One for the Bog

Saturday saw a rules and signals mutual improvement class led by Steve, who was keen to show off the whizzy new PowerPoint presentation training material that he had created.  The graphics which were not infrequently interspersed with American style steam locos trundling along a track and crashing into each other with a rather satisfying boom, were nonetheless a very useful refresher session. 

The concreting of road 6 is now well under way, another pour in the 4' having taken place during the course of the week.  John sent me the following photos of a fair team of people (Ade, Clive, John, Martin, Alex, Jamie, 2 x Chris's and of course Tim & Neal) at work on Friday.  The next two photos courtesy of John Cruxon.

A deceptive perspective, really about two thirds done from the far end

Finishing off levelling the concrete

Tim & Neal were the only people in evidence working on it on Saturday though, removing the shuttering.

Tim(l) & Neal.

 It's hard to tell from this angle, however the extent of the concrete on road 6, now extends about two thirds of the way down the length of the shed.

The end is in sight.

A week or two ago,  I reported on the fact that the rather deformed ash pan on 35006 was being worked on. The bowed section has now been replaced with what is hoped to be a sturdier section of steel.

A fine looking job

 Perhaps a little less glamorous, but no less important, John and Dave were busying themselves on Saturday with draining water contaminated oil out of the axle boxes.

John, draining oil.

 The Dinmore Manor group had a fair presence on site on Saturday, needle gunning and priming 3850's boiler being a priority, as that needs to be completed before the full Non-Destructive Testing of the boiler can take place.

David (l) & Keith, busy with needle guns.

 Once the needle gunning and wire brushing had been done, they added a coat of heat resistant, rust inhibiting primer.  When they paused for a tea break, the side of the boiler looked rather like a slice of Battenburg cake, uncharacteristically, I resisted the temptation to try a piece.

Not one of the "Exceedingly Good" cakes.

 Tea break finished, David & Keith finished priming the sections that they had completed.

It's getting there.

 By the end of ten years of faithful service, a steam loco will have collected a fair accumulation of grime, as well as a bit of rust. That will of course all need to be removed one way or another before renovation can begin.

Nigel wire brushing a cylinder cover

 Cylinder covers are remarkably heavy items, requiring a few people people to manhandle them back into the container after they had been cleaned.

A little more work on 3850's motion has taken place, with the lifting links now removed, cleaned and placed into storage.

The cleaning bath had two right hand gloves, but no left one... Doh!

Lifting links in the container.

Meanwhile, an item that had yet to be done for Dinmore Manor's new tender was the guard irons, Kenneth was in the Dinmore Manor container treating them to some grey undercoat. 

Kenneth painting the guard irons.

As you may be aware, 2807 has been away for a spell at the North Yorkshire Moors Railway, appearing in their recent gala.  Unfortunately during that time, one of her tubes started to leak.  The tube in question was sealed at both ends and she was able to continue in service.  Now that she has returned to Toddington, we needed to establish if the problem was just a single manufacturing defect in one tube, or if it was an issue that affected all of them.  The answer lay in removing the failing tube and examining it.

2807's smoke box.

Unfortunately, the leaking tube was at the top of the boiler and concealed behind the superheaters, giving very limited access.  Without removing the superheater elements & header, the tube was only going to come out in small pieces, which is what happened, Phil pushing the tube from the firebox end, Ian cutting it off in 6" sections as it appeared in the smoke box:

The first section to emerge...

...in fact it was the first of many.

Finally, the failing section of the tube was located, the hole the size of a pin prick was found in the indented area towards the left hand side.

It may not have been big, but with 225 PSI behind it...

This is excellent news, apart from the one small pin prick of a hole, the rest of the tube was in excellent fettle, with plenty of good solid metal left in it.  Had the problem been due to the tube having worn thin, then it would have indicated that the rest of the tubes were probably nearly life-expired, which in turn would have necessitated a full re-tube. As things stand, it looks like it will just require the replacement of the one tube.  

I received the final picture from Phil, of him and Ian having successfully removed the offending tube, an unfortunate typo on his part in the accompanying text said "One for the bog".  I hope that he meant "One for the blog".

Phil (l) & Ian