Dugort Harbour

[jhb171achill]

464 and 90 yes, the latter in 1957 or 1958 I believe. Not sure about 201.

One of the more unusual ones to become black seems to have been T & D No. 6 on the C & L - likely the only narrow gauge loco CIE ever painted black. And there was the one Woolwich which having been green, became black in 1956 but with (uniquely) red lining, for the "Rosslare Express". No sooner was it released into traffic and diesels took over!

[Noel]

This layout is sublime. It transports me to another time before uniform rakes, before fitted goods trains, when shunting was the norm, and railway operations was an assault on the senses.

 

[jhb171achill]

1 hour ago, Noel said:

This layout is sublime. It transports me to another time before uniform rakes, before fitted goods trains, when shunting was the norm, and railway operations was an assault on the senses.

 

I'm hoping to get it moved along with extension soon - it's been far too long in the process....!

New "A" class locos will heighten the urgency!

[jhb171achill]

“We need to hold the train five minutes, Father Donnelly‘s on his way to bless the new diesel!”

”Ha - did ye tell him the driver’s a Protestant?”

[jhb171achill]

“Looks a good bit better than the dirty silver - only out of Inchicore on Tuesday….”

 

.

 

 

 

”Damn Crossleys - Damn thing’s not only broken down again, it’s off the road too, and the beet empties are supposed to be coming in this afternoon!”

 

[jhb171achill]

“I’m sorry, Mrs White, there’s no parcel for you tonight…. It might come down tomorrow, so it might”….

 

.

 

 

“First of the transplants in here! I hope they’re going to be better than the Crossleys! This very heap sat down on me in Cork tunnel three years ago….”

 

[jhb171achill]

“OK, ye change at the junction onto the Dublin train, and get off at Mallow. You’ve a twenty minute wait there for the Rosslare train. You get that one for  Lismore….”

 

.

 

 

B141 hurries the midday local train along the Dugort Harbour branch on a dull afternoon in October 1966….

 

[JasonB]

8 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

“I’m sorry, Mrs White, there’s no parcel for you tonight…. It might come down tomorrow, so it might”….

 

That livery is way outside my era of interest, but I have to admit there's something very attractive about it. 

[Westcorkrailway]

1 hour ago, JasonB said:

That livery is way outside my era of interest, but I have to admit there's something very attractive about it. 

Am I wierd for thinking of this livery 

every time I see this livery

[jhb171achill]

3 hours ago, JasonB said:

That livery is way outside my era of interest, but I have to admit there's something very attractive about it. 

It’s pretty much at the limit of mine, as it’s more of a late sixties thing. My own interests needed steam and diesel, so liveries primarily of the mid-fifties to mid-sixties are appropriate, but I agree there’s something about it. 

I’d be using this one and the “low tan band” when operating in a “later” period, with green carriages put away….

[DB JOE]

wonderfull shots there!!!!!  

 

[jhb171achill]

Not my layout, but at a friend’s house this afternoon:

[Sean Hogan]

Great shots Jonathan 

[JasonB]

8 hours ago, Westcorkrailway said:

Am I wierd for thinking of this livery 

every time I see this livery

Yes, both are quite similar in a way. One overall colour, with the yellow panel standing out. 

[jhb171achill]

1 minute ago, JasonB said:

Yes, both are quite similar in a way. One overall colour, with the yellow panel standing out. 

I hadn't actually thought of that until I saw the pics.

The all-black livery for these locos wouldn't have been the most visible thing in poor light, especially in pre-halogen-headlamp days.

And the all-grey is simply a regurgitation of the utilitarian equivalent into which almost all steam engines were painted from late GSWR days onwards......

[jhb171achill]

Aerial view of Dugort Harbour tonight, with tomorrow morning’s mixed ready to go; an extra coach on market day.

 

                    …………

CIE have agreed to present No. 800 “Maedb” to the Belfast Transport Museum. It was stored briefly at Thurles prior to going north, but who knew it also spent a short time at Dugort Harbour? The guy whose idea it was to send it down here was committed to the Home for the Bewildered after it hit its second bridge and came off the road for the seventh time. Here, watched by locals, railwaymen, rubber-neckers and gricers alike, it is shunted down to the loco road.

 

[GNRi1959]

I've just scrolled through some amazing pics of your layout JB and it is inspiring, well done.

[David Holman]

Great fun, as ever and a splendid model too.

[Westcorkrailway]

13 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

Aerial view of Dugort Harbour tonight, with tomorrow morning’s mixed ready to go; an extra coach on market day.

 

                    …………

CIE have agreed to present No. 800 “Maedb” to the Belfast Transport Museum. It was stored briefly at Thurles prior to going north, but who knew it also spent a short time at Dugort Harbour? The guy whose idea it was to send it down here was committed to the Home for the Bewildered after it hit its second bridge and came off the road for the seventh time. Here, watched by locals, railwaymen, rubber-neckers and gricers alike, it is shunted down to the loco road.

 

Fantastic model, ids say hauling it down the Dugort line did some damage, but with all the rumours of closure to the line, it’s as if the lads from kingbridge don’t Care!

Edited November 17, 2021 by Westcorkrailway

[StevieB]

Maedb looks fine out in the wilds.

Stephen

[Garfield]

12 hours ago, jhb171achill said:

Aerial view of Dugort Harbour tonight, with tomorrow morning’s mixed ready to go; an extra coach on market day.

 

                    …………

CIE have agreed to present No. 800 “Maedb” to the Belfast Transport Museum. It was stored briefly at Thurles prior to going north, but who knew it also spent a short time at Dugort Harbour? The guy whose idea it was to send it down here was committed to the Home for the Bewildered after it hit its second bridge and came off the road for the seventh time. Here, watched by locals, railwaymen, rubber-neckers and gricers alike, it is shunted down to the loco road.

 

To this day, the residents of Dugort swear that the ghosts of the permanent way gangers can still be heard muttering about the damage 'Maedb' caused on the branch...

[DiveController]

Holy Moly that's a proper, Irish loco. Fantastic in the green livery, great change from the grey-black locos and the GSRs answer to the lovely blue of the GNR. Fantastic raised logos and all.

Edited November 21, 2021 by DiveController

[jhb171achill]

It's 1961, and the branch "C" class has failed (again). Well, C202 failed the week before, C221 the week before that, and C230 the week before that. The normal branch loco, a J15, is off on beet duties, being late November an'all, while the other J15 is having its boiler washout.

So the branch mixed has superpower today - just out of Inchicore since being repainted out of the filthy silver, but before Mr. Crossley's contraption covers its new green paint with a layer of sludge.

 

There's a fitter on the way to fix the front handrail.

 

[JasonB]

I've probably said it before, that this layout is way outside my era of interest. But I just can't help liking it. Brilliant as always. 

[jhb171achill]

Also in 1961, a local mill has entered into a contract with Brookhall Mill, near Lisburn. This will involve regular transfers of rolls of linen between the two. Brookhall's linen is among the finest in the world, and here in Dugort the local textile factory is making high end Irish Linen tablecloths and tourist goods for sale in Blarney castle, Parknasilla Hotel and tourist shops in Killarney. Here, we see the first three vans received from Lisburn being shunted into the goods platform. As one might expect, a mix of one CIE "H" van and two ex-GNR vans, hauled by a UTA "Jeep" to Dundalk, A12 to Dublin, B105 to Cork, and A42 to Dugort harbour.  

3 minutes ago, JasonB said:

I've probably said it before, that this layout is way outside my era of interest. But I just can't help liking it. Brilliant as always. 

It's just a shunting layout at the moment, but with the assistance of some good cronies, it will be hopefully extended in the new year.

Edited November 28, 2021 by jhb171achill

[Westcorkrailway]

1 hour ago, jhb171achill said:

It's 1961, and the branch "C" class has failed (again). Well, C202 failed the week before, C221 the week before that, and C230 the week before that. The normal branch loco, a J15, is off on beet duties, being late November an'all, while the other J15 is having its boiler washout.

So the branch mixed has superpower today - just out of Inchicore since being repainted out of the filthy silver, but before Mr. Crossley's contraption covers its new green paint with a layer of sludge.

 

There's a fitter on the way to fix the front handrail.

 

God those American locos on order can’t be much worse then this lot. 

[jhb171achill]

6 minutes ago, Westcorkrailway said:

God those American locos on order can’t be much worse then this lot. 

Can’t see them buying American ones. Sure it would cost a fortune to ship them here, and they’d be too heavy for a ship anyway….

[Galteemore]

And don’t they drive on the wrong side of the road over there ?

[jhb171achill]

1 hour ago, Galteemore said:

And don’t they drive on the wrong side of the road over there ?

Yes!! I told ye - they won’t order American ones…..

[Adrian]

Just caught up, love the layout

[jhb171achill]

The next stage with Dugort Harbour is to actually connect it to something, as it is only a shunting layout now.

It was delivered and installed, but is the wrong height as the extension has to be somewhat higher to clear two small attic access doors. It will shortly be raised to the level of the already-installed "high level" boards which will form its extension.

The concept of the original layout, as may be guessed from the pictures, is of a forlorn backwater on CIE somewhere in West Kerry or Cork, sometime between 1955 and 1965. This allows steam and diesel, elderly six-wheeled passenger stock and brand-new modern laminates and (post-1963) Cravens; and silver, green and black'n'tan liveries as well as the grey and yellow of the B121s, as befits a period with probably a greater variety of everything than at any time before or since.

It was based on a place which was an extension to a secondary line to a somewhat larger place, like what Killala was to Ballina, Westport Quay to Westport, Cahirciveen to Valentia Harbour, or Skibbereen to Baltimore.

My initial favoured fictitious location was somewhere in the west, but there were not even kits, let alone RTR models, of MGWR-type stock, especially six-wheelers - but there WERE GSWR ones; so south-west it had to be. Add to that 00 Work's excellent J15s - you'd never have got them in west Mayo.

So, this imaginary Dugort Harbour will be the terminus of a line of some 4 or 5 miles from Castletown West, a town probably the same sort of size as Newcastle West, Bandon, or Listowel. The trackplan at Castletown West is more or less the same as that at Newport, Co Mayo, except that room shape dictates that it's partly on a curve.

Beyond Castletown West, the line disappears round a corner and beyond a scenic break to end in a fiddle yard. The imaginary line branches west from somewhere about Blarney (main line), or a point maybe halfway between Cork and Mallow, and meanders west, tracing a route roughly between the Muskerry narrow gauge and the Macroom branch to the south, and the South Kerry line to the north, ending up at the coast somewhere between Kenmare and Bantry.

This allows for the sort of train service pattern as seen on the North Kerry or Albert Quay - Bantry, or Mallow - Waterford. Two passenger trains a day each way between Castletown West and Cork, with connecting branch services. I want the whole thing to look as realistic as possible, rather than have seven 15-coach expresses charging round the room (though I do see the attraction in that too, as a separate issue). This, being Ireland, means that less is more - but it also means that considerable operational variety can be had.

Firstly, places like this in real life tended to have a one or two coach train with goods vans and gawd knows what tagged onto the end. The odd cattle truck, a second tin van if there was a lot of mail or parcels, and the like. However, market day or a cattle fair day, plus GAA, pilgrimage, summer excursions and beet resulted in huge traffic and congestion on certain days only. Much scope for operational interest there - but with the "normal" trains being two to three bogie vehicles in length, but good-sized goods sidings, the design favours the reality of what sort of operations would have taken place.

Secondly, with but two stations - one a terminus from a long secondary line, the other a sleepy branch extension of that - there needs to be something else going on to maintain interest. Thus, the section from Castletown West functions as a comparatively busy country town terminus, with all the shunting and goods mentioned above, and a locally based main line set as well as a Cork-based one; each making one return trip a day, with an extra in summer. These bumble back and forth to the fiddle yard. Also, a pilot engine is based here, as there is a fictitious flour mill a little east of Castletown; this allows for short goods trip workings from here straight into the fiddle yard too. The branch operates with its own passenger set and loco, so you've a main line train connecting with a branch one; two operations on an end-to-end layout with but two stations and a fiddle yard.

That's the best I could do with available space.

Track marked out tonight as shown, with markings for wiring to follow, then with the assistance of several friends, we will raise Dugort Harbour to the same level as the rest.

And then, hopefully, the activity which results will distract me from scribbling books for the winter months!

 

[jhb171achill]

Yes, yes, I know - SERIOUS overkill. A 1961 working timetable….

I’ll draw the line at beet circulars, though…..

I’ll shut the door behind me.....!
 

Edited December 10, 2021 by jhb171achill

[Mayner]

28 minutes ago, jhb171achill said:

Yes, yes, I know - SERIOUS overkill. A 1961 working timetable….

I’ll draw the line at beet circulars, though…..

I’ll shut the door behind me.....!
 

Better bring this to Todd Andrew's (CIE Chairman) attention and nip this extravagance and waste in the bud.

Obviously Dugort and Castletown West fell out of the folder with the West Cork and Kenmare line closures before it reached the Chairman's desk or a marginal Government seat in the Dail.

[jhb171achill]

1 hour ago, Mayner said:

Better bring this to Todd Andrew's (CIE Chairman) attention and nip this extravagance and waste in the bud.

Obviously Dugort and Castletown West fell out of the folder with the West Cork and Kenmare line closures before it reached the Chairman's desk or a marginal Government seat in the Dail.

I understand that there was a brown envelope involved, and someone with connections had a word with an influential local publican......

[Fiacra]

On 17/11/2021 at 5:27 AM, jhb171achill said:

 

Many years ago, I had a go at converting a Royal Scot to Maedb, but it didn't turn out anywhere near as good as this. Stunning job!