The 2019 season has got off to an excellent start, the race trains all went ahead as planned, in spite of the weather which threatened to cancel some of the races, all three of our named locos getting in on the action. The Friday of the races saw three race trains running down to Cheltenham Race Course and for the first time in the heritage era, a non-stop express passenger run from Cheltenham to Broadway.
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| 7903 & 35006 about to set off with the race trains on Wednesday (photo courtesy of Peter Gutteridge) |
With 2807 still out of action following valve repairs over the winter, it was necessary to get 4270 back to act as a standby in case of failure.
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| 4270, standing by inside the David Page shed on Saturday |
2807 was having her valves put back in over the course of the weekend and is expected to get a test steaming during this week. If all goes to plan, she may be returning to traffic at the weekend.
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| 2807, nearly ready to run again now. |
To the best of my knowledge, the GWR only built one 8 wheeled tender (I am now confidently expecting to be corrected by a more knowledgeable reader). That tender was originally paired with the one and only GWR pacific, 111, The Great Bear. For a little while at least, there is now another one. Dinmore Manor's old tender, which is next expected to see service behind 3850 was to be found with 8 wheels. To be fair, 4 of them were not the usual size of wheel that you might expect to find on a GWR tender.
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| Accommodation bogie on the front |
It turns out that the draw gear is not yet completely ready to be fitted to the tender, which in turn meant that the vacuum cylinder couldn't be fitted, which in turn meant that the leading wheel set couldn't be fitted. That was all a problem, as the lifting jacks are coming up for their annual inspection, which can't be done whilst the tender is hoisted aloft. After their inspection, the jacks will next be required for fitting the centre axle to DES, one of our collection of diesel shunters. Kenneth & Martin were to be found preparing the last pair of axle boxes for the tender in anticipation of the day that they can be re-fitted
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| Kenneth (L) & Martin. |
At the close of play on Saturday, the tender finally had to move, and the plan was that it should go on road 6 between 3850's frames and the Peckett. The upshot was that just about everything on roads 5 through to 11 that had wheels had to be shunted, and if it didn't have wheels had to be moved out of the way.
The wooden blocks supporting one end of the tender were marked up so that they can be returned to the same place when the tender returns to the jacks.
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| Something like a large jigsaw puzzle, with hints! |
A full ballast train on road 5, which was blocking road 6 was first to have to move, in this case, up towards the car park .
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| Ballast train being shunted. |
Then the bubble car, scrap class 20 (without a draw hook on one end) and the well wagon with 76077's boiler on it moved across to road 5 from road 6.
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| And then the Peckett was moved... |
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| The Peckett & 76077's boiler on the move |
Somewhere along the way, 2807 and 4270 were fetched out and back in on different roads to free up space for 35006 to go into the shed at the end of the day.
The last wheel set for the tender also needed to be moved from road 7 to road 6.
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| Neal uses the telehandler to swap the wheel set from road 7 to 6 |
At last, the tender itself could be shunted across. The accommodation bogie had been specially modified by Mark & Mike to fit into the place of the missing axle, but even so, it was shunted at a very slow pace with people watching it carefully as it moved to make sure that nothing untoward occurred.
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| The 8 wheel tender on the move |
All went as planned, and all that remained to be done was to put back just about everything else to where it had come from.
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| The Peckett and 76077's boiler, back off to where they came from |
Just in case you weren't sure about the identity of DES (short for Diesel Electric Shunter), the next engine to be lifted on the jacks, here it is. It was just about the only engine that wasn't included in the mega shunt on Saturday.
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| Spot the missing axle |
A mammoth shunt indeed! Would have made an interesting public spectacle....If announced!
ReplyDeleteNice to see 4270 back on the running list again.
Regards, Paul.
any update on 76077 rebuild?
ReplyDeletere. The eight wheel tender there is a photograph taken at Swindon works showing the tender coupled to 5071 Clifford Castle (renamed Spitfire during wartime) in Tim Bryan’s The Great Western at War 1939-1945. I cannot confirm if this pairing was used mainline.
ReplyDeleteMay I be the first to say: I think you'll find....
ReplyDeleteI think you'll find the GWR produced two eight wheeled tenders. The earliest was that for the Great Bear but there was a second tender of a design that resembled a standard castle tender but with eight wheels.
(Beats a hasty retreat under a shower of lumps of coal)
A search of the web turned up this: 8 wheel tender No. 2586 was built as an experiment in 1931 Over the years it ran with the following locos (in the order in which they had the tender) - 5919, 5001, 5032, 5071, 5049, 5017, 6951, 5068, 4043, 4093, 4918, 5904 and 5957. Here's a photo of it coupled to 5904 https://www.warwickshirerailways.com/gwr/gwrls936.htm
ReplyDeleteIt is believed the 8 wheel tender was attached to 5071 from June1940 to May 42 which suggests mainline use.
ReplyDeleteThat photo of 5904 at Leamington Spa does rather confirm mainline use - as does the coupling of it to all those other Castles and Halls!
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