BREL designs for Ireland - that didn't turn out like this

[Mol_PMB]

About 25 years ago I started my career in Derby, at the Litchurch Lane works which had been opened by the Midland Railway and still exists today as part of the Alstom empire. In the 1990s and 2000s the name on the gate seemed to change almost annually!

Anyway, one quiet afternoon I hid myself away in the Microfiche viewing room and trawled through the drawings for anything of Irish interest. The archive didn't go back very far, but did cover some interesting things in the 1970s and 1980s. For example, there are some nice drawings of the BELL containers built in Derby, and of the International Train demonstrator which was later sold to Irish Rail. But both of those really existed. Here are some drawings of rolling stock for NIR that didn't see the light of day, or at least not in quite this form. Might be of some interest to those who like 'what if' models. Some of these are related to the 1980 additional Enterprise coaches, for which BREL proposed to build new stock but eventually NIR bought second-hand vehicles from BR.

'Shortie' Mk3, with windows like a Class 317 EMU:

Somewhat like a Mk2a, but with inset, inward-opening doors more like the Mk2 Pullmans:

This is a drawing for a modification to convert a Mk2b BFK to a brake generator buffet car:

And finally, an early scheme for what became the Castle class, but with a large van area in the power car and a different arrangement of doors. This was more like the power car of 210001 than what was eventually built for NIR:

[Colin_McLeod]

Now you can see why NIR purchased second hand tried and tested coaches instead of more experiments at high index linked prices, with a delivery date of God knows when.

[jhb171achill]

Most interesting!

[Mol_PMB]

I could scan these drawings properly if anyone would be interested. It’s a bit of a faff because they are printed on A2 or larger, and I only have an A4 scanner. 
I also have similar diagrams of the international train, the rest of the not-quite-450 train, and some Bell containers (which are much more detailed blueprints but harder to read).

cheers,

Mol

[jhb171achill]

3 hours ago, Mol_PMB said:

I could scan these drawings properly if anyone would be interested. It’s a bit of a faff because they are printed on A2 or larger, and I only have an A4 scanner. 
I also have similar diagrams of the international train, the rest of the not-quite-450 train, and some Bell containers (which are much more detailed blueprints but harder to read).

cheers,

Mol

NIR is a small area, with less variety (no internal goods trains since before inception and only half a dozen locos) but the “might have beens” like the C classes pulling lignite and so on… or loco hauled trains on the Derry line. So here’s more!

[hurricanemk1c]

4 hours ago, Mol_PMB said:

I could scan these drawings properly if anyone would be interested. It’s a bit of a faff because they are printed on A2 or larger, and I only have an A4 scanner. 
I also have similar diagrams of the international train, the rest of the not-quite-450 train, and some Bell containers (which are much more detailed blueprints but harder to read).

cheers,

Mol

I'd be fascinated at the scans, drawings are always an interest to me!

[Robert Shrives]

I like the Mk2 gen idea - like a service car on a well know NG line ..  At least nobody tried to foist the Leyland MK1 conversion on NIR - quite likely as it as uber cheap it would have seen fleet production ! 

The Mk3 shortie shows Hornby might have been onto something!  but the windows as on the 317 were dreadfully ugly.

 FWIW on the international coaches CIE started to look at/ cut a bit of metal to make the International brake into a driving car have you ever seen anything of a diagram in your searches? 

Cheers

Robert.    

[Mol_PMB]

Next time I get the scanner out I'll scan these then - I will have to do them in several parts.

I do have the BREL diagram of the International brake, but I don't have anything relating to what CIE planned to do with it.

I have fond memories of travelling in the International set to Galway, and even to Ennis (on the spare International carriage that sometimes turned up in a Mk3 rake). Somehow I don't think BREL's target market for the carriages was trundling along a single-track branch line with baby GM haulage!

 

1 hour ago, Robert Shrives said:

I like the Mk2 gen idea - like a service car on a well know NG line ..  At least nobody tried to foist the Leyland MK1 conversion on NIR - quite likely as it as uber cheap it would have seen fleet production ! 

The Mk3 shortie shows Hornby might have been onto something!  but the windows as on the 317 were dreadfully ugly.

 FWIW on the international coaches CIE started to look at/ cut a bit of metal to make the International brake into a driving car have you ever seen anything of a diagram in your searches? 

Cheers

Robert.    

I'd be fascinated to see you build models of these!

[jhb171achill]

The Fry model of Drumm train unit C / D differs from the real thing as it was built off plan, but there were amendments made while the real thing was being built! 

Edited November 4 by jhb171achill

[Mol_PMB]

I've had a go at scanning the 'shortie' Mk3 but it's been a bit tricky because the page is about 6 times bigger than my scanner!

Attached are four individual scans and an imperfect combination of them. There may be software tools that could merge them more effectively - if anyone here is good at this then please feel free to improve on my effort.

[Mol_PMB]

On 4/11/2024 at 11:22 AM, Robert Shrives said:

I like the Mk2 gen idea - like a service car on a well know NG line ..  At least nobody tried to foist the Leyland MK1 conversion on NIR - quite likely as it as uber cheap it would have seen fleet production ! 

The Mk3 shortie shows Hornby might have been onto something!  but the windows as on the 317 were dreadfully ugly.

 FWIW on the international coaches CIE started to look at/ cut a bit of metal to make the International brake into a driving car have you ever seen anything of a diagram in your searches? 

Cheers

Robert.    

Here's the BREL drawing for the International brake coach, in two halves owing to scanner limitations!

Mol

[hurricanemk1c]

Interesting stuff, it does confirm a suspicion I've had for a long time (and unable to prove) that the Internationals did have a slightly different body profile to a normal Mk3. In some photos it looked pronounced compared to a EGV, in others pretty much identical, not helped by the differently sized and placed windows

[Mol_PMB]

16 minutes ago, hurricanemk1c said:

Interesting stuff, it does confirm a suspicion I've had for a long time (and unable to prove) that the Internationals did have a slightly different body profile to a normal Mk3. In some photos it looked pronounced compared to a EGV, in others pretty much identical, not helped by the differently sized and placed windows

Yes, they definitely had a different profile, more angular at the solebar, and the end taper was more than just the door.

[Mol_PMB]

A few of my photos of International stock. Two shots in comparison to a Mk3, and one with the door open showing the door edge profile.

It was nice to get some baby GM haulage in one of these!

[Robert Shrives]

For the Galway set I imagined the Brake driver could follow the MK3 driver trailer - easier to train staff but does loose the corridor connection . However possible that a DBSO style half cab with just one end window added would prevail - certainly easier to make from the Southern Pride/ jouef MK3 conversions. However with the likelyhood of Mk3 rtr driver I could muse on using a silver fox resin end "melded" to the SR side. 

Thanks for the photos and drawings - interesting the catering car doors omit the plug logo.

Robert   

 

 

    

 

  

[Mol_PMB]

5 minutes ago, Robert Shrives said:

For the Galway set I imagined the Brake driver could follow the MK3 driver trailer - easier to train staff but does loose the corridor connection . However possible that a DBSO style half cab with just one end window added would prevail - certainly easier to make from the Southern Pride/ jouef MK3 conversions. However with the likelyhood of Mk3 rtr driver I could muse on using a silver fox resin end "melded" to the SR side. 

Thanks for the photos and drawings - interesting the catering car doors omit the plug logo.

Robert  

I'll see if I can find any more photos of them, I thought I had some interior shots somewhere but I can't find them.

Note that 6208 was a 'spare' for the Cu Na Mara set, and often ended up running with a normal Mk3 rake, as seen at Ennis for example. It had BT10-type bogies, like a Mk3, different from the rest which were on a variant of the T4.

Here are the drawings for the catering car: