Irish Railway Model Enthusiasts - facebook page

[Mike 84C]

If you look at posts on RmW and read in magazines its pretty obvious why 7mm/ 0 gauge is on the upswing.  Many modelers reach a certain age and failing eyesight plus manual dexterity means you cannot see those small parts let alone make or fit them.  Also we oldies look at 2mm/N and compare what you get for your £/Euro and the larger scale makes a lot of sense. We are more content with a smaller layout and maybe do not need the lots of trains whizzing around. And with oldies there is often the empty nest syndrome where kids are gone and space is available for a couple to indulge in the hobbies that they always wanted too. That's how it works in this house!

[Bumble_Bee]

31 minutes ago, Westcorkrailway said:

 

The attitude of myself coming into modeling is to start with anything RTR and work from there. My first irish model was the silver fox C class. From there i put silver fox railcars on order as there the 2 big RTR west cork models (unfortunately none of IRM or MM offerings ran on the west cork except for the BnT 141s which only ran in albert quay and aren't readily abailble pre owned and the  A class.....which ran all but twice!) Rolling stock is usually converted dapol wagons with flying snails slapped on the side and given a lick of paint! While silver fox offer flying snail cars 75 pounds a pop is a bit expensive. I only see myself buying one for railcar use. There is an RTR brakevan on the way if course which i look at licking my lips and those 3 wheel coaches.....they look like a decent conversion. Locos that need some converting like my other young west cork modeller include a j26 out of a j72 and a beautiful GSWR no. 34 out of a LNYR 2-4-2. 3D modeling has already given is number 90, i hope more models come abailble this way as its wayyy more accesable then conversions and kits

 

From the kits are abailble from SSM. Like the MGMR j26 and of course the bandon tank. (Which i have but haven't touched and probably wont for years.....and i made the mistake of not buying thre gearbox or wheels ect!) However none if us have nowhere near what is required yet to do brass kits, i have only soldered wires together as of now!

 

Can I also suggest using instagram? My West Cork Railway Colourised page uses both platforms and while Facebook one is more popular, more young people tend to use instagram. A few have tried and failed....the only way it could work is if that instagram page happens to have a stream of pictures if other layouts to post consitantly! (All credited to there respected owners of course) as groups dont really work on instagram. it would have to be a page

Great idea to try instagram, today i will be planning out proper milestones and aims, i wouldn't want to try too much to quickly and overburden myself but i for sure would try instagram at a future time maybe after getting a team together to run the page also. 

[Westcorkrailway]

22 minutes ago, Bumble_Bee said:

Great idea to try instagram, today i will be planning out proper milestones and aims, i wouldn't want to try too much to quickly and overburden myself but i for sure would try instagram at a future time maybe after getting a team together to run the page also. 

Its an idea, however the numbers it would gather would be minimal compared to facebook for example

 

IRM themseves have 271 followers on instagram compared to 2.2k on facebook

 

West Cork Railway Colourised Has 746 followers on instagram compared to 2.8k on facebook

 

And despite the fact that instagram is run by facebook. There are huge differences between the two. One of the most annoying things about instagram for myself is that you cannot individually caption photos, one caption fits all!

Edited March 13, 2021 by Westcorkrailway

[Bumble_Bee]

30 minutes ago, Westcorkrailway said:

Its an idea, however the numbers it would gather would be minimal compared to facebook for example

 

IRM themseves have 271 followers on instagram compared to 2.2k on facebook

 

West Cork Railway Colourised Has 746 followers on instagram compared to 2.8k on facebook

 

And despite the fact that instagram is run by facebook. There are huge differences between the two. One of the most annoying things about instagram for myself is that you cannot individually caption photos, one caption fits all!

Interesting! 

Certainly food for thought. 

Instagram's audience seems to prefer 'real life' topics rather than hobbies to be fair. 

For example i used to run a cosplay page and it was very difficult to gain a following compared to other things like my music account. 

Photography and history does do quite well though, so perhaps an idea would be to try an instagram account based on real irish rail history photos then link it back to the modelling another way. 

[Westcorkrailway]

5 minutes ago, Bumble_Bee said:

Interesting! 

Certainly food for thought. 

Instagram's audience seems to prefer 'real life' topics rather than hobbies to be fair. 

For example i used to run a cosplay page and it was very difficult to gain a following compared to other things like my music account. 

Photography and history does do quite well though, so perhaps an idea would be to try an instagram account based on real irish rail history photos then link it back to the modelling another way. 

So your suggesting a picture of the prototype in a place and then showing a picture of the model

 

What i will say is that it would work if you showed pictured of lines that dont exist so people interested in there local history would then want one!

Also i recomend making a group of people wanting to use it. Give them the login details and let various people work off the same account...but of course such a operation would have to be kept very private!

[Bumble_Bee]

1 hour ago, Westcorkrailway said:

So your suggesting a picture of the prototype in a place and then showing a picture of the model

 

What i will say is that it would work if you showed pictured of lines that dont exist so people interested in there local history would then want one!

Also i recomend making a group of people wanting to use it. Give them the login details and let various people work off the same account...but of course such a operation would have to be kept very private!

Yes, as an example, a post could be like:

'here is a historic picture of a CIE A-class loco trundling about its duties in the 1950s, this line doesnt exist anymore, but you can make your own' then have a historic pic of an A-class and then a pic of a model. 

 

[Ironroad]

As this discussion evolves, some ideas are emerging. But as alluded to by Mayner, it may be best if this endeavour is driven by a "collective" rather than one individual (no disrespect is intended here the initiative already taken is great).  Perhaps that collective could be formed through support from MM, IRM, the clubs and individuals willing devote time and effort? Any thoughts on this?

[Bumble_Bee]

27 minutes ago, Ironroad said:

As this discussion evolves, some ideas are emerging. But as alluded to by Mayner, it may be best if this endeavour is driven by a "collective" rather than one individual (no disrespect is intended here the initiative already taken is great).  Perhaps that collective could be formed through support from MM, IRM, the clubs and individuals willing devote time and effort? Any thoughts on this?

I agree, I would like it to be a collective project rather than a one person endevour. 

Today or tomorrow I will draft an outline of ideas/goals based on what I originally planned, plus what has been suggested and discussed in this thread. 

Following that, I can post another thread asking for volunteers etc to help out. 

I am however, in no immediate rush, so it may not be until next week (as I am returning to work this week  haha) 

[Westcorkrailway]

10 minutes ago, Bumble_Bee said:

I agree, I would like it to be a collective project rather than a one person endevour. 

Today or tomorrow I will draft an outline of ideas/goals based on what I originally planned, plus what has been suggested and discussed in this thread. 

Following that, I can post another thread asking for volunteers etc to help out. 

I am however, in no immediate rush, so it may not be until next week (as I am returning to work this week  haha) 

5th years go back to school on mondag🥲

I can help promote through my page, might be able to "volunteer" too

[DJ Dangerous]

How's the Facebook page coming along?

[DJ Dangerous]

On 11/4/2021 at 10:06 PM, DJ Dangerous said:

How's the Facebook page coming along?

...Or is it?

[Blaine]

The 'Modelling Irish Railways and collecting and selling and discussion and wishlisting and criticising and buses' page on Truth Social is getting popular now

[jimr]

On 13/3/2021 at 2:19 AM, murphaph said:

The Irish diaspora in North America especially seems like it might be a market for Irish railway stuff, particularly given the "GM connection". Something like ten times the population of Ireland consider themselves Irish American. Model railroading in North America is, I suspect even in percentage terms, far more popular a hobby than model railways are in Ireland.

If I was hoping to attract more people into our small corner of the hobby I'd be looking there. Bachmann clearly thought there was merit in the idea when it brought out that trainset for the US market.

I watch too many American "layout tour" videos for my own good. Often the guy has a basement empire of American prototype but up on the walls might have a collection of foreign stuff on display. Nobody needs to be convinced to go "all in" for it to make a difference.

So bumble Bee I humbly or should I say bumbly suggest that you use your FB page to target North America

I'm one of those long-time American railroad fans that have been converted to Irish railways. Started 12 years ago on my first trip to Ireland doing an all rail tour. That's when I got hooked. Bought my first Murphy Mark 3 coach before I left for home on that trip. Got back to the States to find out how much more difficult it is to find Irish railway products here. In recent years the Murphy products have been imported, but they're very pricey. I do admit I've splurged on a Murphy 121 and a 141 and a couple of Mark 3 coaches. But for the most part my rolling stock has been repainted lima, hornby, and some other manufactured products that are similar to the prototype Irish products. I'm at an advantage of not being too close to Ireland and that no one in America would know the difference, haha. Each of my successive three trips back to Ireland I picked up what I could find and manage to get home safely. I've even started some conversions for my fantasy railroad, "Irish Rail under wire", electric heavy traction. I had a couple of E60 CP shells that I repainted one in black and tan and the other in silver for freight logistics. I was able to find a hornby class 58 frame for each of them that fit pretty close, just a couple of slight modifications needed. I know it's not prototypical but it's close enough for me. 

So at the moment I'm trying to wrap up two older layouts and planning to sell those so I can concentrate on building a small Irish format layout.

Edited August 23 by jimr
Added photo

[murphaph]

Hey that's cool. Keep spreading the word!