exciecoachbuilder

Ivory and orange , C.I.E roundels,.

Hi, I remember that after they changed the mesh on the doors to plywood, they started to have a lot of problems with the runner wheels that the doors slid on because of the extra weight. I recall a few times, that they would bring in a rake of fertilizers into the carriage for quick running repair, the majority of work being replacing the wheels. The reason for the ferts being brought into the carriage shop, ( because it was not coachbuilding work) is because at that time, the wagon repair shop was just a small area situated within the lifting shop in Inchicore. Also, there were only, as far as I can remember 3 or 4 wagonmakers working there at the time, so they would have been overwhelmed with the amount of work. Eventually, it was decided to do away with the sliding doors, weld plates over the slots where the doors wheeled into, weld the door hinges onto the plates and then you had basically swing doors. There was a lot of body maintenance on the fertilizers, as the plywood panels were constantly being damaged.....

They really are lovely wagons, they look a lot better in the flesh, than on the website.

Ok but, we don't say landlord in the ROI.

Landlord?? You got off lightly. My 'landlord' increased the pint of Heineken by 50 cent.

They look fantastic, well done.

Hi Murph, all C.I.E / Irish Rail carriages and vans that had a black roof, were painted in gloss black paint. Never Matt black or grey, the only Matt black I can remember being used on carriages, was the window frames on the commuter railcars ( sparrows etc) when the new liveries were introduced in the early 2000's. Paul.

I ordered an 071 class loco from DC kits, heard nothing for weeks. Like yourself, I got a bit concerned, so I emailed DC kits to see what's going on? I eventually got a reply, ' order posted'. Poor customer service unfortunately. Wouldn't take a chance with them again. Paul

Apologies for the late reply murphaph, yes indeed they entered from Heuston end ( Dublin end) then exited from the Cork end. Then on to the long siding, exactly as you said. I think they did repair Connolly based locos sometimes, when they had no room in the much smaller Connolly shed. I worked in Connolly shed for a short period , and it was a very busy running shed. A lot of C class locos were maintained in Connolly shed at the time too. About the fueling, I honestly cant remember if they did or not. Paul......

Hi Murph, yeah it was done just inside the shed on arrival from Heuston direction. The loco would be shut down for the refuelling process, when complete, the loco would be started up ( the best part, as nothing beats the sound of an 071 class or the growl of an A class starting up) then moved up the shop for running maintenance. Paul....

Mayner is 100% right with his answer. In the 70's / early 80's , there was no political appetite for spending money on the railways. In fact, i recall there was constant talk of closing railway lines and selling off big chunks of Inchicore works. We even had a coalition government transport minister, saying that had he been in power, he would never have given the Dart project the go ahead, incredible stuff imo. It took two rail disasters to bring the government to their senses. I worked on the mk3 new carriage building ( NCB) project from 1984 to 1989, and I remember the talk at the time, being that there was going to be no more money to be spent on anymore carriage building projects on completion of the NCB project. Irish rail was to come up with a solution themselves and that the finance would have to come from the agreed budget in the existing contract. So they came up with their own push pull ideas. I have to be honest, I think that the Mk3 driving trailers are awful looking things, the carriage side light being used for the windscreen, just doesn't look right, and the cab is so big you could fit an elephant into the bloody thing, appalling. Ok guys, rant over......... Paul.

Hi Murph, the oil train ran daily from Inchicore to the north wall. The Inchicore shunters would take turns at doing guard duty on the oil train, some of the shunters who I knew at the time, said it was a handy number. Also the big storage tanks seen in the photographs were used to supply the bus depots in Dublin as well. I remember the road oil tankers would do numerous runs from the works, to the depots every day. Yes the buildings you refer to facing onto Jamestown road was some kind of private metal / steel fabrication company. But at one stage it must have been C.I.E property, because you could still see the old railway line that ran in that direction. there was also an old level crossing gate there too. Paul....

Thank you, it was a pleasure..... Paul. Thank you Jonathan... Paul.

Hi, the paint on the loco body was painted with ICI multistripe paint. Multistripe, which meant it had a 40 minute drying time ( flash off) when baked. This meant that you could mask up quickly, and continue on spraying more colours etc. Then, when all the colours where finished, the multistripe painted part of the loco would be given two coats of laquer. The unerframe/ bogies, on the other hand were painted with ICI turbo plus paint. Turbo plus is a gloss finish paint, but it takes hours to dry, even after being baked, which meant that you could only do one colour, maybe two a day, which wasn't practical when doing multi coloured liveries. Irish rail were not going to use the much more expensive multistripe paint on bogies and underframes. When the new paint shop in Inchicore opened 1999/ 2000, the Cravens, MK 2's , MK3's , loco's, the whole lot, were painted with Turbo plus. It wasn't until they decided to do multi coloured liveries , that they needed to use a paint that would bascially speed up the job, hence the multistripe. I hope this answers some questions. Paul..

I only remember C.I.E police in Inchicore works. I worked in Connolly, Pearse and Heuston depots, and I don't recall seeing C.I. E police in any of those places.

Yes, you're right Citygold was introduced in 1993.

That's interesting, never heard that before, or never heard any of the fitters mention that? , The notch on the end of the key was a kind of release mechanism for safety reasons. Maybe the piece of timber worked? If I see some of the oul drivers that I knew, I will ask them. Paul....

Hi, these were a later version, the original handles of these keys were made from a type of resin or plastic. I'm not 100% sure, but some of these brass replacement keys could have been manufactured in the foundry in the works?? I can't remember to be honest. Paul..

Yeah, you are right. There certainly was a ' slam door ' at that end of the coach.

Here is a 141 class manual.

Is this the one that you are referring to?

Hi guys, this is the 'owners manual' that came with the loco's when they were delivered. The photograph in the manual is interesting, because the loco is longer than the CIE version and the cab is about a foot lower than the CIE version. No double windows at the back of the cab, also only four steps up into the cab instead of five on the Irish version. The six wheel bogies are different too.

Very true irishrailwayman. I will leave it at that.

Hi John, Yes the Park Royal programme initially was to re skin the coaches. But after stripping back one coach, the ' powers that be ' decided that the work would be too costly and time consuming. So they decided to fit the new steel panels over the existing old panels, much to the astonishment of the staff, especially the older generation coachbuilders. The original vestibule ends porthole windows or side lights as we called them , were done away with, and the replacement was just a steel panel with no window. All the new panels both outside, and the timber panels on the inside were pop- riveted on. Pop rivets or blind rivets as they are known , were the order of the day. The Park Royal programme was not one of the carriage shops finest moments, but these were the cash strapped days of C.I.E. Also John , Apart from the Park Royals, i really don't recall seeing asbestos on the other types of coaches that i had worked on, and I worked on a lot of heavy repair / crash / casualty jobs over the years. I do remember fitting sheets of black or brown ? asbestos in the new half heating van / half passenger conversions that C.I.E were doing in mid / late 70's. The whole new framework and access doors to the new boiler section , had fibreglass insulation/ sound proof, then asbestos sheeting which was then all sheeted out with steel paneling, which was all screwed into place. Interesting times in Inchicore during the ' poverty' era...