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The Bleach Green Project


colmflanagan

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  • 4 months later...

Hello all,

 

just a heads up for those of you who may live within travelling distance of Bangor (NI!), we are planning to take Bleach Green to the First Bangor Model Railway Exhibition on Friday 24 May from 7 -10pm and 25th from 10-5 pm.  The show will be in the church halls on Main Street, onlya  few minutes walk from the railway and bus station.

 

No significant changes except for one lineside building which is being demolished and rebuilt...

 

Colm

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  • 7 months later...
  • 4 months later...

Hello All,

 

just an update, as Bleach Green has now been in storage for nearly a year!   We plan to take it out, dust it down (and sort a few technical issues) and it will DV be at the First Bangor Show on 23/4 May. Still the same basic UTA/early NIR period.

 

I'd personally like to see a few NIR "Enterprise" sets on it but we only have one NIR set (blue MM 112 + Lima NIR "intercity" coaches.)  So if anyone has an Enterprise in other liveries (GNR/UTA blue & white, CIE/IR/IE, NIR 70s/80s and enterprise post 1997, we'd love to see it & roster it for a spin..

 

Colm..

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Hello All,

 

just an update, as Bleach Green has now been in storage for nearly a year!   We plan to take it out, dust it down (and sort a few technical issues) and it will DV be at the First Bangor Show on 23/4 May. Still the same basic UTA/early NIR period.

 

I'd personally like to see a few NIR "Enterprise" sets on it but we only have one NIR set (blue MM 112 + Lima NIR "intercity" coaches.)  So if anyone has an Enterprise in other liveries (GNR/UTA blue & white, CIE/IR/IE, NIR 70s/80s and enterprise post 1997, we'd love to see it & roster it for a spin..

 

Colm..

Sorry that I haven't managed to get the spoil wagon kit ready in time for you to build a rake for your next outing, but the pre-production prototype is promised for Bangor, Special Delivery permitting!

 

Leslie

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  • 1 month later...

Hello all,


 


We are planning to take Bleach Green to the First Bangor Model Railway Exhibition on Friday 23 May from 7 - 9.30 and  Saturday 24th from 10-5 pm.  The show will be as usual  in the church halls on Main Street, only a  few minutes walk from the railway and bus station.


 


Colm


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And a "heads up\" for anyone interested - later this year Bleach Green will cross the North Channel and will be at the East Lancashire show in Blackburn on 6-7 September, then it will be out again (with a 10 wagon (maybe more) spoil train running DV!) at the Cultra Model Railway day on 8 November.  

 

Colm

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A few shots from my archive from angles the public can't get normally....

 

An operator's view (if they are standing on tiptoe anyway...)

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We don;t really like people standing in the middle of the track.....

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And you would need to be very flexible to get this shot.

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Oh yes and this year's little puzzle. On the layout are two little foxes - if you're a visitor at any of the shows, see if you can find them. (There are two on KIllagan as well) - It's a bit like Terence Cuneo's mouse ( older enthusiasts may know about this)

 

Colm

 

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  • 2 weeks later...

I took the opportunity of our setting things up at early at Bangor last weekend to have a photo shoot. Then, having a bit of downtime, I thought I'd fiddle in photoshop with some of the ones I liked best.  Here are the results, some angles aren't really  feasible without having unimpeded access to the whole layout - and making full use of tripods and timer settings. But it takes some of us back to the days when the viaduct really did stand out in the countryside. Our model is probably "cleaner" than the real one was in the sixties and maybe some day there'll be an equally pristine  "North Atlantic" in LMS crimson lake to pose on it... 

 

 

 

 2-6-4 tank WT 55 comes off the viaduct as a V1 goods engine No 13 approaches it

 

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Class W 2-6-0 No 97 storms down Bleach Green with a late running express. 

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55 again, heading for Portrush; this picture was inspired by a picture by Derek Young in the book "UTA in Colour" In the sixties the open fields gave a great view.

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It's 1966 and the new Diesel Electric railcars are entering service. A six car set heads for Londonderry Waterside station.

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A main line express passes over a Larne train

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Looking upwards as a UTA Multi Purpose Diesel train races towards Belfast on the last few miles of it's 93 mile journey to York Road Station, as skies begin to clear overhead.

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  • 3 months later...

The group took Bleach Green over to the Blackburn & East Lancs Model railway society last weekend - a long journey but a good show; the size of the layout and the scope of the scenic panorama scored highly with those who saw it, as did the fact that we were able to run long trains at relatively high speed (observing the appropriate speed limits of course...). The hero of the show was 0-4-0T No 16 "The Donkey", a dock shunter built in 1914, which took over when Jinty 0-6-0 No19 failed. This little  engine pulled a train of hoppers down the Line line without a glitch, all day.  Bowman Malcolm (chief engineer of the BNCR )would have been astounded. A Hornby "Caledonian Pug" provided the basis of the conversion. As a result of the engines performance I have decided to finally order a pair of number plates for her!  I apologize for the poor picture quality of this shot. 

 

The next outing will be at the Model Railway day at Cultra in November (Saturday 8th) - and there should be a "first" at this show - we hope to have a 10 wagon (at least) spoil train by then, thanks to our friend Leslie McAllister; the first batch of wagons are on their way to us.

 

A few more pics from Blackburn -including the operator team - I think we had the youngest operator there!  Proof that railway modelling is not just for sad men over 60...

 

 

 

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Hi folks,

 

Just thought I'd post a few pics of Bleach Green taken at the Blackburn & East Lancs show last weekend...

 

The first one is an overall view of the layout with a couple of very suspicious looking gentlemen in charge...

 

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It really is an excellent scenic layout with a difference and fun to operate too. Many thanks to Colm too for the invite to join the crack operating team for the weekend. At least that's what I think it was called.  :jester:

 

Cheers

Dave

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  • 1 month later...

Bleach Green will be at the Model Railway Day this Saturday (10-5 on 8th Nov; standard museum entry fee); as this is it's second visit to this venue we hope to have some "visiting stock" running at intervals - but I'm not telling what it/they might be!

 

I can confirm though that we will have a Spoil Train - the first time such a train has ever appeared at a public exhibition; we hope to have a double headed 20 wagon train,a  formation which ran in the 1960's as a result of the M2 motorway project and which gave steam in Northern Ireland the distinction of being the last main line steam in the UK.

 

Colm

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