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IRM A Class; Our First Locomotive!

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Warbonnet

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1 hour ago, Warbonnet said:

Not sure why Noel, website is performing like a champ here! 

It's fine again now and the thumb nails are appearing. It was almost seemed like some sort of JS/Ajax interaction issue. All good now.

Great to see the superb selection of liveries. Love the stepped band Black'n'Tan on A23R.  Would have loved another stepped band on one of the other two B&Ts A15 or A39r, but quite content. :)  Not looking for opening doors or working windscreen wipers! :)  Happy days ahead next Christmas when some of these beauts will be making their inaugural run on the layout, retiring some hard worked 071s.

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I have to admit I'm seriously tempted to bang a deposit down on another couple of these beauties. God knows how I'm going to explain myself when she finally wants to see this "holiday home" that I've been investing my money in. Strangely enough, not long after IRM appeared on the scene. 

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30 minutes ago, Sails said:

Would anyone be able to put an approx date range to each livery in use? Mid 70s - Early 80s would do.

 

Mark

Silver: inception to early 1960s (last repainted out of it).

Light (carriage) green: on carriages after 1956, extended to these locomotives plus C class from about 1959 onwards, due to poor weathering of the silver.

Dark green: short lived and applied to only a few A class (and no C class); early 60s only.

Black with high tan and no “R” after the number: 1963/4 repaints from green or silver. So in 1959-64 or so, green running alongside (VERY filthy!) silver.

All black: 1965-68 repaints. Ran alongside green until last green repainted. From about 1965 yellow panels were added at the front of some but not all of the class. Same story with the Cs.

Black with high tan band WITH “R” after the number, and also black with low tan band:  introduced after each loco had its re-engining completed 1969-71 or so. About 12-15 had the high tan band, mainly those treated first, most having low band. 

“Supertrain” livery: CIE logos on ends only, no white lines: 1972-87.

Same mostly orange livery with IR “set of points” logo and NO white lines: this was not an official “livery” as such - it was a quick way of “modernisation” by putting a new IR logo on the CIE “supertrain” livery. Locos of A, 141 & 181 types temporarily bore this variation pending a full repaint in the lE livery WITH white lines. So, 1987-1990 or so.

”Tippex” livery - nickname given to IE livery as, for cost-cutting reasons, instead of introducing a complete new livery, IE just amended the CIE livery by adding white lines! This was applied from 1987 onwards, when CIE was split into operating subsidiaries.

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4 minutes ago, jhb171achill said:

Silver: inception to early 1960s (last repainted out of it).

Light (carriage) green: on carriages after 1956, extended to these locomotives plus C class from about 1959 onwards, due to poor weathering of the silver.

 

Excellent, thank you so much.

 

Mark

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On 1/19/2019 at 2:19 PM, Sails said:

Regarding the sound projects mentioned before, will they be also using the new ESU decoder the Deltic is getting?

That’s the plan! We will have more info about n the whole sound area for the A after the Nuremberg Toy Fair in Feb all going well.

On 1/19/2019 at 1:37 PM, BosKonay said:

Now you just need to convince the other three lads!!!! I’m sold!

50% of us, so half way there! 😂

if only it ran like that, even once! 

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  • 4 weeks later...
2 hours ago, iarnrod said:

When did the CAWS and toughened windscreens get fitted to the locos?

CAWS was introduced in 1984. The locos were fitted with the toughened windscreens during the late 1970s and all locos appear to have received them by the time the CAWS equipment was added...

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2 hours ago, Garfield said:

CAWS was introduced in 1984. The locos were fitted with the toughened windscreens during the late 1970s and all locos appear to have received them by the time the CAWS equipment was added...

Thanks. So looks like definitely two locos on my shopping list, but will be multiples of each for renumbering.

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I think it was simply a case of modern safety glass adding a wee bit of added protection for the crew (i.e. the glass would shatter as opposed to breaking unpredictably, possibly into dagger-like shards). The toughened panes were slightly smaller so required extra sealing.

For comparison...

Original: 

Freight at Bray

 

 

Toughened:

CIE 002 Cork

 

The first photo may be making a liar out of me, as the loco has the original windows while fitted with CAWS, although the date listed in the caption is 1982, in which case CAWS didnt go ‘live’ for another two years (it’s not carrying the ‘S’ suffix to indicate CAWS is fitted, however, despite the antennae being fitted). Maybe 025 was fitted with a flux capacitor...

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Hi Robert,

Do you mean on the A class?

Chinese New Year has been essentially ongoing the last two weeks, and the factories are only coming back online at the moment. It will be another week or so before they are back up to speed as workers return from 'up country'.

The Plough is in the final assembly phase, and the 42' project and A class are in the toolroom however. Updates as we have them!

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theres a lot of comments on this topic, about hiding the postal arrival of the A's from your partner ,

Had IRM made the A's in just one livery. it would be easy, 

but with so many choices, and so many committed to buying more than one loco at a time

IRM should post them one at a time every two weeks.

its the only way,

and modellers can say on arrival that they are shoes... as in shoes in boxes,

and as  you 'mail ordered them' you were entitled to return them, as each time the colour was wrong..

your partner will fully understand.

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On 2/15/2019 at 1:46 PM, Garfield said:

Toughened:

CIE 002 Cork

 

The first photo may be making a liar out of me, as the loco has the original windows while fitted with CAWS, although the date listed in the caption is 1982, in which case CAWS didnt go ‘live’ for another two years (it’s not carrying the ‘S’ suffix to indicate CAWS is fitted, however, despite the antennae being fitted). Maybe 025 was fitted with a flux capacitor...

how exactly does a loco end up looking like that? is it just the black peeling off?

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8 hours ago, WRENNEIRE said:

Fed up waiting for the A so "a friend" knocked this one up for me, 7mm

 

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Springs made from screws cut in half, very clever.

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40 parts in the bogies alone!!!

Wow looks fabulous. An O gauge A class. Doesn’t get better than that. Hope they do a nice (matt/satin finish) airbrush paint job on it for you. And not a gloss sheep dip :) What livery will she be? Your ‘friend’ has done a great job capturing the unique and difficult shape of the cab profile. 

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  • 1 month later...

Hi everyone,

Here is sneak peek at the design for the internals of the the A. Here you can see the heavy chassis block, large central can motor with twin fly wheels and circuit board. This work has been approved and tooling of the chassis components is well under way!

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Exciting times I'm sure you will agree!

Cheers!

Fran

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