Please do not Climb on this Exhibit

More photos and information have arrived in my in-tray regarding the day on visiting loco 70013, Oliver Cromwell and our recently retired driver, Jeff.  Ben had arranged the day, Steve made the gauge frame spanner, and Neal had it mounted.

(L-r), Ben, Jeff and Steve in front of Oliver Cromwell  (photo courtesy of Jack Boskett)

 Jeff you may recollect was a driver based at Cardiff Canton in steam days and often worked on Britannia class locos from there.  A "Red Dragon" headboard and GWR lamps completed the BR(W) theme, although 70013 itself was never based at Cardiff.

Jeff in the driver's seat. (photo courtesy of Jack Boskett)

A "Thank you" card from Jeff in the mess coach after the event.

The gala is now well and truly over and scenes such as this...

(L-r) Ade, Gwendolyne & Ed) on USATC S160, 5197 (photo courtesy of Neil Carr)

...have been replaced by this:

5197's tender about to depart... (photo courtesy of Peter Gutteridge)

... and the loco awaiting its turn to go.  (photo courtesy of Peter Gutteridge)

Pannier tank, 6430 being moved onto the unloading road, ready to go.

The only one of our visiting locos with any more running days scheduled on the GWSR now is King class, 6023, King Edward II, which is running on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday & Sunday.

Friday was a silver footplate experience day, your humble scribe was drafted in at short notice to cover the fireman's duties.  For only the second time ever, 35006 was the loco in steam.  As coincidence would have it, Steve (driver) and myself had been the crew on that previous occasion as well.

35006 on the stock and ready for action

 The timetable has been revamped for the 2018 season, and involves a run down to Cheltenham Race Course, then up to Broadway, then shuttling back and forth between Broadway and WInchcombe, before finally ending up at Toddington.  The first two people on the footplate turned out to be a father and son pairing

Keeping it in the family

 I won't bore you with the details of the day, all the participants appeared to enjoy firing and driving 35006 as you might have expected. There were a few departures from the usual run of the mill day however. The first was that under a relatively recent operating notice, there is a white flashing light at the base of the bracket signal at the south end of Gotherington loop.  The white flashing light is there to confirm that the facing point lock (FPL) is in place, guaranteeing that the points are correctly secured on occasions where the signal box is switched out.  We were operating under a single line staff with a travelling signalman and of course under these conditions we would have expected to see the white flashing light confirming that all was OK.  You've already guessed it, the white light didn't flash as we approached and we had to come to a stop.

We had the signal, but not the flashing light

 There is a procedure involving checking and clipping points to go through at this juncture, however Steve rang Neil, the Operations Manager who established that in the course of some routine maintenance work, somebody had switched the box back in, thereby disabling the white flashing light. With the box switched back out and the white light flashing as required, we were once again able to proceed.  A sheepish looking signalman apologised as we eventually passed the signal box.  With breaches of the operating notice's procedure being treated as a SPAD, you can see why it is important to check signals even in places where you expect them to be set in your favour.

Another out of the usual incident was that one of the participants lost his hat overboard in the vicinity of Hayles.  On the return journey, we stopped and recovered it for him, he was delighted to get it back.  

Stopped for the lost hat

 Something else that I hadn't been expecting, but should of done if I had given it any thought is that the Broadway station team no longer work on Wednesdays, but now continue their labours on Fridays instead as for most of the year we don't run trains on Fridays.  This was of course a Friday, so on the approach to the station, we encountered a number of their volunteers continuing their excellent work.

Broadway building project continuing on platform 2

On Saturday evening, I was back again to enjoy the "Cheltenham Fryer" fish and chip train on the cushions.  There are plenty more fish and chip trains throughout the remainder of the 2018 season, however I'm afraid that none of them will be hauled by 70013, Oliver Cromwell as Saturday Night's was.

Oliver Cromwell ready for the "Cheltenham Fryer"

Eleanor had 70013's fire ready, but didn't cook the fish and chips on it

At Cheltenham as the fish and chips was delivered

 You may have noticed that in the last blog post about the gala, I said surprisingly little about 6023, King Edward II.  The reason for that, was that I wasn't rostered on it over the gala period, however I was rostered on it on Sunday.  I have been like a kid at Christmas ever since the turn came up on our online rostering system (some weeks ago now) and have been not so patiently counting down the days until Sunday arrived.  Before anybody says it, yes, it's a privilege to operate any steam locomotive, however for some it's more of a privilege than others.

His majesty King Edward II basking in the sun.

 Climbing up onto the footplate is a little intimidating and as you might expect from royalty, not altogether welcoming.

Well, at least it says "please"

The grate is vast, and without the rostered cleaner on hand to assist with fetching wood etc (many thanks indeed to Martin for kindly deputising), I was a bit too rushed to take any photos of the light up process.  I did take a photo of the inside of the smoke box before cleaning it out, the blast pipe and steam feed pipe arrangement being very different to any of our two cylinder locos.

The regal smoke box

 The owning group had brought along a couple of short handled but incredibly large bladed shovels with them, which had proved very useful for initially filling the 11' 6" long firebox.  Rather impertinently, the crew of 70013, Oliver Cromwell, which was also running on Sunday "borrowed" one of the shovels to cook their breakfast on and failed to return it before we left the shed.  I expect that a royal decree saying "Off with their heads" will shortly be delivered for this act of treason!

Pressure coming round

 As has already been mentioned, we can't put 6023 on any of our roads beyond road 7, so for oiling up, we had to have enough pressure on to allow us to move onto the indoor pit once the smoke from lighting up has abated.

King Edward II inside the David Page shed

 Once there, Paul, the driver for the day was able to get to the inside motion bits that were otherwise inaccessible.

Paul oiling one of the inside big ends.

At the south head shunt

Waiting to go onto our stock

 The tender was rather bereft of water, and we couldn't take her onto roads 8 or 9 to fill up at the parachute tank in the yard.  In the end, we had to shunt the stock on platform 2 back a bit in order to replenish the tank.

We wouldn't have got far on that.

Crossing Oliver Cromwell at Winchcombe

 There had been a couple of concerns lurking in the back of my mind regarding a turn on King Edward II.  One was that I had never had an opportunity to operate a loco fitted with an exhaust steam injector, relatively few preserved steam locos have them.  I needn't have worried, after a quick guide from Karl, (Owner's representative), I found it to be extremely easy to use.  The second concern was would I be able to get coal all the way down to the front of the firebox, 11' 6" away?  I had had a footplate ride on 6023 some years ago during a photo charter on another railway and remember that the fireman on that occasion couldn't hit the front and had to ask the driver to step across the cab and do it for him.  I was still a cleaner on the GWSR at the time and desperately wanted to volunteer to do the job for him, but somehow managed to contain myself.  In the end, I needn't have worried, either using the one remaining big shovel or my own rather more modestly sized one, all parts of the firebox were within easy reach.  In short, her size belied that fact that she was extremely responsive and it was a fairly straight forward task to keep the pressure and water levels where you wanted them to be.

An aside here, is that for 2018, many of the normal running timetables are about to be changed.  Teething troubles are to be expected after making major changes such as opening a newly extended line, and the timetables have been cunningly tweaked in the light of recent experience. This isn't a "Network Rail" style timetable issue, no trains will be cancelled or depart any earlier, so visitors using the old timetable will only find themselves having to wait a few extra minutes occasionally for a departure.  The new timetables come into effect on Tuesday, however several station staff/guards and even footplate crew had jumped the gun and were expecting them to have started already.  The message was soon spread and the trains eventually ran to the correct timetable.  

Somewhere between Toddington and Broadway, I lost my watch.  It was on my wrist when we set off from Toddington, and it wasn't there when I wanted to check how close we were to departure time at Broadway.  I suspect that I lost it whilst hooking on or off.  Should you happen to spot a wrist watch lurking on the four foot at Broadway, please don't rescue it yourself, but inform a member of staff.  Hopefully they will be able to work out how to get it back to me.

The timetable for Sunday didn't give much time for a lunch break, and once at Toddington and heading towards Cheltenham again, Eleanor appeared with some lunch for me... she also got roped into helping us take water again and eventually joined us on the footplate.  This was quite useful as she was wearing a watch and could keep me updated with the time when I needed. Once at Cheltenham, Paul let Karl take hold of the big red handle for the trip back to Broadway and I let Eleanor take the shovel

Karl, soon after leaving Cheltenham

Eleanor, having borrowed my jacket and shovel.

 Eleanor of course knew what she was doing, so I was free to enjoy the scenery and grab a few photos as we went along.

The view from the footplate

Leaving Greet tunnel

 At Winchcombe we crossed Oliver Cromwell again.

70013 entering Winchcombe

Later, crossing Stanway viaduct

 King Edward II, is probably rather less well known by her TOPS number, 98823.  On the big railway, she is allowed up to 75 MPH going forward, and 45 MPH tender first.  Just in case you forgot, there was a notice on the cab roof

Heritage railway speed limits are significantly lower of course

 After two round trips, it was time for the class 20 diesel to take over for the final round trip.  I'd have happily stayed on for another trip.

It's always odd watching a diesel take over your train.

 All in all, a memorable day, I certainly won't forget it in a hurry.

Though perhaps a little more coal would have been preferable