minister_for_hardship

still has own teeth, shame about the hair tho...

On the first pic you can see an imprint of where an oval plate (about the same size as the GSWR Inchicore Works plate) was carried. Usually they were centred on the solebar, bit odd to see one bolted to it off-centre. The sligo leitrim railcar looks to be in limerick junction shed?

What was the deal with the silver laminates? Were they trying to match them up with the silver locos or did they just run like that until they got a proper paint job? How long did they run like that?

Hang on, didn't the Irish Woolwichs not get the front steps???

+1 Mayner. The Sentinels look well, hopefully they won't have the same flaws as the other 0-4-0s, stalling and going at 120mph scale speed. There is still at least one or two steam Sentinels in everyday service in the 21st Century, somewhere in South America I think, undoubtably there would be a good few diesels still knocking about overseas. Wonder why the Irish (steam) versions had such a short innings. That LMS/BR van looks a bit like an NCC 'brown van', probably too long though.

Thought it was India Pale Ale for a sec..

Classy indeed.

Nice to see the preserved Pichi Richi Railway in South Oz getting some publicity in the pics, v. nice set-up they have too. Their numbersake to 'our' 186 featured in the movie 'Gallipoli' as No. 981 by the simple expedient of turning the numberplate upside down!

Also, the 'Stand Behind Yellow Line' painted-on warnings are alternately in English and Irish. Can't remember exact wording right now.

Putting the 'fun' into funicular.

[video=youtube;3VMSGrY-IlU]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VMSGrY-IlU Charlie on the MTA - Kingston Trio Hal and the 'Gentlemen Callers' did a version in Malcolm In The Middle! Heard a sh*t-hot band from Carlow do a cover of it in Kilkenny one night, surprised to hear it on this side of the pond.

GSWR 90 was in lined green when on display in Fermoy. I'm assuming it never worked in that condition and that it was a post-withdrawal paint job?

English vistor stepping off a train in turn of the century Ireland, takes a deep lung-full of country air: "Isn't this invigorating?" Porter: "No, it's in Tipperary"

Not a joke as such, more a funny story. Back in the day at Limerick Junction there used be staff dorms, this one was an awful rat-infested kip with a reputation for being haunted. Apparantly, one night a staff member supposed to be booked in there for the night, ran up to that station and swore he wouldn't stay the night at any cost. Said he'd looked in the window and saw the Devil, Old Nick himself....poking the fires of Hell with his pr*ck. Apparantly, there was a driver already in residence, who happened to have a goatee beard and a penchant for sleeping in the nip, had gotten out of bed to poke the fire.

Most likely this, painted green. http://www.shunters-junction.com/Pictures/Stamford%20collection/Stamford%20Coaches/Sta238.jpg Not sure about the white line running under the lower Eau De Nil band, did they have that in real life?

The closest font I've come across that suits GSR/CIE bilingual signage http://www.gaelchlo.com/bungc.html Download the font file, unzip it, bung it into the folder that stores your Word fonts and type away.

Looking at pics, the enamel advertising signs seemed to vanish from stations after the Emergency/WW2 for some reason, but remained on shops and other places for years afterwards. Tipperary had small 'Mazawatte Tea' signs, Foynes and Ballingrane had big 'Paddy' ones with the Whiskey bottle, Strabane had 'Virol'. BOVRIL was a popular one, got a huge one from my local station that was nailed up to block a hole in a shed after it was taken down. One that was hanging around loose for a bit had 'Prescotts Dye Works' but that got thrown away. There was a white/blue one that escaped for a long time at Mallow as it was so high up at the former freight yard approaches and covered with ivy with something about artificial manures (maybe Gouldings?) up to 15 years ago. BR did distribute some posters to Irish Stations, seen a one with a hotdog logo advertising rail/ferry services to/from Ireland dated early sixties. Some poster boards did carry 'LMS' lettering and spotted a big posterboard with 'GREAT WESTERN RAILWAY' (painted over but the letters could still be made out) at Kilkenny well before it was redeveloped.

What in the name of Jaysus was that? A Crampton?

That's the old logo. Great Southern Railway in 'Stralia has been rebranded to Great Southern Rail now!

Rather bizarrely, in a number of locations, eg Mallow/Cobh/Killarney the fairly new White/Orange/Black IE signage was replaced with signage with dark blue background and white lettering. I can understand a move away from the orange/black but this scheme doesn't really match anything. Hard to spot from a moving train in darkness/poor light as well.

An IR-era tubular steel nameboard, can't be many of those left now!

CCTV would have been unknown in rural locations 10-15 years ago, they're everywhere now. They're also seen mounted on poles monitoring level crossings. I've seen white plastic CCTV cameras, usually fixed to buildings or on a pole, that swivel around, probably with a motion sensor. Open to correction but the P&T poles with the monkey-load of wires would be disused with +20 years, but remained in place for a while before arbitrary removal. I'd say they're all cut down by now, sometimes the lads just chop them down and leave them there rather than carting them away.

Word.

Recently saw what appeared to be an early GA drawing of a 121 with what looked like 2 little apertures at the top rhs and top lhs of the nose. Looked like they were intended for Yankee style 'road numbers'.