Colin R

I reckon he must have been bored and put the rumour out that he wanted to retire, so everyone has jumped on the bandwagon to get him to do stuff before that happens 

He is still trading, and it would be worth you contacting him. I have just bought a West Clare Drewry railcar from him. I would suggest that, until we know for certain that he has retired, it is worth contacting him. If I had the money, there are still a lot of his products I would love to have   

I don't want to put anyone on the spot, but there is one person who already has Irish brass etch kits, and I think they would make a good fit, but I suspect that it will be down to the amount of money that needs to be invested to make this a possibility.

Plus, of course, the need to make sure that any castings of bits that are also needed are available, there must be a point where something like this goes from being a cottage industry to something else. 

I guess it is horses for courses. I remember many years ago, at the beginning of the HOe/009 boom, when N gauge chassis became readily available, just how many narrow gauge layouts got built My first model layout (as opposed to a toy train set) was a figure of 8 rabbit warren that my brother and I built, it had all the usual Playcraft/Eggar stock and some bits Bro built based on the quarries in North Wales I think it lasted about two or three years then it was taken part.

Since then, I have been playing around in various scale gauge combinations. 

I am not sure it might be worth emailing him to find out, to be honest, I am awaiting two T&D 5T loco etches from him. I have had them on order since March, after he said that he had sent them off to be etched, I only found out today that something must have happened, as one of the scale societies has done a deal with him for their complete range in their scale, I am hoping that I hear something positive soon. Once I get the finances back in order, I still want to obtain a few more bits from him to complete my Donegal stock.  

Hi all.

I am not sure if any of you have heard, but Allen is calling it a day, so if anyone fancies taking over his Irish etches and keeping them alive, now would be a good time to drop him an email.

I understand that the Irish narrow gauge kits might have already found a home, but his range of 5ft 3ins stock and there are also several other kits which he has not advertised for 5ft 3ins as well, could be available.

Regards

Colin Rainsbury 

HI Leslie, I do like these wagons, but do you know if they would have been seen on the Belfast and County Down Railway?

Colin

OK thanks

Sorry, I have no access to the Flick links. can you tell me what it is I am looking at

Thank you

Colin Rainsbury

Hi Leslie.

Yes, please, I would love a Conflat and a Milligen if that is possible. As for an EDSS, I need to look at what would be going in and out of Downpatrick. I know that Downpatrick had been shut by the timeline I am modelling, but as I am using rule 1, then it does not matter.

I have also noticed that I will also need to model a gas works siding (which is not on the real site), and I will also need to try and fit a grain store line or a small works section. Oh the joys of freelance modelling.

Hi Leslie

Can you please add me to your list for one of each of the above?

Regards

Colin Rainsbury

Just now, Mol_PMB said:

Oval boiler and all

Well, that is the sort of thing I was wondering about.

5 hours ago, Horsetan said:

 

The Bachmann one is unfortunately too narrow over the footplate. Once you notice the width, you can't "unsee" it.

If it's any consolation, even Tony Miles got it wrong on his scratchbuilt Woolwich for Adavoyle

I do have in the collection box two white metal Woolwich kits that I bought at the time to convert over to Irish 5ft 3 inch. Cutting them down the middle and then adding the 2mm to the finished width might be possible.

The only thing is I still need is more information before I do that.

39 minutes ago, murrayec said:

A good starter, it is white metal, slightly different process- 70 deg lead solder and one has to be careful with the iron as the white metal can disappear on you!

I suggest you buy his brass etch telephone box at the same time, that would start you off on etch brass also

You need to contact Des by email to order

I saw you note above about the cost of the books, I took a look and Iain Rice's books are available for around £22.00 on ABS books or Amazon- buy one at a time......

Eoin

Also, it might be worth looking here for books and their costs:-

https://www.titfield.co.uk/index.htm

https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_nkw=model+railway+modelling+books&_sacat=0&_from=R40&rt=nc&Genre=Art%20%26%20Culture&_dcat=261186

The second link is to second-hand books on eBay, so do have a look at some of them before you buy. Amazon does have a reasonable book section but don't expect to find AJ Hartley's book on fly fishing there. (You might need to be of a certain age to get this.) Also, be aware that Amazon runs several other web-based bookshops, so it is worth looking there as well.  

Now due to my own experience do you want books with loads of words or pretty pictures, the reason I say this is many older books tend to in my experience tell you how to do this and that and take a cat apart and put it back together with no harm and by the time you get to the end of the book, you have forgotten what it was all about or just more confused than you might have been before.

Current books tend to be more of this is how I have done it and let's look at the results in the following pictures. 

The third bit of advice buy only the tools you need now and buy the best you can afford, make sure you keep them in a toolbox when you are not using them.

Besides getting into modelling for the fun of it you can and will learn so many new skills, many of which are very basic engineering skills which sadly are not always taught at school or colleges this day and age. If you want to learn why and how you do something I can't recommend highly enough the following series of engineering books for you life long library.

https://www.teepublishing.co.uk/books/workshop-practice-series/

Good luck on your journey of railway modelling just remember you learn something new every day during your life

Regards

Colin Rainsbury

.

Just as an aside, the nice man at Worsley (Allen) used to sell or give away packets of scrap brass and nickel silver to practice on at exhibitions. Nothing too big, but a lot of free strips of old sheet. As a side note, though, Des might have a load of old scrap brass you could ask him for.

One thing which comes to mind, and that is practice soldering before you start on a kit, the more you do the better you become  and a lot fewer burnt fingers to boot, and the different types of soldering will be helpful, ie Brass sheet is harder that say covering a wire in solder and so on

Here are a couple of useful sites to look at:-

https://www.instructables.com/How-to-solder/

https://www.clfinescale.co.uk/copy-of-c-l-product-diagrams

https://www.clfinescale.co.uk/solderingtechniques

hope this helps

Colin R

On 14/3/2025 at 10:02 AM, Mol_PMB said:

I think the 5th carriage in this train is a former Pullman, hauled by 801 in 1955:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53508723481/

Dimensions of the Irish Pullmans were as follows:

• Length over body 63'10", over buffers 67'
• Bogie centres 43'4"
• Bogie wheelbase 10'
• Body width 8'11"
• Height to top of roof 12'9.5"

I don't know much about the UK Pullmans except that there was a huge variety of them. Probably none identical to the Irish ones but some might have similar dimensions and style?

Some Irish Pullman photo links:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53507626132/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/54252982311/

https://www.flickr.com/photos/irishrailwayarchive/53511625293/

 

If you want a kit of an Irish Pullman, try the following 

http://www.worsleyworks.co.uk/4mm/4mm_Irish_Standard_Gauge.htm

1 hour ago, ttc0169 said:

As seen here on Tara junction…….
 

I think I can just about do that in Grey, would be good to have a couple of John's GSR grain vans as well.

OK, Thanks, I hope John will try for another batch of his red grain wagons

14 minutes ago, Galteemore said:

Are you an IRRS member Colin? The photo archive link only works if you are.

No sadly not at present

Sadly for some reason I can't access Flickr

Thanks, guys. So, one last question: What would have been the typical length of a grain train with 6,9 or more wagons in it?

30 minutes ago, Mol_PMB said:

I see that some of the H vans and grain wagons are getting close to selling out, especially the brown ones:

https://www.accurascale.com/collections/irm-wagons

Hopefully the orders are holding up and will help to justify some further model developments. I get the impression I'm not the only one to be attracted to Irish modelling by the quality of IRM's products!

I would like to see a second batch of Grain wagons with the snail in grey and with different numbers, if not then I will have to buy a second box and change the numbers myself

Does anyone know if the Grain wagons had the red oxide livery with the snail motif on them at the same time?

I see two issues here?

1 Just how many does Des need to order

2 How many different types are there

1 hour ago, jhb171achill said:

I recall speaking with a (long defunct) small manufacturer almost forty years ago who was keen to do easy-to-make plastic kits of Irish narrow gauge to run on 12mm track.

He was considering offering a Donegal class 5, which would have been amazing.

Sadly, then as now, he did the sums and walked away…..!

 

 

Admittedly, there is now a lot of Irish narrow gauge in kit form from Worsley, that said, however, this is one of those chicken and egg situations, I know 00n3 modellers who have splashed out on a new Hornby TT120 scale 08 chassis the biggest draw back to the size/scale is the lack of a commercial locomotive chassis.

There are two items of narrow gauge which I think would work for most people, they are 1. the West Clare bogie Diesel or 2. the West Clare/Donegal Railcar, there is of course one outstanding NG loco and wagon set that you could put on a modern day layout and that would be a Wagonmaster and a train of Peat wagons, it could even be done as a complete roundy roundy layout with a loco and say 3 peat wagons. Then later on you could introduce a railcar. Would that work? I don't know, but I would have one if it was made.