Which wagons to use for older CIE 1950's-60's era?

[John McGahern]

Hi everyone,

I'm brand new to the site and will be full of questions looking for your expertise! First off, which British ready to run wagons would be closest to getting a match for some of the old CIE wagons? I already ordered four of the Dapol un-painted banana vans which I'm sure I have seen used by some of you. I would just like to find some more that would closely resemble (although I know they'd never be perfect) the real thing.

 

Cheers,

 

John.

[Dunluce Castle]

Hi there.

Welcome to the forum.

A company called provincial wagons do some CIE wagons which a few are left.

Here's the website http://www.provincialwagons.com/index.html

Highly recommended.

Thanks

[UP6936]

If you know the BR 12T vans, painted grey and decaled with a snail or broken wheel logo can look quite passable

[jhb171achill]

Re banana vans, very very few Irish wagons were ever in private owner liveries, unlike UK; and when repainting, remember to do the chassis too.brown wagons had, and have, brown chassis and (until very recently in the case of container flats only) brown bogies, grey wagons had grey chassis. The ubiquitous application of black as a chassis colour for wagons is a GB / BR thing, not UTA, NIR, or CIE.

[Glenderg]

Lol JHB, I think he's talking about the outline of the wagon, rather than having "O'Toole's Banana's" on the side. (Oh Matron!) The outline is somewhat similar, but I don't think there's a direct copy for what JHB might call the H Van. Steer clear or any with vent at the end though, I recall someone here, possibly JHB or Mayner, saying that ventilated vans didn't run here.

 

I have a load of old Weetabix, Ford, branded hornby vans with their logos removed, sprayed red and grey, with some CIE decals and plenty dirt and rust on them, and to my mind they look the part. After all, a wagon is a wagon, and provided the brake van and loco look the part, and there's a bullied open thrown in the middle of the consist, I doubt anyone would get upset. Or would they?

 

Welcome aboard John, nice to see more of the pre 80's era modellers here. Richie.

[David Holman]

Wagons!. The bane of my life John - as you will see if you sift through the site...

There is a book called 'Modelling Irish Railways', which gives some ideas, but the problem with Irish wagons is that there are very few, if any genuine equivalents from English ones. Eg opens in England tended to be 3, 5, or 7 plank; Irish are mainly 4 & 6 plank. Apart from the BR plywood vans, there is little that goes anywhere near Irish ones, but if you want to be more authentic, then scratchbuilding wagon bodies in plastikard is not difficult once you get started and there are plenty of chassis kits around that will ensure they then run properly. You could even do resin casting too. Check out some of my threads for ideas. Note, I work in 7mm scale though.

Historical info is also hard to come by. Seems few if any photographers took pics of actual wagons & one is forced to scan general photos of trains - especially if there is a goods yard in the background, to get an idea of what was running.

If you are happy to have generic stuff to give your locos stuff to pull, then a decent impression is possible, as you'll see from all the super pics on the site. However, if you are a wagon enthusiast, then beware!