4270 reunited with her boiler

As mentioned in the last entry, 4270 has now been reunited with her boiler after a long absence.   Many thanks to Paul Stratford who has kindly provided the following report of the event:-

  

Thursday 3rd December dawned cold with a gold and blood red sunrise over the Cotswold escarpment as Ian Carpenter, Mark Young and Paul Stratford signed the Ops Office register at 7am. In the car park at Toddington an articulated transporter painted in colours that matched the sunrise had arrived the previous evening from Crewe bearing the newly refurbished boiler, itself in red oxide primer, for GWR 2-8-0 tank loco 4270. The huge Scania four axle tractor unit was fitted with an enormous telescopic crane with a 100 ton short lift capacity and with a lift capacity of 1 ton at the incredible full extension of 100 feet.

The task for the day, to refit the boiler to the refurbished frames of the former resident of the well known Barry scrapyard.

The first lift of the day involved removing the boiler from the trailer and lowering it down onto the awaiting newly fabricated ashpan. Whilst this excercise was  carried out the rolling chassis of 4270 was shunted around the yard and onto the unloading road.With a small degree of adjustment carried out by Andy Tranter who had traveled down from Crewe to oversee the whole operation the scene was set for the boiler to be again hoisted ready to be fitted to the frames.

 But hold on, by this time everyone involved was thoroughly cold in the by now overcast and subzero conditions. Guess who was sent to make the first of seemingly endless cups of tea?

The rolling chassis was carefully pushed forward with the resident 08 shunter into position alongside the suspended boiler. 

Steadied by ropes the the boiler was swung into position and carefully lowered into the frames, not without a few anxious moments and minimal clearances the boiler and frames were once again reunited after being separated at Toddington some eight years ago. A heart warming moment on a cold damp December day.

There still remains a huge task to complete the restoration but the end is certainly on the horizon.