jhb171achill

The reason they didn't launch it in a blaze of publicity is probably that they're ashamed of it!

Hard to believe all that was TWENTY years ago!

Excellent, Broithe! We can all picket Heuston Station with banners containing flying snails and broken wheels!!!

The coach on that was identical to Downpatrick's 836; in fact I think that one may be 837. Built 1902, GSWR.

Rare visitors to shunt there were not only the "E" class, but at least one "G"!

With sinking feeling I see, yes, it IS on the downloadable timetables. the good news is they'll probably touch the taxpayer's wallets to "re-brand" again in what, 8 months? A year?

If they put it on the "Enterprise" it will probably attract unwelcome attention from stones in Portadown!

AHHH! Folks, look at the original post. It was done in April!!! Hmmm. !!

Richie, that's good. Now I can sleep. !!

No problem John we can march through the tunnel around the M50 and hang the snail on all the lamp post,s but some how i think a meeting in a good pub would be nicer given the weather. A truly Excellent idea, sir.

Very good point, Mayner. Goods traffic didn't end when they stopped putting a broken wheel emblem on wagons!

Cue the graffiti about "ole girls"....! Having seen the mess made of one of NIRs GMs by neancderthal graffitists some years ago, and a horrible similar job on at least one IE loco and I think, a DART; while i would happily strap the "artists" to the track in front of the "Enterprise" (after they'd been made to clean it off!), I have to say the look of a heavily weathered or vandalised loco on a layout is quite interesting! That one looks amazing, a superb job of artwork in itself.

It's ghastly. Sentinel's point is correct too - I wonder did they have a "public consultation process" like they seem to want to do with the most irrelevant trivia in all areas of life nowadays? Here's one where it might have done some good. Question: who volunteers to pay tax to re-brand all those new shiny railcars on IE? Even as they run down rural services further....... maybe ONE bit of good news: perhaps the good townspeople of Nenagh, Roscrea, Cahir, Tipp and Clonmel will never have to see one!!!!!!

The GSWR crest lasted three quarters of a century. The GNR crest lasted from 1876 to 1958. The GSR crest, 20 years. BCDR - longer. Flying snail - almost 20 years. UTA crests - about 10 years each. NIR logo as was - in various forms 1967-1996 or so. Broken wheel - 1962-87. IE Set of points - 1987 - maybe early 90s, getting shorter. Three-pin-plug - over 15 years. Recent green wiggly thing - not long. So we are going to copy insurance firms and English "TOC"'s - i.e. these pixie outfits like the Grand Great Western of Cotswold and Ayrshire Train Station Company**, and change logo at huge expense to taxpayers every fortnight!! (** who own three railcars, sorry; DMUs, and each one has a different livery apart from the garish yelllow ends!) I'll just finish my tea and go. The snow's started.

Utterly grotesque. I'm going to get a load of people with Flying Snail flegs, and we're going to mount a daily "peaceful protest" outside the Dail, whadddever it takes. BRING BACK THE SNAIL!! :-)

Just checked... at least one "P" van received CIE livery. GNR 780, renumbered C780N, was repainted into full black and tan livery in Dundalk paint shop in spring 1963. I have no record of any having received green.

Yes, Glenderg, it is. The windows were originally single as shown on the first pic. The triple window on your pic was a UTA amendment I think - I doubt if the GNR amended them thus, but I would stand to be corrected. The UTA painted them brown. I am not sure what way CIE painted them, if indeed they had any - perhaps, with so many "tin vans" being built CIE had less need for them and maybe didn't use them?

Very much so - there were a number of variations. When CIE was formed in 1945, they adopted the green colour and logo of the Dublin United Tramways company; the "flying snail" dated initially from the 1930s, as did that shade or darkish brunswick green. CIE added the lighter green broad stripes, as seen on preserved buses and on the Bachmann "flying snail" coaches, which would actually be better in UTA green as they are of LMS design - they'd make very comvincing NCC coaches, but that's wandering off the point! This original livery had the "snail", the numerals and the broad light green lines edged in gold. The light green was initially not QUITE as light as the "eau de nil" but close enough. Thus, modelling the period 1945-50, a layout would have newly painted coaches in this livery, but quite a few, especially older 6-wheelers or parcel vans / passenger brakes still in GSR maroon of the later type, i.e. LMS red. This faded, incidentally, to a more browny red, due to brake dust; a weatherer's dream, well able to be very convincingly done by many here. In 1950 when the first AEC cars were introduced, the livery currently worn by Downpatrick's brake genny standard 3223 was adopted but only for railcars. Base colour was the same, but a single thinner light green line along the waist was used, and both it and the snail, as well as the lettering, no longer had the gold lining. Unlike locos and wagons, which were almost "sheep dipped" in their respective body colours, carriage roofs were always dark grey, and chassis always black at this stage, on all coaching stock. Carriage ends were black, never green, unlike the GSR, which tended to paint the ends of non-corridor stock in the body colour, though I am aware some were black too. The "steels", in GSR days, and all similar coaches, always had black ends. CIE generally painted all coach ends black, bar a few on narrow gauge lines. The "railcar" green had several interesting variations; some were seen (one or two in West Cork in particular) with a striped pattern on the curved very front of the roof. I am not sure what colour the stripes were, but this detail was only applied to a few AEC cars; most had grey roofs all over. There were variations. On the West Cork system, some old bogie coaches had the dark green with an unlined "snail" about a third along the bodyside, and another about 2/3 along; otherwise the standard was always ONE snail. On coaches treated thus, perhaps only one or two, there was no lining at all, and the unlined snail and unlined numeral was a very much lighter colour, possibly even white. On the Cavan & Leitrim, carriages carried a light green band above the window level only, not below, and neither it or the numerals & snail were gold-lined. The West Clare stock had no lining but were otherwise as above; many items of coaching stock on this system had no snails either; just plain green with a number (suffixed with "c", of course). In 1955, the Park Royals appeared in the lighter green now worn by DCDR's TPO, and the RPSI's Dublin heritage set, with lining and snails as on them; namely unlined in gold, and the thin waist line rather than thick bands of light green above and below window, which no vehicle painted light green ever had. Then we have the new tin vans and laminates appearing unpainted - chassis, roof, ends included. After 4 milliseconds in traffic this became an awful, drab, dirty looking dull uneven patchy grey (I'm really selling it, aren't I!). Carriages turned out thus never had flying snails at all, and numerals were reported by some to have been red on at least some of them, though locos turned out in silver always had snails and numerals in the standard light green, no gold lining. By 1960, ex-GNR coaches are appearing on CIE lines. Unlike the UTA, who painted out the GN crest on some and applied a UTA one to the otherwise-unrepainted coach, CIE left them alone until a proper repaint was due, after which they came out in the standard light green livery - except for one, the RPSI's 114, which is believed to be the only GNR coach whcih went straight from GNR livery into black'ntan as late as about 1965. Many of the remaining sixwheelers and old wooden stock was by now repainted into the light green, but by 1960 a few old examples in the dark green with full "above & below" gold lined light green bands were to be seen, among light green vehicles and a few "silver" ones. Then the famous black'n'tan era started. I was in Kildare signal box one day with my father and a 141 speeded through with an up train from Cork. The 141 can't have been long out of its Hornby box (or should that be Bachmann?), and the train consisted of carriages all in green, bar the last vehicle which was just repainted. "Oh!" says Senior; "is that the new livery!". "Yeah", said the signalman, in a somewhat deadpan way, "Ye'd think we'd have seen the last of the black and tans!". I digress; it was early 1963 when all but a few experimental coaches, started to be painted in b'n't en masse, even as grey and yellow 121s were appearing to haul them. This livery was to remain on Cravens unaltered until the early 1990s. As a corporate image livery it was very strong and ahead of its time. The next major change was of course when the "supertrain" livery appeared from 1972; all over orange, roof included, and the body colour for the first time slightly coming round the coach end, and a black band of window-depth. Post 1987, the "tippex lines" were added, giving the attractive livery of orange & black edged in white. And the rest ye know! The final incarnation of orange and black was to be that on the 2600s when new, with a black band just below the window level edged in white, the "Arrow" branding, and for the first time the chassis, bogies and roof were light grey instead of dark grey or black. If that was the "Fanta Can" livery, we then had the "Lilt can" lime green and dark blue, followed by NIR's "red bull" livery! Dunno what you'd call the current forty shades of grey (and green...)... a "novel" livery? Hope that helps!

Yes, that's the "P" van. If anyone wants to model it, some assistance might come from the fact that the DCDR has the chassis of one, on which the BCDR "Golfers Coach" (aka Royal Saloon) is sitting. Original bogies as above and all. I think there might be one at Whitehead, but I just can't remember!!!!

Nothing like that did run here, though the GNR had similar TYPE of van, the "P" van, used in the same way the SR in GB would have used this, on the ends of passenger trains with a lot of mail or parcels. A "P" van would actually make a nice model, right enough.

I can even get ye a copy of the grey paint! Gimme a shout privately!

"OR", not "of"!!

thats is sickeningly beautiful! i would happily trade the M-I-L for a set like that. how many chips are required to operate her? The layout of the M I L, Heirflick? :-)

I was doing the bar on that trip, and I served a pint to someone who had their head stuck out of the window. He was holding his pint and great chunks of leaves and greenery kept coming through the open windows. One big lump landed in his pint and he looked at it in dismay. I said to him "There's your side salad to have with it"........

Woww!!!