jhb171achill

jhb171 senior went over to England for 2 or 3 years in the forties, working in the LMS Blackburn Division as civil engineer. He saw many "Black 5" class locomotives, which were straight out of their Bachmann boxes, and always called them the "new engines"....

Absolutely superb!

Mayner's points there are spot on. Whether we like it or not - and, doubtless, none of us do - while the abandonment of the railway in its entirety in the morning would certainly cause difficulties, these would be nowhere near as much as they would have been seventy years ago, when such a thing would have paralysed the country entirely. Politicians, the travelling public, and railway staff and their unions, as well as railway management, would all do well to be aware of that.

Long time since I sawed a baseboard, but I used to do so outdoors for the reasons of dust, no matter what stuff I was using....

Sure what are credit cards for, Railer!

Very nice models indeed! There are two prototypical GNR bogie ones at Whitehead, in various states of advanced distress. As you obviously know, they were always standard GNR grey with simply the word "GUINNESS" added. They were used for carrying grain and had hatches on the roofs.

That's correct, minister. Generally, where the few non-grey liveries did exist, they were all made grey after the GSR came into being; it seems the GSR had an even greater liking for grey than even contemporary IE! Certainly, for most of the 121-class era, anything four wheeled was grey entirely until about 1970, when the current brown (albeit with a slightly less reddish tint) began to appear. By the end of four wheel traffic, probably 60% of the fleet was brown! including allow bogie flats - these were never grey.

So few were any of the real ones (and thanks for clarifying actual existence of Murphy), that a layout attempting authenticity is probably better off without. The "Guinness" wagons as shown in the book, and also similar were shed by the GNR to carry grain, were in coming grey with company markings; just the word "Guinness" added.

Private owner wagons were exceptionally rare in Ireland. Unless I'm mistaken, the Kilkenny and Murphy ones are fictitious; I've never seen a photo of eitherf. The East Downshire Company had coal trucks on the Belfast and Co Down Railway, but there weren't many others. Instead, the railways would build wagons for private traffic, but they would almost always be in railway company livery. The biggest thing on model Irish wagons to be aware of, probably, is that bought wagons all seem, without exception, to have black chassis as if they were passenger vehicles. Very few Irish wagons had black chassis (NCC "brown vans" were one exception, as they generally ran in passenger trains). Prior to 1925, body (and matching chassis) colours varied from a very dark grey (almost black) as on the GSWR, to various shades of grey. Grey was universal among all companies 1925 - mid 1950s. At that stage, the GNR used brown on some stock, though most was grey; the UTA used brown on some in the 60s, and CIE started using brown in the 70s. Brown became the universal CIE colour after the elimination of loose-coupled goods stock in 1975 after cattle traffic ended. In the era when a 121 would have run (60's - 2010's) four wheeled wagons would have been all grey, and no private owner wagons like Murphy or Kilkenny existed at all (so just use CIE plain grey for coal traffic!). As wooden four wheel opens were phased out in the late 60s, very few ever wore brown; they were taken over by Bullied steel wagons instead. These had unpainted steel bodies - a throwback to the unpainted silver "livery" of the 50s. Initially, chassis were the same, though in the 80s a few had brown chassis. Once doubled in height, at the end of the beet era, these were all brown.

Hurricane Mk 1 - yes, I did indeed make representations, let us say, to the relevant areas within IE. Junctionmad - the later branch lines were certainly not built with speed in mind - but the main surviving routes are the original ones from way before that, which were very well engineered. There is no reason, given the right economics, politics and demand, timetabling and organisation; in other words, hypothetically, why (say) Dublin - Cork, Dublin - Galway and Dublin - Belfast should not be high speed. Other comments relate to competition with the car; this is quite correct. For thew railway to compete with road times, the investment needed would be of TGV proportions. If ever the Irish population rises to 20 million, and oil reserves twice that of Saudi are found in Co. Tipperary, that's a possibility; not otherwise.

Irish railways, being broader gauge, and originally extremely well engineered, are built, as such, very much as suitable for high speed as British ones. Lack of high speed is largely due to (a) lack of money and (b) management's perception that the public will settle for lower speeds.

Right across the network, there's another issue - the extreme heat inside ICR and also Mk 4 carriages. The air is stale, the toilets stink, because no fresh air gets in. Why can't the heat be turned down inside them? Typically (and I'm a very regular traveller on Cork, Tralee and Galway services), the inside temperatures must be over 25 degrees at least.

The Croom branch (Charleville - Patrickswell) also closed in 1967; by which stage it just carried the night-time Cork - Limerick goods, having lost its passenger service in 1934. The Thurles-Clonmel line also succumbed then. In 1975, the last ever cattle trains ran, Loughrea to Cabra. On 3rd November that year, the Loughrea line was closed, and with it the last mixed trains in Ireland. On the same date the Burma Road and the Ardee branch closed. In 1967 - I'm nearly sure that's the date - the last GNR (brown) liveried coach in service - was repainted black'n'tan. It had survived the GNR navy-and-cream period and also CIE green. The "flying snail" was replaced by the "roundel" in 1963. Early examples of buses in red / cream or navy / cream still, had snails for a very, very short time. No snails ever appeared on blank and tan railway stock, nor roundels on green.

It might be added that while CIE was formed in 1945 by amalgamation of the GSR, DUTC and the Grand Canal Company, it was initially a private company and was actually nationalised as a state body in 1950. The GNR diesel No. 800 (as opposed to 801), was, I think, lent to CIE for trials but would have remained in GNR ownership (and navy livery) until the dissolution of the GNR in 1958. Very interesting post, by the way - well done!

G601 class and narrow gauge F class - three each, rather than five.

I've bought bargains on eBay myself, but some of the garbage offered by others for sake makes you think they are either seriously deluded or they've got a cheek!

I'll ring Brian tonight, David. Being a voluntary group, reliable phone answering has always been a problem!

I always thought an "08" made a very good representation. I take it you'd also be painting the connecting rod and adding white flashes on ends? Even the orange paint on the roundel disappearing looks like weathering! Looks well indeed. Shows what can be done quite readily with proprietary models.

Minister, that type too is unlike anything which ever ran here. By the time that the type of body design shown in both the pictures posted was the norm, six wheeled chassis were universal here. British lines kept on building four wheelers a great deal longer, leading to some of the beautifully restored examples on the Isle of Wight, for example. On these boards a while back, someone showed how he had made a quite superb GSWR-like six wheeler by amalgamating a couple of those "Thomas" coaches to make one that was one and half times the length, and using a six wheel chassis. That's more like it for Ireland. The initialing wheelbase four wheel shown in this post would do fine for many Irish lines if it was fitted with a six wheel chassis. It would look like many first class coaches (4 compartment) off the GSWR, or at a pinch West Cork or the DSER. It's not, however, convincing for NCC, BCDR, GNR or MGWR scenarios.

That's correct, Jawfin. The two I mentioned were normal passenger carrying ones. The two you refer to are of an even earlier era. The one shown at the start of this post is completely unlike anything that ever ran here.

That type of long wheelbase four wheeler would be reasonably common on British lines at one time, but Irish four wheelers were way shorter and of a more primitive body design. A body like that, if in Ireland, would inevitably be six wheeled. Some Irish 6-wheelers were only 24ft long. Four wheelers here followed much older body designs, because they stopped building them here decades before they stopped building them in England. By the mid 1880s, the standard in Ireland was six wheeled, but vehicles of the body design of that model would have been built in England possibly as late as the 1910s.

The MGWR had a handful of four wheelers into the 1920s. Well into GSR days, there were at least two or three old relics usually kept kicking about in Inchicore. These were only used in emergencies; they had as you might expect no heat, light or corridors. Rather than being painted in normal GSR lined maroon, they were just plain maroon with no crest or lining, but just "G. S" on their dudes. I think they lasted until about 1930. I can't remember - off the top of my head - what company they originated from.

No probs, aclass, it's a public operating day, so anyone may travel. However, I am arranging behind-the-scenes visits to areas normally off-limits on an operating day, in order that modellers may take photos and examine anything they might want to model. You are very welcome to join us there, on the day, but I would ask that if you plan to do so, PM me nearer the time and I'll advise you where to meet the rest of the group. In the referendum, vote DCDR! ;-)

Hello David Email me, and I will forward to the appropriate folks, or contact the railway and mark for the attention of Brian Goodfellow (Chairman) and Patricia McGrath. I'm presuming 20th June doesn't suit you? If you were there that day, I could show you round with the other folks. On normal operational days, access to the running shed would be awkward.

New one to me too! Any follow-up?