Sean

Actually being able to drive the train from one location to another will more than make up for that though! looking great as always.

those fuel figures are crazy, specially the 437l/h figure

Doh, you are quite right, I had been confusing them with 4401/2. That ex br stock is a confusing lot

I think so edit: yes , https://steverabone.com/RailwayPhotographs/ireland_1984.htm Back at Connolly 173 is on a Dublin - Belfast service. CIE 173 leaves Connolly at the head of a Belfast train made up of Mk2 coaches.

from what i can work out it seems to have been plausible for them to have popped up anywhere. but i cant find a huge amount of info out about them or even pictures of when they were in service, so its plausible that they have served my area at some point once or twice in their lifespan. I have seen pics of them pre conversion and also pics of them "preserved" at moyasta but i cant seem to find anything of them just around the time they went into service and should have held this "IR intercity" Livery... interested in seeing was the offset logo prototypical or not, and also how they would have coupled up in practice as there is only a toilet on one end of a given coach. Overall I was just happy to get my hands on an RTR coach in this livery. not too clued up on prefixes so kinda just know them as EX BR's and the 2d's as aircons and use the windows as the way to differentiate them. i dont need to get too more detailed about things for the time being, although im sure i will in time as i get more stock. @DJ I think the issue is having them under a perfectly lit white studio backdrop to try and make them look pretty kinda backfires as it masks loads of detailing and that particular livery looks way better illustrated as a rugged machine in its natural habitat. its not apparent so much on the other liveries as they are visually a lot more detailed and seem to work better in this setting as your eyes are perusing all of the painted details so you dont really miss anything like you do with the plainer sort of livery.

Im sure ill be pleased with the RPSI set as i wait for more suitable liveries for my own applications... and that means ill need at least 2 of this eventual theoretical dutch van.... cant buy em all, unfortunately. I think we all have some sort of sentimental attachments to the things that we model and that by and large dictates where the modelling budget will go, of course id buy em all if I could but i have tied myself to a specific place and period for the time being and i suppose thats mostly a financial decision Not knocking these other variants at all, they look class and I'm sure ill see a lot of them at shows. they just arent for me this time around. The mags arent for me either, but im strongly considering shelling out for some gypsums as im finding the subject matter is a bit more interesting to me.

Agree with these two posts, but on the balance of things, we are getting the RPSI coaches. I was a bit underwhelmed by the NIR variants when i seen the RPSI's i was instantly like gotta have some of those. Grabbed some bachmann 2a in the meantime and they come highly recommended. sure they arent up there up there in the detail but they arent bad and are solid runners. will also compliment the eventual 2b IR run, we just gotta be super patient. With me its simply a personal bias against "things that i am not modelling" and things i dont have fond memories of, for example,I have a serious desire to model a deep tube station after a recent trip to London, Im Mad for IR/IE stuff because thats literally what ive watched on the lines over the years and ive seen NIR stock maybe once in my whole life so it doesnt interest me, but it will interest many who seen it from day to day so thats okay.. 4101 and 4102 are available by mm however they are incorrectly modelled as 2a. 4108 and 4410 are available also and correct as far as i know Good things will come to those that wait.....a dutchie is needed for the RPSI set too so it would definitely make sense on some level

somehow youve made them look far better than mine. and there the same containers!

Ideal. Now just to find a donor. Will give you a shout if I need anything more specific during the build

VID20220609080650.mp4 Early morning ballast train hurtles past "the works" I'm looking forward to making a few videos with DCC sound. All in good time.

The main reasons i took the plunge with DCC was the inability to control lights and the way they dimmed in and out so obnoxiously as the locomotive changed speed. So i was happy to see a DC mode tab within the JMRI decoder programmer interface for LP5. It allows the user to control lighting and a few other parameters in this DC mode. but as i had a dcc system now I never really bothered to explore it until today as the layout is currently set up with a dc controller as i dont have any chips for some new locos i got this week. I want to run some DCC locos today and think to myself that i "cant" aka too lazy to plug in the other controller. So I remember this DC mode and grab a loco from the siding. Took me a minute to figure out just what was happening but when I did the results left me pleasently surprised. 132 would light up and not move, so im guessing its programmed like this. 143 is where things started to happen setting the controller to 45% would make the lights come on 50% and the loco begins to crawl. slap it up to 100% and instead of taking off the loco gradually starts to accelerate up to speed as programmed. back to 45 and again the loco slows as programmed down to a halt. This is brilliant and i can see it working really well on a shelf layout where one would want to restrict speed or have a loco sit static lit up in a siding but there is one drawback. Theres a very audible PWM hum that can be heard as the motor works at low speeds, I think its from the motor itself but im not 100% sure. Is this harmful to the motor and can it be improved upon by any sort of programming? Is anybody else using this feature and do you find it useful? are there any drawbacks? Sean

No video as of yet. Have been on a fairly nocturnal schedule so have not had much chance to take any under good daylight.... In the mean time I have gotten to work using all my spare track to lay the "depot" section of things. 3 big coach sidings. 3 smaller loco sidings. engines must use a headshunt. theres another siding for good measure. freight area extended with a third siding. ballast plow siding is isolated, thats the JMRI programming track Found a use for a hornby express point in the end. it can be plumbed cleanly into a second radius loop(and maybe third) without issue. makes the bend in the loop seem way less severe than it actually is. finally able to test the theory of how many coaches can my station hold? the answer is four!, well four with a pilot and 3 with a solo engine. Finally back to an empty layout so i can finish things off. ST is starting to grow on me, it looks way way better in person than it does on model websites.

Add another 50 to post it, plus whatever the tax man decides, then suddenly theres actually a cheaper one for sale within Ireland.

Dont think so, i could be wrong. I think silver fox did one.

Cheers thats just what i need, @phil. i still need the shoulder sizes for a rebuilt one, so when you get a chance that would be most helpful. Sean

It's a good thing I'm not a "collector" so. Because these things run great! Very smooth running and tight close couplings. Was a little put off by the offset logo at first but now they are on the track I think they look great! Was that offset prototypical or is it just wrong on the model as I don't think I've seen these coaches in real life except the moyasta ones with the later livery and it's not offset on those. Wrong egv however it is the right one for these which have been rolling around for a while now with no van! I have 2x first open 5152 coaches, would anybody be interested in trading me for any other second open in any livery? Just to add uniqueness to my rake. As I have blown the entire budget on rolling stock, it looks like I will be reverting to DC until I save up for a few decoders! Not too bad as the esu decoders also work in DC mode. 142 and 192 await running in..just haven't gotten to them yet because I finally have a nice fleet of coaches! 142 might be for sale soon as she was bought on impulse before 192 appeared so I'm a bit over budget with her. We will see how I wing it for the next week I definitely need to plan and lay depot trackage now too. Next post will contain videos. It would be very unfair not to now. GoPro is working and everything.

All them different prefixes confuses me. and i cant REALLY comfortably run more than a 3 coach train on my layout anyways so to the uneducated lay person such as myself they are pretty much the same with the brake swapped for the bar. obviously its a bit more complicated than that and some people will want both but they are definitely a one or the other type of purchase for me., not to detract from either because i own neither.

the mk2 are a perfect example actually as I had an opportunity yesterday to get the old RPSI set, still sealed and for a fair price, but i left them there as i know im getting the new set some time in the future. was alot more comfortable picking up a few baby GM over the past few months knowing that there wont be an IRM one in the near to mid future Its the under wraps stuff that im truly getting at, c'mon and make a big dirty spoiler calendar and end our misery for the year I dont wanna go building a rake of idk lets say pallet cements or beet doubles only to find one is announced before the paint is even dried on them ...

Hey Phil. Any chance you could measure the length and height of the dutch van body shell for me as i am looking for a suitable donor to make one. Sean

@johnfromoz is the lais still available at that price? suddenly i have an extra 3-5 locos without chips and cant afford to lokpilot them all.

ahh, i nearly bought those before i started my hyster kit bash.

Is there an Irish version of this calendar available? On a serious note though, there are 2 more freight rakes that i want to build for the layout this year, I would much rather be saving my pennies for high grade RTR stock rather than assembling kits that i will never finish up to the same sort of standard. Unfortunately only one of these options will be financially viable for me, If I had a better picture of what is and is not coming over the next year or two it would certainly help with budgeting for upcoming purchases, and reduce fears of buying kits/used RTR stock of things that are about to be re released.

If you just want one for decoration then check out the loco accessory pack, most of them seem to include at least one , get little resealable bags before you open it though or you WILL lose all the little bits that you dont use. ask me how i know.

Ugh, Castlebar.

Well now. It appears that I am going to be eating sawdust for the foreseeable future! Yes,I know it's the wrong egv and no, I don't care until I get my hands on the right one. (hint hint any swaps) I'm even almost too afraid to break that FACTORY SEAL...... Almost.....