Any news with the RPSI's B134?

[228RiverOwenboy]

Here's the same DVT mock up in Inchicore in May 1988! 

Credit - seagoebox/Michael

 

...Was she repainted and given different headlights in 1989? Or is this a different mock-up?

Credit - SouthernYard on YouTube

Edited April 5, 2023 by 228RiverOwenboy

[Westcorkrailway]

10 minutes ago, 228RiverOwenboy said:

Here's the same DVT mock up in Inchicore in May 1988! 

Credit - unknown (PM if anyone knows)

 

...Was she repainted and given different headlights in 1989? Or is this a different mock-up?

Credit - SouthernYard on YouTube

Same mock up just painted differently with a few very minor modifications me thinks.

Edited April 5, 2023 by Westcorkrailway

[228RiverOwenboy]

1 minute ago, Westcorkrailway said:

Same mock up just painted differently with a few very minor modifications me thinks.

Perhaps!

10 hours ago, Westcorkrailway said:

Yes very similar to that but applied across a whole coach! You can see they were clearly wanting a dart branding for normal commuter trains 
 

Aperently it is January of 1989 this livery saw a month of use! 

Cool seeing another photo of it! Hope there's more...

[Ironroad]

 

error

Edited April 5, 2023 by Ironroad

[exciecoachbuilder]

3 hours ago, 228RiverOwenboy said:

Here's the same DVT mock up in Inchicore in May 1988! 

Credit - unknown (PM if anyone knows)

 

...Was she repainted and given different headlights in 1989? Or is this a different mock-up?

Credit - SouthernYard on YouTube

This is brilliant, I remember this well. This was a posed photo for An Nuacht (the quarterly C.I.E. newspaper). The lad in the white coat was holding the drawing upside down, I kid you not. I was working in the carriage shop at this time and there was only one mock up built, so it's the same mock up. The powers that be decided that the crappy green colour was a no no. Good decision imo.

[228RiverOwenboy]

2 minutes ago, exciecoachbuilder said:

The powers that be decided that the crappy green colour was a no no. Good decision imo.

I do agree with you, the green looks... Ugly, to put it lightly.

[Flying Snail]

Yes, not a great colour combo. Reminds me of these:

[minister_for_hardship]

I'm glad 'Snot & Club Orange' livery never made it beyond the planning stage.

[Branchline121]

Also, the 121’s livery doesn’t nicely line up with the DVT. Either they were experimenting, or they were going to have a low green band on the loco and high one on the coaches, which would make the colour not the worst thing about the livery!

[exciecoachbuilder]

19 hours ago, Ironroad said:

Same here, I was using the commuter services daily in 1989 and never saw the green strip depicted in the photograph above on either a loco or a Mk3 coach.

There is something very odd about that photograph, if that is Connolly station and I think it is,  The footbridge that is visible was removed in the early '80s as part of the renovations made to the station in the early '80s in preparation for the introduction of the DART services and long before introduction of the tippex livery Additionally there are no over head cables visible.   Photoshopped???

If you look closely you can see overhead line equipment over the grill at the back of the 121 class engine, and the " streetlight" on the platform. Platform 4 had an overhead line, platforms 1 ,2 and 3 didn't. These two locos are parked on platform 2, which is normally used by the enterprise trains. The overnight mail trains were usually loaded up on platform 2 as well.

 

[gm171 kk]

On 5/4/2023 at 4:24 PM, Branchline121 said:

Also, the 121’s livery doesn’t nicely line up with the DVT. Either they were experimenting, or they were going to have a low green band on the loco and high one on the coaches, which would make the colour not the worst thing about the livery!

They did paint one 121 in an adaptation of the Tippex livery with a bit of the snot green near the cab. Presumably to match the DVT. 

Edited April 7, 2023 by gm171 kk

[228RiverOwenboy]

1 hour ago, gm171 kk said:

They did paint one 121 in an adaptation of the Tippex livery with a bit of the snot green near the cab. Presumably to match the DVT. 

Might've had a bad flu... Poor 121!

[228RiverOwenboy]

I wonder how 134's getting on...

[Blaine]

On 23/12/2023 at 3:27 PM, 228RiverOwenboy said:

I wonder how 134's getting on...

Its the least of the rpsi's problems right now. Enough vanity projects clogging up the propaganda machine when theres holes the size of planets in the finances

Anyway 'diesel locomotives' are the devils work according to the elders of the rpsi. They were never used to haul sunday school outings on the derry road

[Galteemore]

Given that the RPSI’s initial aim (even before preserving an S class which was the main objective c1964) was simply to preserve a GNR railbus, they have actually been fairly open to the internal combustion engine….the RPSI’s perennial problem is balancing the costs of a hugely expensive motive power fleet with running enough fare paying and revenue generating efforts to cover it. The enthusiasts have always been subsidised by the general public stumping up cash. Having spent much of my childhood in muddy traction engine rally fields flogging RPSI merchandise I know how hard that exercise is. Had the purist hard core of Derry Road nostalgics really won over the levers of power in the early 70s, the organisation would have ceased to exist c1980…….any comments @jhb171achill or @leslie10646? As far as I know, the RPSI is generating very little revenue in NI right now and is largely held above the waterline by packed Dublin family trains, not all of which are steam.

Edited December 27, 2023 by Galteemore

[leslie10646]

@Galteemore No use asking me, as a founder member of the RPSI, I still look on diesel preservation as for "other people" - that said, the generation who MAY keep the RPSI running after I'm gone remembers with affection the single ended Yankees etc, as do I, so some attention must be paid to that side. (A look in my display cabinet here shows a lot of unusual diesels!).

That said, I'd like another run with No.171 before I discuss my sins with My Maker - plenty of OMMISSION as well as commision.

@Blaine Sorry but you're wrong about "Sunday School Excursions on the Derry Road". The generation who founded the RPSI and ran it until recently were of the NCC Sunday School Brigade - in other words 2-6-4 tanks. I DID have one Sunday School excursion with a S Class which came over the GN Antrim Branch.

Just as @Galteemore spend many wet afternoons in fields with his Dad raising money in what today are tiny quantities, I was attending similar events in England - the Syndicate did that for fifty years and is still raising a few bob now and again today.

But back to your illustrious Dad - like it or not, his careful stewardship of the RPSI's finances in the early 1970s and the unending efforts to raise a few bob kept the money coming in in the days before mass market trains for the public offered more cashflow.

In those days, it was the enthusiasts ("Derry Road excursionists"?) who paid for almost everything and with the Troubles reducing that market,  it was my job to try and bring the odd couple of dozen extra passengers over from Britain. Without those efforts by John and his small band of fundraisers - no RPSI today and no preserved B134.

It's over to you guys now, but let me have another few runs with "171"!

 

[jhb171achill]

Indeed; an interesting discussion, and one which I'll bring back to B134!

Galteemore's dad, referred to above, for those who don't know, was RPSI Treasurer for, I think, 27 years. This period spanned from when the society was only a few years old, until the late 1990s when I took over.

At this time the RPSI was truly an amatuer organisation; today it must, of necessity, be semi-professional in function and fully porfessional in standards. Galteemore Senior, let's call him JR, saqw the society take its earliest financial steps, and presided over its finances through not only its financially delicate early years, but this aganist the background of the "Troubles". Keeping a voluntary body stable and afloat throughout a thirty year long, slow-burning civil war is not exactly a walk in the park, especially when the domestic market, north AND south, was in almost constant recession. People simply did not have the disposable income in the 1960s, 70s and 80s that they have now. Nothing close.

Despite JR's best efforts, the best treasurer on the planet can't get people off settees on Saturday afternoons and into trains; but boy, did JR try. As (pre-treasurer days) I well knew, on-train sales were but part of widespread and imaginative efforts top raise money. Along with a very youthful Galteemore, his brother, a couple of friends (Mike, I know you're reading this!) and members of my own family, we visited agricultural shows, selling books about tractors, we sold "Britains" toy balers and much spreaders to persons of a rural disposition at such events, we sold books on and off trains, and at every station we got off the train and flogged badges, posters, gawwd knows what, soft toys (and, yes, toy tractors) to the unsuspecting public on station platforns who were either waiting for the 14:25 to Woodlawn, Glarryford or Thomastown, or in the station to rubberneck at a steam train. JR and a couple of other members compiled a book about Belfast trams which I hawked about bookshops, convenience shops and newsagents in Belfast, while JR did the same in Carrickfergus and many another place, I am sure.

Plus, there was the shop at Whitehead; a portakabin with a leaky roof which was the nerve centre of the Giant Teddy Bear Raffle; the ancestor of today's "Everyone's a Winner" raffle on board trains.

Why sell teddy bears and toy tractors if ye are a railway organisation?  - I hear you ask.

Before continuing, the following answer is not for the faint-hearted, is X-rated, and parental advice and smelling salts may be necessary.

The answer is, quite bluntly put, that Irish railway enthusiasts, north and south alike, will not buy railway books and specifically railway-orientated stuff on board trains. In contrast, English enthusiasts (yes, and Scottish!) will, do and did! The May Tour (90% English bookings) always sold more railway books than every single other sales outles source, in any year. And I don't mean 10% more: probably 95% of the sales of railway books and RPSI-branded merchandise was sold on the forst weekend in May! So, JR (quite rightly) took an early view to flog what people would buy - on Portrush Flyers and Mullingar excursions (there were no Santas back then). This meant plastic "train whistles" for three-year-olds, "Thomas" flags, furry toys, colouring books. With attendances at agricultural shows busy all summer from as far afield as Newtowncunningham, Co Donegal, Upton, Co Cork, Fenagh, Co Carlow, and all sorts of other places, the toy tractors, balers and all things haulage-truck-and-tracxtor related, were the only show in town. With a very respectable differential between what the RPSI paid for them and what we sold them for - what we found we COULD sell them for, the money rolled in and went directly to steam locos and the RPSI's newly-acquired coaching fleet of ex-CIE and ex-UTA / NIR steam stock.

I took over as Treasurer in 1988, and would continue in this role until 2000, whenh pressures of family life and a million other things made me ralise I hadn't the time to devote to do this effectively. I remained on the finance committee for probably another twelve years. The challenges mounted financially all the time, as the society went through its growing pains from a relatively inexperienced amateur group of people to the necessarily hardcore professional body it must be today.

All the while, JR was somewhere to be found in the background, chipping away at the ever mounting challenges of balancing the books as railway and engineering prices exploded through one roof after another.

But JR wasn't the only one.

At an early stage in my own financial career with the RPSI, a cheque for £1000 sterling arrived in my letterbox one day. No, it was not for me to buy IRM goodies, or even to buy Provincial Wagons goodies; it was FROM our own mr. Provincial Wagons himself, but in his alter ego as the cheque-writer for the small band of London-based railway enthusiasts called "The Syndicate". I was delighted to accept it and respond accordingly. This, i was to learn, was not the first such donation, nor would it be the last. In addition, any time an appeal went out for a new loco restoration project or the like, another cheque would arrive.

These illustrious gentlemen carried oput their own equally relentless fund raising activities in the London area, where Irish ex-pat railway enthusiasts are a fantastic lot - most being members of the RPSI and the IRRS. The purpose of the "Syndicate" was to simply raise money for "good causes" in railway preservation in Ireland. I had known Leslie before that, but from now, I looked forward to receiving these donations from the "Syndicate".

Folks, when you see JR on board trains, or his sidekicks, or you are invited to divert your inciome stream in some way towards the "Syndicate" at RPSI / IRRS / other events in London or that general neck'o'the woods, PLEASE do so.

There are many railway preservation projects, but the "big" ones like the RPSI lead the way - and don't forget Downpatrick either. RPSI & DCDR are the only 5'3" steam operators on this island, and both - in their own ways - face ever-mounting expense. The RPSI has lost its northern market now, with the sad and untimely death of NIR's only steam driver. With Dublin being several times the size of Belfast, and statistical evidence many decades old showing that people in the greater Dublin area in general spend a higher proportion of their disposable income on days out than their counterparts in the north, it stands to reason that the Dublin market - and commercial profit - is way bigger than that the RPSI has had on NIR metals - but - any income is valuable, and any loss of income results in something worthy of restoration languishing on a siding, until the elements take it to its rest. Downpatrick, meanwhile, is facing damage caused by a flood which Noah would have been proud of. Hope that ark didn't have traction motors; such would have made a nice Chapter VIIIIIIIIXXVVIII of 1st, 2nd & 3rd Deuteromonosis.

I digress; why earn money, why donate money? Because locomotive restoration costs zillions.

We see, all the time, amongst the uneducated press in local papers, "Why don't they reopen the XXX line for tourists and steam tyrains? Sure it'd make a fortune!"

No, it most certainly would not. Even if the tooth fairy waved a wand, and built it, plus ten new-build steam locos for it, someone has to maintain them, replace boilers when necessary, etc etc etc etc. DCDR and RPSI already HAVE operational steam engines - but not only that. They now also have carriages, premises and colossal insurance bills. The meter's running.

JR, the Syndicate, and others who have made often substantial private gifts to the various societies over the years (one of whom will also be reading this), are all too well aware of this. And so to B134; WITHOUT the efforts of the aforementioned, B134 would now either be under a tarpaulin in a yard, almost certainly never to run again, or already scrapped. And that's it; we owe the aforementioned a great deal of gratitude, and may the Syndicate keep syndicating away, and JR continue raffling, for many many years to come; we should support them as much as we can.

Phew.

 

 

[Signal Post]

Thanks for this detailed explanation Jonathan. I know that there are many on here who will already be familiar with the situation and with the history of the RPSI/IRRS/DCDR having been around and either involved in or following the events described above, but there are also many others, including myself, who either were not active railway enthusiasts in former times or in some cases had not even been born. It is very useful for us to gain some insight into the wonderful work that has been done and indeed continues to be done by a very dedicated few who work tirelessly in the interests of Irish railway preservation.

Thank you.

[Gabhal Luimnigh]

Great post JB, very informative and even stirring, I for one will be sending a few quid to the above mentioned, I am certainly not flush but I don't need any more stock for my layout today and maybe today is then a good time

[Westcorkrailway]

15 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

Indeed; an interesting discussion, and one which I'll bring back to B134!

Galteemore's dad, referred to above, for those who don't know, was RPSI Treasurer for, I think, 27 years. This period spanned from when the society was only a few years old, until the late 1990s when I took over.

At this time the RPSI was truly an amatuer organisation; today it must, of necessity, be semi-professional in function and fully porfessional in standards. Galteemore Senior, let's call him JR, saqw the society take its earliest financial steps, and presided over its finances through not only its financially delicate early years, but this aganist the background of the "Troubles". Keeping a voluntary body stable and afloat throughout a thirty year long, slow-burning civil war is not exactly a walk in the park, especially when the domestic market, north AND south, was in almost constant recession. People simply did not have the disposable income in the 1960s, 70s and 80s that they have now. Nothing close.

Despite JR's best efforts, the best treasurer on the planet can't get people off settees on Saturday afternoons and into trains; but boy, did JR try. As (pre-treasurer days) I well knew, on-train sales were but part of widespread and imaginative efforts top raise money. Along with a very youthful Galteemore, his brother, a couple of friends (Mike, I know you're reading this!) and members of my own family, we visited agricultural shows, selling books about tractors, we sold "Britains" toy balers and much spreaders to persons of a rural disposition at such events, we sold books on and off trains, and at every station we got off the train and flogged badges, posters, gawwd knows what, soft toys (and, yes, toy tractors) to the unsuspecting public on station platforns who were either waiting for the 14:25 to Woodlawn, Glarryford or Thomastown, or in the station to rubberneck at a steam train. JR and a couple of other members compiled a book about Belfast trams which I hawked about bookshops, convenience shops and newsagents in Belfast, while JR did the same in Carrickfergus and many another place, I am sure.

Plus, there was the shop at Whitehead; a portakabin with a leaky roof which was the nerve centre of the Giant Teddy Bear Raffle; the ancestor of today's "Everyone's a Winner" raffle on board trains.

Why sell teddy bears and toy tractors if ye are a railway organisation?  - I hear you ask.

Before continuing, the following answer is not for the faint-hearted, is X-rated, and parental advice and smelling salts may be necessary.

The answer is, quite bluntly put, that Irish railway enthusiasts, north and south alike, will not buy railway books and specifically railway-orientated stuff on board trains. In contrast, English enthusiasts (yes, and Scottish!) will, do and did! The May Tour (90% English bookings) always sold more railway books than every single other sales outles source, in any year. And I don't mean 10% more: probably 95% of the sales of railway books and RPSI-branded merchandise was sold on the forst weekend in May! So, JR (quite rightly) took an early view to flog what people would buy - on Portrush Flyers and Mullingar excursions (there were no Santas back then). This meant plastic "train whistles" for three-year-olds, "Thomas" flags, furry toys, colouring books. With attendances at agricultural shows busy all summer from as far afield as Newtowncunningham, Co Donegal, Upton, Co Cork, Fenagh, Co Carlow, and all sorts of other places, the toy tractors, balers and all things haulage-truck-and-tracxtor related, were the only show in town. With a very respectable differential between what the RPSI paid for them and what we sold them for - what we found we COULD sell them for, the money rolled in and went directly to steam locos and the RPSI's newly-acquired coaching fleet of ex-CIE and ex-UTA / NIR steam stock.

I took over as Treasurer in 1988, and would continue in this role until 2000, whenh pressures of family life and a million other things made me ralise I hadn't the time to devote to do this effectively. I remained on the finance committee for probably another twelve years. The challenges mounted financially all the time, as the society went through its growing pains from a relatively inexperienced amateur group of people to the necessarily hardcore professional body it must be today.

All the while, JR was somewhere to be found in the background, chipping away at the ever mounting challenges of balancing the books as railway and engineering prices exploded through one roof after another.

But JR wasn't the only one.

At an early stage in my own financial career with the RPSI, a cheque for £1000 sterling arrived in my letterbox one day. No, it was not for me to buy IRM goodies, or even to buy Provincial Wagons goodies; it was FROM our own mr. Provincial Wagons himself, but in his alter ego as the cheque-writer for the small band of London-based railway enthusiasts called "The Syndicate". I was delighted to accept it and respond accordingly. This, i was to learn, was not the first such donation, nor would it be the last. In addition, any time an appeal went out for a new loco restoration project or the like, another cheque would arrive.

These illustrious gentlemen carried oput their own equally relentless fund raising activities in the London area, where Irish ex-pat railway enthusiasts are a fantastic lot - most being members of the RPSI and the IRRS. The purpose of the "Syndicate" was to simply raise money for "good causes" in railway preservation in Ireland. I had known Leslie before that, but from now, I looked forward to receiving these donations from the "Syndicate".

Folks, when you see JR on board trains, or his sidekicks, or you are invited to divert your inciome stream in some way towards the "Syndicate" at RPSI / IRRS / other events in London or that general neck'o'the woods, PLEASE do so.

There are many railway preservation projects, but the "big" ones like the RPSI lead the way - and don't forget Downpatrick either. RPSI & DCDR are the only 5'3" steam operators on this island, and both - in their own ways - face ever-mounting expense. The RPSI has lost its northern market now, with the sad and untimely death of NIR's only steam driver. With Dublin being several times the size of Belfast, and statistical evidence many decades old showing that people in the greater Dublin area in general spend a higher proportion of their disposable income on days out than their counterparts in the north, it stands to reason that the Dublin market - and commercial profit - is way bigger than that the RPSI has had on NIR metals - but - any income is valuable, and any loss of income results in something worthy of restoration languishing on a siding, until the elements take it to its rest. Downpatrick, meanwhile, is facing damage caused by a flood which Noah would have been proud of. Hope that ark didn't have traction motors; such would have made a nice Chapter VIIIIIIIIXXVVIII of 1st, 2nd & 3rd Deuteromonosis.

I digress; why earn money, why donate money? Because locomotive restoration costs zillions.

We see, all the time, amongst the uneducated press in local papers, "Why don't they reopen the XXX line for tourists and steam tyrains? Sure it'd make a fortune!"

No, it most certainly would not. Even if the tooth fairy waved a wand, and built it, plus ten new-build steam locos for it, someone has to maintain them, replace boilers when necessary, etc etc etc etc. DCDR and RPSI already HAVE operational steam engines - but not only that. They now also have carriages, premises and colossal insurance bills. The meter's running.

JR, the Syndicate, and others who have made often substantial private gifts to the various societies over the years (one of whom will also be reading this), are all too well aware of this. And so to B134; WITHOUT the efforts of the aforementioned, B134 would now either be under a tarpaulin in a yard, almost certainly never to run again, or already scrapped. And that's it; we owe the aforementioned a great deal of gratitude, and may the Syndicate keep syndicating away, and JR continue raffling, for many many years to come; we should support them as much as we can.

Phew.

 

 

To be honest a history of the various preservation societies around Ireland would make for a superb book. Most CRRS efforts were also funded by cashflow from across the pond.

 

I actually have a massive collection of Britain’s stuff. As I was a massive model tractor modeler years ago. Those Britain’s balers were a super job for there time. Glad to hear they had helped keep the RPSI above the waterline 

[226 Abhann na Suire]

On 27/12/2023 at 10:11 PM, jhb171achill said:

Indeed; an interesting discussion, and one which I'll bring back to B134!

Galteemore's dad, referred to above, for those who don't know, was RPSI Treasurer for, I think, 27 years. This period spanned from when the society was only a few years old, until the late 1990s when I took over.

At this time the RPSI was truly an amatuer organisation; today it must, of necessity, be semi-professional in function and fully porfessional in standards. Galteemore Senior, let's call him JR, saqw the society take its earliest financial steps, and presided over its finances through not only its financially delicate early years, but this aganist the background of the "Troubles". Keeping a voluntary body stable and afloat throughout a thirty year long, slow-burning civil war is not exactly a walk in the park, especially when the domestic market, north AND south, was in almost constant recession. People simply did not have the disposable income in the 1960s, 70s and 80s that they have now. Nothing close.

Despite JR's best efforts, the best treasurer on the planet can't get people off settees on Saturday afternoons and into trains; but boy, did JR try. As (pre-treasurer days) I well knew, on-train sales were but part of widespread and imaginative efforts top raise money. Along with a very youthful Galteemore, his brother, a couple of friends (Mike, I know you're reading this!) and members of my own family, we visited agricultural shows, selling books about tractors, we sold "Britains" toy balers and much spreaders to persons of a rural disposition at such events, we sold books on and off trains, and at every station we got off the train and flogged badges, posters, gawwd knows what, soft toys (and, yes, toy tractors) to the unsuspecting public on station platforns who were either waiting for the 14:25 to Woodlawn, Glarryford or Thomastown, or in the station to rubberneck at a steam train. JR and a couple of other members compiled a book about Belfast trams which I hawked about bookshops, convenience shops and newsagents in Belfast, while JR did the same in Carrickfergus and many another place, I am sure.

Plus, there was the shop at Whitehead; a portakabin with a leaky roof which was the nerve centre of the Giant Teddy Bear Raffle; the ancestor of today's "Everyone's a Winner" raffle on board trains.

Why sell teddy bears and toy tractors if ye are a railway organisation?  - I hear you ask.

Before continuing, the following answer is not for the faint-hearted, is X-rated, and parental advice and smelling salts may be necessary.

The answer is, quite bluntly put, that Irish railway enthusiasts, north and south alike, will not buy railway books and specifically railway-orientated stuff on board trains. In contrast, English enthusiasts (yes, and Scottish!) will, do and did! The May Tour (90% English bookings) always sold more railway books than every single other sales outles source, in any year. And I don't mean 10% more: probably 95% of the sales of railway books and RPSI-branded merchandise was sold on the forst weekend in May! So, JR (quite rightly) took an early view to flog what people would buy - on Portrush Flyers and Mullingar excursions (there were no Santas back then). This meant plastic "train whistles" for three-year-olds, "Thomas" flags, furry toys, colouring books. With attendances at agricultural shows busy all summer from as far afield as Newtowncunningham, Co Donegal, Upton, Co Cork, Fenagh, Co Carlow, and all sorts of other places, the toy tractors, balers and all things haulage-truck-and-tracxtor related, were the only show in town. With a very respectable differential between what the RPSI paid for them and what we sold them for - what we found we COULD sell them for, the money rolled in and went directly to steam locos and the RPSI's newly-acquired coaching fleet of ex-CIE and ex-UTA / NIR steam stock.

I took over as Treasurer in 1988, and would continue in this role until 2000, whenh pressures of family life and a million other things made me ralise I hadn't the time to devote to do this effectively. I remained on the finance committee for probably another twelve years. The challenges mounted financially all the time, as the society went through its growing pains from a relatively inexperienced amateur group of people to the necessarily hardcore professional body it must be today.

All the while, JR was somewhere to be found in the background, chipping away at the ever mounting challenges of balancing the books as railway and engineering prices exploded through one roof after another.

But JR wasn't the only one.

At an early stage in my own financial career with the RPSI, a cheque for £1000 sterling arrived in my letterbox one day. No, it was not for me to buy IRM goodies, or even to buy Provincial Wagons goodies; it was FROM our own mr. Provincial Wagons himself, but in his alter ego as the cheque-writer for the small band of London-based railway enthusiasts called "The Syndicate". I was delighted to accept it and respond accordingly. This, i was to learn, was not the first such donation, nor would it be the last. In addition, any time an appeal went out for a new loco restoration project or the like, another cheque would arrive.

These illustrious gentlemen carried oput their own equally relentless fund raising activities in the London area, where Irish ex-pat railway enthusiasts are a fantastic lot - most being members of the RPSI and the IRRS. The purpose of the "Syndicate" was to simply raise money for "good causes" in railway preservation in Ireland. I had known Leslie before that, but from now, I looked forward to receiving these donations from the "Syndicate".

Folks, when you see JR on board trains, or his sidekicks, or you are invited to divert your inciome stream in some way towards the "Syndicate" at RPSI / IRRS / other events in London or that general neck'o'the woods, PLEASE do so.

There are many railway preservation projects, but the "big" ones like the RPSI lead the way - and don't forget Downpatrick either. RPSI & DCDR are the only 5'3" steam operators on this island, and both - in their own ways - face ever-mounting expense. The RPSI has lost its northern market now, with the sad and untimely death of NIR's only steam driver. With Dublin being several times the size of Belfast, and statistical evidence many decades old showing that people in the greater Dublin area in general spend a higher proportion of their disposable income on days out than their counterparts in the north, it stands to reason that the Dublin market - and commercial profit - is way bigger than that the RPSI has had on NIR metals - but - any income is valuable, and any loss of income results in something worthy of restoration languishing on a siding, until the elements take it to its rest. Downpatrick, meanwhile, is facing damage caused by a flood which Noah would have been proud of. Hope that ark didn't have traction motors; such would have made a nice Chapter VIIIIIIIIXXVVIII of 1st, 2nd & 3rd Deuteromonosis.

I digress; why earn money, why donate money? Because locomotive restoration costs zillions.

We see, all the time, amongst the uneducated press in local papers, "Why don't they reopen the XXX line for tourists and steam tyrains? Sure it'd make a fortune!"

No, it most certainly would not. Even if the tooth fairy waved a wand, and built it, plus ten new-build steam locos for it, someone has to maintain them, replace boilers when necessary, etc etc etc etc. DCDR and RPSI already HAVE operational steam engines - but not only that. They now also have carriages, premises and colossal insurance bills. The meter's running.

JR, the Syndicate, and others who have made often substantial private gifts to the various societies over the years (one of whom will also be reading this), are all too well aware of this. And so to B134; WITHOUT the efforts of the aforementioned, B134 would now either be under a tarpaulin in a yard, almost certainly never to run again, or already scrapped. And that's it; we owe the aforementioned a great deal of gratitude, and may the Syndicate keep syndicating away, and JR continue raffling, for many many years to come; we should support them as much as we can.

Phew.

 

 

Jaysus JB that has me tearing up and ready to go fighting at the same time!! Maybe if they got yourself to give the Mayo football team their half time rile-up speech, Sam would be in hand in no time!!! 
 

In all seriousness though, a mighty speech and I certainly will be trying to send money Whitehead-bound wherever I can!! God bless the work and long may it continue!

[jhb171achill]

1 hour ago, 226 Abhann na Suire said:

Jaysus JB that has me tearing up and ready to go fighting at the same time!! Maybe if they got yourself to give the Mayo football team their half time rile-up speech, Sam would be in hand in no time!!! 
 

In all seriousness though, a mighty speech and I certainly will be trying to send money Whitehead-bound wherever I can!! God bless the work and long may it continue!

Many thanks; and despite metropolitan background, there’s Mayo blood in me too! (My mothers lot - Ballina, Belmullet!)…. so I’m well up for Sam taking the train to Killala!

Yes, again in seriousness, the RPSI in Dublin AND Whitehead faces challenges like never before; volunteer numbers being one, but not the only one….

[Gabhal Luimnigh]

23 minutes ago, jhb171achill said:

Many thanks; and despite metropolitan background, there’s Mayo blood in me too! (My mothers lot - Ballina, Belmullet!)…. so I’m well up for Sam taking the train to Killala!

Yes, again in seriousness, the RPSI in Dublin AND Whitehead faces challenges like never before; volunteer numbers being one, but not the only one….

Sent in my application form and subscription couple of days ago.

[jhb171achill]

6 hours ago, Gabhal Luimnigh said:

Sent in my application form and subscription couple of days ago.

Fair play to ye! 

[Branchline121]

So anybody got news about B134? It's been almost 2 years since she was unveiled...

[228RiverOwenboy]

On 30/3/2024 at 10:16 AM, Branchline121 said:

So anybody got news about B134? It's been almost 2 years since she was unveiled...

Had a visit at Inchicore pretty recently. Her cab interior hasn't been fully sorted from what I saw inside, the electrical stuff still needs finishing. So I suppose, cosmetically speaking, she's complete, but mechanically? Most likely not.

[hurricanemk1c]

It should also be stressed that B134 is being worked on by IÉ employees, and naturally the usual diet of 071s and 201s are priority for their time and attention. It's moved around in the last week or so ready for electrical work to continue. It's also giving more time to get through certification with the CRR.

[irishrailways52]

just thinking how are they going to run her when she is ready. will they doubblehead her with a 141. i know im really getting my hopes up here but might she run with the mark 3 control car curently at Moyasta

[Galteemore]

1 minute ago, irishrailways52 said:

just thinking how are they going to run her when she is ready. will they doubblehead her with a 141. i know im really getting my hopes up here but might she run with the mark 3 control car curently at Moyasta

Unlikely I’d say. She’ll be on the Cravens down south and Mk2s up north if she heads there. 

[Westcorkrailway]

6 minutes ago, irishrailways52 said:

just thinking how are they going to run her when she is ready. will they doubblehead her with a 141. i know im really getting my hopes up here but might she run with the mark 3 control car curently at Moyasta

I hear there allowed to run bonnet first…..won’t that be something

[irishrailways52]

Just now, Westcorkrailway said:

I hear there allowed to run bonnet first…..won’t that be something

that will be indeed

[jhb171achill]

If the thing ever takes to the rails they’ll have to pair it with some other loco. Possibly an 071 these days…..?

[228RiverOwenboy]

On 7/4/2024 at 4:35 PM, jhb171achill said:

If the thing ever takes to the rails they’ll have to pair it with some other loco. Possibly an 071 these days…..?

I'd imagine something like that, didn't the 121s have a bit of a struggle when pulling 6 Mark 3 Suburbans by themselves (as in one loco)?

Edited April 8 by 228RiverOwenboy

[airfixfan]

Would say money or the lack of it helps explain the lack of progress recently!

[jhb171achill]

6 hours ago, 228RiverOwenboy said:

I'd imagine something like that, didn't the 121s have a bit of a struggle when pulling 6 Mark 3 Suburbans by themselves (as in one loco)?

A 121 on its own would struggle with eight packed Cravens and the RPSI's "red van".

I once saw a 141 trying to lift nine loaded Mk 2s on a Portadown - Belfast morning commuter local. Boy, did it make a noise! It was standing in for a failed NIR 111 which normally did this - at the time, it was the last 071-hauled train on the island. The 141 had been commandeered off the Dundalk goods, I think.

However, even if a 121 was well able to lift 18 bogies, never mind 8, there's the small matter of turning. there's no way under the sun they'd allow it to go nose forst, so pairing will, I guess, be mandatory.

The DCDR considered taking 124 some years ago, but opted for 146 instead, as the curves around the north junction area and elsewhere would have necessitated a 2-man crew; not always possible on a volunteer-run railway. If nose-first won't do on the DCDR, it certainly won't do on the Cork main line.... Plus, an 071 would be well able to haul a train of eight plus a potentially failed 134.

Mind you, if the 071 threw its toys out of the pram, the whole lot would be stuck.