jhb171achill

I’ve just spotted a second error in that list, regarding the “C” in addition to the “N” on ex-GNR stock. This was ONLY on railcar power cars. Loco-hauled coaches and wagons just had the “N” suffix.

If your rebuilding skills are anything like your weathering skills, it will end up better than when it left the IRM factory!

Absolutely superb. The scenic detail on this is magnificent. Very smooth-running little engine.

I've been mulling over this issue too. Personally, I'd prefer to see 0 and 00 scale in the correct gauge - I do think the appearance makes the difference; but I'll agree that in terms of pricing and convenience, as well as flexibility, the idea that it "isn't worth it" carries a lot of weight. A friend is making an 0 scale MGWR D16 for me; prinarily as a display item, so I had thought, why not put it on a 36.XXmm gauge bit of track - but I took the option of putting a motor in too, in case I ever have time to do an extremely simple mini-shunting layout with half a dozen trucks, or run it on someone else's layout. The jury is still out, but I'm veering towards the narrower 0 gauge just for convenience.

In millions, yes.

Well, it would - it’s just a wooden box on wheels. No bogies to worry about either…..

In all reality, as Mike implies, a preservation body must acquire what it can and when it can. Not everything will end up being restored for a whole range of reasons. Between Downpatrick and the RPSI, spanning my almost fifty years in preservation, I could mention various vehicles which either fell to bits (wooden coaches / wagons) were burnt by vandals, which (correctly) took a back seat because they were far too expensive to restore / rebuild, too much highly specialised manpower / maintenance needed, of little or no historic value (e.g. yet another Mk 2, for example), would not ever be of any benefit to the organisation concerned, and a host of other reasons. In an ideal world everything acquired would be preserved (and in the correct livery!) but the world’s not perfect, and preservationists have yet to discover how to get 25 hours into a day, nine days into a week, a decade into a year or how to obtain goods and services worth €1,000 with a fifty cent coin! Yes, SLNCR “B” and 6111 (especially the latter) may indeed never run again - but look at the stuff we DO have! As Mike says, the operational stuff MUST take priority, always. I lament the fact that no preserved MGWR locomotive exists. Yet, not one person has ever died, become injured or disadvantaged in any way as a result! As always in preservation, cold hard practicality MUST prevail over our emotional attachment to what a senior RPSI steam locomotive person once described as “obsolete, redundant equipment“ when being badgered by people as to when a particular locomotive was going to return to traffic….

Looking better and better and better and better and better........! Can't wait to see results!

Not at all beyond the bounds of possibility that the UTA might have asked to try one out.........

It was already at Downpatrick but nothing short of a total rebuild will sort that one out - PLUS a new engine.

Without wanting to veer away too much, in the mid 2000s when the 27s were being withdrawn, I was finance officer for the DCDR, and was involved in the transfer of 0.6.0T No. 90, the SLNCR railcar and the remains of two mangy old MGWR six-wheelers to Downpatrick. Being in touch with IE over this matter, I broached the subject of the society getting 2750, 2751 or possibly even both. The background to this was that the DCDR had, at the time, a funding application being put together for a possible extension to dundrum, and it was felt that if this was to come into being, the very severe gradient just south of Ardglass Junction (in the cutting; a quarter mile of one of the steepest gradients in Ireland) plus thee length of line would be too much for maybe a three-coach train in the summer behind a Sugar Co. loco. These things were not made to do a 9 mile return trip. My query was a general one, and a casual one, but was siezed upon with interest by the folks in IE with whom I was dealing. I relayed this information to the DCDR committee, but as the funding scheme was abandoned shortly afterwards due to a change in personnel in Down District Council (as was), no formal request was ever made to IE. Bottom line, had things been different, you could have had a 27 from Downpatrick or Inch Abbey to Dundrum...... Mind you, maintenance of these things would have been an unholy nightmare for an organisation like that, for a number of reasons.

VERY nice, and shows the correct LMS lining style (Whitehead take note) for not just the LMS over in Brexitstan, but also the NCC - and - the GSR! Same lining on the GSR, same background colour (after 1933) but different crest and lettering style.

How many geigers can it count up to?

Most yellow patches were applied 1964-5, and lasted until about 1969. Like the "day-glo" patches on 141s and 121s in the early IE days, some locos had them and some didn't. As a general rule, when locos started being repainted out of the green livery in 1962, initially they were painted black'n'tan. After a couple of years, all-black (with white flashes on the ends above window level). Some, but not all, got the yellow patches. After rebuilds, between 1969 and 1972 any new repaints were black'n'tan, usually (on A & C classes, but also B101) with the "low" tan band, in which guise they belnded in better with 121/141/181s. # After 1972, the orange and black "Supertrain" livery, and the white "tippex" stripes added after 1987. When liveries change, an entire fleet of anything will never be repainted overnight. There were still some steam locos in old company liveries to be seen in the very early 1930s, seven years after the all-grey livery had spread to all. There were still a few green diesel locos and coaches into the late 1960s; 1967 certainly, maybe 1968. And it's only recently that the last of the 29 class railcars has lost that gawd-awful lime green, white and navy blue livery, despite the first of the fleet getting the all-green something like ten years ago.

That is EXPERT weathering! Well done!

You're better with green. Those were never blue - in fact only a small handful of MGWR locos were ever blue and they were (a) express passenger types; (b) few in number; and (c) very short-lived. MGWR used a lightish green until before those were built - a darkish leaf green (probably not a million miles off British Railways loco green) from about 1890 to 1915 or so, lined black after that until 1925, after which they were plain grey until withdrawal in the 1950s. Needs red buffer beams too. The way it is in your pic - I can't make out if that's a name plate or a GSR number plate. If the former, black or green livery. if it's a number plate, plain dark grey would be the only accurate livery. In the 1950s some, but not all, had the numberplates removed and a large painted number put there instead. Nice catch - especially if the price was good!

Hattons will give you a different design - the GSWR type. Completely different, and appropriate to mix in with MGWR types; remember the old adage that pre- the "supetrain" Mk 2s and their equivalents on the NIR Enterprise of 1970, there was probably never a passenger train ran in Ireland composed of several of the same type of coach. (Now you see why us oul wans find Mk 2, Mk 3 & Mk 4 - be they in CIE, IE, NIR or RPSI ownership - sterile and boring!) So keep the Hattons order, and get a few of these, and a few of KMCE Models' excellent DSER six-wheelers (as shown recently on "Dugort Harbour") for an authentic mix-mash.

Being of a nocturnal disposition, ‘tis many a communication I’ve had with the same Garfield at times when anyone half normal is in the land of zzzzzzz’s……

Is my "O" gauge DCC'd Fintona horse kit ready yet?

2751 almost ended up in Downpatrick! There's a story behind it............................... (but it wouln't have had that livery for long it it had gone....)

Looking V E R Y nice, Owen!

That is an abolute masterpiece.

Yes, if its route was more or less a straight line - direct - it would make more sense. I don't think it will ever make economic sense as it is, unless they get Boris to dig a tunnel under the Black Mountain.

Most of them did. The last few sets only received it last year, but they've been doing a few at a time for quite a few years now.

Me too!