I suspect that most of us, when handling peat (or nowadays one of its more enviromentally-friendly alternatives) would think in terms of one or two plastic bags, just too heavy and just too floppy to carry easily. However for one company, Bord na Mona of Ireland, the scale of operations is exceedingly large. They extract peat from bogs deep in the Irish countryside, mill it on-site to a consistency similar to that found in said heavy, floppy bags, and transport it in large narrow-gauge wagons to several power stations, where it is burnt for electricity generation. Many miles of temporary track are laid, and frequently relaid, to carry the peat trains, hauled by numerous small diesel-hydraulic locomotives.

 

Until 2008 it was possible to tour some of the operations on the ‘Bog Train’ or the Clanmacnoise & West Offaly Railway as it was officially known. However its closure did not stop SMRS members from visiting the area twice, in 2009 and 2013. On both occasions we wandered in to the Lough Ree power station at Lanesborough, where we were welcomed as if we weren’t uninvited tourists just wanting to photograph their trains. For those seeking more there are books, but this is a tale of two 16mm models, one a peat locomotive and the other a peat wagon.

 

The loco is a perfect gem, scratchbuilt in plasticard on a Swift Sixteen chassis by Mark Haydock, a member of the Merseyside and West Lancs 16mm group. Not only is it an accurate and highly detailed scale model, but Mark also painted and weathered it to look exactly like those we saw operating. It runs off a 9v PP3 battery, and is fitted with Timpdon radio control. I acquired it a couple of years ago when Mark was selling much of his garden railway stock, a misfortune which can happen to any of us. But I would have kept the loco, and put it behind glass as a shelf queen!

 

Now a model of that stature requires something decent to pull, preferably wagons that bear some resemblance to the prototype. That thought was carefully recorded on the List Of Things That Really Ought To Be Done Sometime. However without a numbered ticket for the Queue of Things That May Actually Get Done, progress was inevitably limited. Eventually a re-wheeling operation on a wagon left me with a pair of small bogies, identical apart from one being metal and the other plastic, for reasons unknown. These could perhaps form the basis for a peat wagon. The prototypes are made of aluminium, for lightness when being tipped 180 degrees, with steel angle reinforcement. Relatively simple, I thought to model this with plasticard and styrene strip. After a good deal of fiddling about with ruler and calculator, I came up with estimates for the dimensions and quantities involved, and with a little help from Messrs eBay the styrene angle was acquired, in two sizes. The plasticard I already had, in the form of a sheet of alleged bath surround acrylic, donated by a patternmaker of my acquaintance, but that’s another story.

 

For once reality matched the expectation, and building a box from angle turned out to be fairly straightforward, although I rapidly learned the benefits of accurate measurement and cutting, not to mention prolific use of an engineer’s square. The floor was a sheet of thin steel, retrieved from Baker’s Tray No.4 (Metal Bits) - Not To Be Thrown Away. A pair of holes were drilled for the bogie fixings, and the acrylic sides and ends solvent-welded in place. The smaller angle strip was cut to length and fitted as per prototype photos acquired on location, a pair of spare couplings added, and the wagon was essentially complete.

 

After painting with acrylics I wondered about the load. A wagon full of peat was a mass spillage waiting to happen, so I made a dummy floor from more plastic sheet and installed it about half an inch below the top of the sides. Dried and sieved peat substitute was glued on top, and when all was dry it looked quite convincing. A test run behind the loco was satisfactory, and the overall effect very pleasing. More wagons are clearly needed, but that’s for another day, or possibly year.

 

For the record, the prototype modelled is a 1964 Hunslet loco No. LM226, allocated to the Mountdillon works. The model is named after the local power station (or perhaps after the lake after which the power station is named). Bord na Mona is winding down its peat-for-power operations, for both commercial and environmental reasons, so the future of its rail operations and rolling stock is in doubt. One would hope that at least something gets preserved.

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