went out via Derry (or Dublin) before that. I'm not sure where the cattle traffic generated in narrow gauge country went; probably out of Derry until the Victoria Road - Strabane section closed. Certainly the GSWR was carrying cattle for Belfast across the Burma Road for many years.

The second one....I think the top bit reads "Road Transport Act 1933" - am I right? And the lower bit means "licence plate". Thus, it is off a commercial (privately owned) registered lorry. It must be remembered that at that time the GSR had almost a monopoly of road freight. I am not sure if ownership records are still held for that period - if they are, bear in mind that the vehicle could have had many owners in its lifetime. Actually - just thinking - since the GSR was a private commercial company, rather than a state or nationalised entity, it could in theory be off a GSR lorry.

Good piece of detective work, Leslie. Pettigo would itself have seen many a cattle wagon pass through. I know there has been a kit of a GNR cattle truck, but now that we have "H" vans, fertiliser bogies, container flats, bubbles and corrugated opens, the ONLY iconic things not available, and "must-haves" for realism in the period up to 1975, are CIE "Palvans" and the standard CIE cattle truck. In the late 50s, older cattle trucks seemed to disappear overnight, and through the sixties and seventies it was just the CIE pattern. Quite low-roofed; those of us who have had a certain number of birthdays will recall.

B101s and maybe Cs into Omagh! Of course, as we know, 141s made it to Omagh.....

Leslie, he'd need 150 "H" vans for them to pull, plus about 200 GNR vans - maybe you could give him 350 for the price of 349? :-) In reality, CIE did offer at one stage to take over the entire GNR, so the idea of CIE all over Pettigo is by no means far fetched - in fact it's a very credible "might-have-been". If that had happened, it's very probable they would have eaten the SLNCR too, so "Arigna Road" would all have to be repainted (sorry David!!). That would probably have resulted in C class locos taking a three-times-daily mixed from Sligo to Enniskillen, maybe on to Omagh. Thus, the GNR Western District would have its own way into Sligo. Would the SLNCR's Railcar "B" have ended up in green on the Fintona branch?! Had all this happened, and especially had there never been a border, while much that actually did close would have done so anyway, it's at least possible we would still have the Derry Road, and Enniskillen - Clones - Portadown and Dundalk..... that's for another day!

It's certainly close enough. A repaint, some work on the rear door, and liberal weathering will do the trick!

I absolutely WISH that the late jhb171 Senior could see this layout. This was his patch, and had the line survived to go into CIE - which he would have very much approved of - it would have fallen to him to fix up that corrugated monstrosity and work out how much green paint they needed! The arrival of "A" and "C" class locos into Enniskillen to replace steam - now THAT would have been a wholly different matter!

Yes indeed - it is the real deal. And again, I would recommend keeping it indoors.

Bound to have been, Tony! A very different world that they lived in!

Wow!!!!! Outstanding stuff, Glover, truly superb.

A totally realistic goods train REALLY makes a layout come alive! Excellent stuff.

Indeed.... during this time he also took a look over the SLNCR in his own time and made recommendations to them; the SLNCR couldn't afford their own civil engineer. The CDR system was run under both NCC and GNR auspices. While on the NCC he also inspected that system, and his report on the track condition was unreservedly damning! he slapped an overall 25 mph limit on the entire system for railcars, with 20mph for steam engines (in 1949, I think it was), and had previously told them that if the Glenties line was to remain open (it didn't) they would have to replace the entire track; rails, sleepers and all, and renew much of the lineside drainage from scratch. Needless to say, the CDR hadn't the money, and the track became so bad that the branch would have become uninsurable, especially after an engineer's report like that. So it closed.

jhb171 Senior had an identical one! He would have joined the PWI about 1944. When he died two years ago, he was the oldest member of it in Ireland, and the last from the GNR(I) or NCC, as far as anyone was then aware, and also the last surviving GSR white-collar staff member, also as far as anyone knew. (He worked for all 3 companies, as well as the UTA and the LMS in England).

My dad was based in Enniskillen from the early 50s until closure, as District Engineer, with responsibility for track, bridges and other structures Omagh - Enniskillen - Dundalk, Portadown - Cavan, and the branches to Carrickmacross, Cootehill, Belturbet. Fintona and Bundoran. So Omagh was where he crossed over with whoever looked after Foyle Rd - Portadown and Cookstown / Keady - Portadown, and Antrim / Belfast / Newcastle to Amiens St. / Howth / Oldcastle was the Eastern District. he passed away just over two years ago, and Selwyn got him recorded.

Fantastic, Tony, well done. He probably knew my late father. Ex-GNR men are fewer and fewer now. You should interview him at length and introduce him to Selwyn Johnston in the railway museum in Enniskillen. Selwyn has recorded many old railwaymen, particularly from that area and has some priceless collections on tape of many railwaymen now gone to their well deserved rest.

That's what it's all about, Tony! Well done...

Superb stuff, Roxy. Thanks for sharing. Very dramatic!

Yes, Kirley. The partitions in the vestibule areas either side, i.e. both those which opened into the 1st and 2nd class sections were not of glass. They were of the same cream coloured panelling as can be seen on the sides in your photo. The glass partition, which is actually better described as a partition with windows in it, was between the driver's compartment and the 1st class section.

As you can see, these ones aren't stepped, as (a) it's the main 2nd class saloon and (b) as such, you wouldn't be able to see ahead anyway. That type of upholstery shown was, as far as I remember, some sort of red and grey mostly. That's GNR original.

I remember looking through those windows! Yes, there was a door between the 1st class and the driver, and yes, there was a seat on both sides. The car above is in an "in-between" livery - a one off. Despite still being in GNR navy and cream 9the blue was a lot darker in real life than that pic suggests), a UTA yellow panel has been added, but as yet no black "wasp" stripes. The GNR lettering and crest have been painted over in (GNR navy blue!) and UTA numerals added instead. Interesting. With regard to the grilles, as can be seen above, by the time the UTA and later NIR inherited their share of these railcars, the bare engine was generally exposed with the entire panels off, grilles and all. I never remember seeing one with a grille (or side panel), and for a time I travelled on them regularly. The front partition between driver and 1st class was indeed all glass (waist up) but more often that not the driver kept blinds down - don't know why. As children we thought it was because the driver was a killjoy! In terms of the tiered seats, I could be entirely wrong on this, but I have a theory: I have seen definite photographic evidence of tiering, but from recollection I suspect this may not have been the case in ALL of the 1st class sections, as I never remember seeing it, or sensing that some seats were higher. Maybe someone out there might know for certain? Where the tiering did exist, as may be seen in at least one photo, it didn't amount to much and wouldn't have made much difference. We're not talking about cinema or Croke Park tiering here, and these railcars had high enough seat backs, so only the front two pairs of seats had any meaningful forward view. The others didn't. The seats in those cars were extremely comfortable, although the engines were noisy and in later years the window openings rattled (though not even remotely as badly as in the power cars of 70 and 80 class railcars). My recollection of AECs is also that they seem to be the only railcars, apart from the 70 class, ever to run anywhere in Ireland where the temperatures setting were comfortable! Well ventilated in summer, cosy in winter. Now we have the NIR CAFs as probably the best temperature wise, and the ICRs set at stuffily tropical extreme heat almost all the time. I am assured by an extremely reliable source that this is not, as I first wondered, a design fault, but a conscious decision to keep the blue-rinsers happy! (I would tell them to buy a jumper, but that's for another day!). For interiors of GNR AECs, the walls were covered in a sort of vinyl-like stuff, painted cream in UTA days - probably also in GNR days. At least a couple in their very late NIR days were a light grey. not unlike the upper panels exterior above the NIR maroon. The first class upholstery was a flowery pattern on a mid green background, and the standard class was the standard dark green UTA upholstery as may today be seen on several preserved UTA buses. The UTA used this on main line stock too. The GNR sets which went south ended up with CIE upholstery which was a mid to light brown plastic stuff, same as in many buses. And as push-pulls, of course, the dreaded bright orange plastic seats!!!

Normally it's entirely 100% the road vehicle driver's fault. Not here!!

Interesting, Mike - was it working then? I think the reason they laid it aside was that they needed a more powerful loco for whatever trains they were operating. In retrospect I wonder might it have been working over there with a reduced boiler pressure or something, as it could haul a serious amount of coal between Derreenavoggy and Dromod, via (on the branch) some savage gradients and twists and turns.

I can reassure you, Roxyguy. I'm just back from the pub, and nothing happened beyond a conversation about passenger train make-ups in the 1970s with a partner-in-crime, known to those here. Thursday night; now that's different; that'll be a longer session.