hexagon789

You can still get SailRail tickets from any GB stations to any station in Ireland routed via the ferries from Holyhead They are £51.10 in the UK or €60 in Ireland for London/Dublin for example. Further destinations are slightly more expensive, but a ~£5/€5 discount can be had by booking them in advance. Stafford-Ballybrophy comes to £66.40/£71.60 presently.

Top photo is a 4CEP (4 Coaches, Corridor, Electro-Pneumatic brakes - TOPS Class 411) Southern Region 3rd Rail EMU. 90mph; 1,000hp; based on the BR Mk1 coach design. These lasted from 1956-2005. Not sure of location. Other photo is a Class 319 at Gatwick Airport, these are 4-car dual-voltage EMUs introduced in 1987 for the Thameslink Bedford-Brighton cross-London project. 100mph; 990kW/1,328hp; based on the Mk3 design. Some remain in service with Northern and WMR, others have been converted to 769s for Northern, TfW and GWR by adding diesel engines to the driving trailers. The livery in both cases is Network SouthEast, essentially the London & South East commuter area, introduced as a separate business sector of British Rail in 1982 as London & South Eastern and relaunched as NSE by new manager Chris Green in 1986 with a new livery (he had just transferred from ScotRail and had already made several improvements with branding and services etc). Some 4CEPs retained NSE until the 2000s, but the last 319s in this colours were repainted in 1994. So it's between 1987 and 1994 for the second photo at least.

Between 1979 and 1988. It's an ex-Class 24, no. 24061. She was taken over by the Railway Technical Centre in 1975 and renumbered as per your photo in 1979, withdrawn 1988. Hence it must be between 1979 and 1988. As for location, I'd guess the RTC at Derby, given it was based there and another Test Vehicle - 'Laboratory 1' - is also in shot. Edit: in fact, it is definitely the RTC at Derby, I've just looked at a photo and the main building is 100% that one.

For completeness, the DMU parked in the platform is a Swindon-built InterCity unit of Class 126. The unusual feature of these units was that there were two styles of driving motor - one as per your photo with a full-width cab but also a design with a half-cab and gangway, allowing a walk-through six-car formation to be made up. They entered service from August 1959 and the final two units in traffic lasted until January 1983. One unit is preserved in working order at Bo'ness near Linlithgow.

Jonathan Allen has an excellent flickr account, including several photos of Hunslets on all sorts of workings: https://www.flickr.com/people/152343870@N07/

Good point, maybe more a passenger GB Class 59 then? It's probably just as well the original plan to get rid of generator vans on Mk2D and Mk3 sets was shelved!

I've only just seen this @jhb171achill many thanks for posting it - ive never seen an interior plan of the Irish Pullman cars so it's most interesting to see the layout. The 3-seat benches with extending tables at the seating saloon area ends are an interesting way to accommodate the offset doorways. I don't believe any British cars had such an arrangement that I'm aware of. The photo showing the interior seating, and decor is likewise fascinating - they may have been third class but they are not exactly spartan.

I understand the designs are identical except: The IÉ 201 had HEP equipment fitted, passenger gearing (165km/h vs 120km/h) and a different cab design. The engines, generator, traction motors are all the same and I suspect much of the other mechanical equipment is too.

I think Blaine is alluding to the belief that the 071 is the superior locomotive class. A tenet which I subscribe to I must admit, though I don't hate 201s. If it didn't model railways wouldn't exist you could argue, or wouldn't be as financially viable at least.

After the Cherryville Accident in 1983. It was one of the recommendations of the report produced into the accident.

Either that or they are taking on Bachmann and Hornby's offerings

The full set was launched on the 23rd July 2001, all the refurbished vehicles were still on the books in January 2008 and were among the very last Mk2D carriages in revenue service.

Quite, sometimes you just have to take the plunge or risk missing out entirely or playing the long waiting game with the potential for increase costs as well.

Let me find my WTTs and double check, but I think pre-1984 the full 75 linespeed applied over most if not all that section.

I read with interest recently, that many of the mainlines in Ireland had no prescribed maximum linespeed until the late-1940s/early 1950s when a 70mph ceiling was imposed, there were just limits for junctions and curvature. Apparently 80mph was not uncommon when drivers were looking to make up time. This rather mirrors the situation with the GWR in Britain where Sectional Appendices prescribed no maximum linespeed but rather stated: "the maximum speed may be as high as is required to maintain the timetable". A situation which lasted until 1939 and then from 1955-1960 when a 90mph ceiling was imposed for a few years until regularly scheduled 100mph running was introduced.

Oh right, got you now. I thought you meant the base livery. Yes, the bilingual logo is later - 2012/13 iirc.

I understood the current IÉ InterCity livery dated from 2006 (when the Mk4s were introduced) and the Mk2D stock lasted until March 2008, the Mk3s until October 2009 and the latter were certainly hauled by Green/Silver 201s

Could be Alloa then - the Wickham cars saw use earliest on the Stirling-Alloa-Dollar service, another lightly used rural line. Alloa being yet another large station with a service greatly lower in proportion than the amount of track provided, though there was a reasonably frequent Stirling-Alloa shuttle from memory until the line closed and of course it's now been re-opened for 10 years and served by a regular hourly electric service from Glasgow!

Some form of catering vehicle? The wee railbus is one of the Scottish Region 'Wickham' cars, these were used on a variety of lightly used rural branches, but one of the best known was the Gleneagles-Creiff-Comrie line. Crieff was actually a huge junction station but by the railcar era it had only the 6 railcar services each way through it despite having four mainline length platforms and 5 through roads. I think that may be Crieff in your picture, the canopies are right but I can't really make out any surrounding detail.

That's a shame, but I suppose at least the photo was of interest!

Sent you a PM, will try and check the journals for the other info tomorrow.

I can check the IRRS Journals later for that information. I'll PM you

Could you provide a link to the photo @jhb171achill? Might be able to find the information you're looking for if I can follow the link.

The electrific sliding doors on Mk3 p-p, 4 & D-D stock certainly as the doors are all controlled by the driver. Normal IC Mk3 sets I believe the guard controlled the doors - at least that was the original method, it may have changed when the 201s appeared. Slam-doors I presume would have been the guards responsibility to ensure they were closed. Yes, can PM you.

And of course the number of TSRs grew and grew right up until the late-1990s when a lot of relaying was done and the speed ceiling on the Western routes was raised then from 70 to 80mph and on the Sligo Road from 70 to 75mph. Quite scary to think about the unofficial speeds attained on some of those less than perfect sections of track. I wonder if Irish Rail drivers had a similar attitude to those in Britain in the days before widespread speed monitoring. I believe IR had recorders on the 071s and later locos, not sure about the older GMs but did these dissuade drivers from pushing speeds at all? In Britain the attitude was often that exceeding linespeed by a moderate amount was tolerated if it was ever discovered but not that of exceeding PSRs or TSRs by any significant margin.