Tick Tock

If like me, you read all of the GWSR's blogs, then you'll have been missing your regular fix of the Broadway Station blog.  The good news is that its resurrection is imminent.  On Wednesday evening, I met up with John and David from the Broadway Area Group and helped them set up a new blog.  I even told them all I know about running one (obviously that didn't take long).  The bonus for me was a quick tour of their lovely new signal box.

No levers installed yet, but the frame for the interlocking mechanism down below is in place

One of the windows has been fitted

The roof is done, one level of scaffolding has been removed

 The Braodway Station blog, like the station itself is in good hands, I'm looking forward to hearing more news of their progress.

Leaping forward to Saturday, I was rostered to fire 2807 as train 1 on the red timetable.  Eleanor was rostered as cleaner and I had arranged beforehand for her to do the light up.  The draw back to that is that the poor old fireman ends up doing half of the loco cleaning as well.  Apparently I've been passed out as a fireman too long and forgotten how to clean locos properly if the comments from some of the others who were around are to be believed.

The "not shiny enough" safety valve bonnet

 The driver for the day was Ian, who judging by the hi-viz attire was keen to make sure that he wasn't overlooked by this blog's photographer.

Ian oiling up 2807.

Eleanor sorting out the smoke box after getting the fire lit.

 Meanwhile, over on 5542, rostered as train 2, its crew are preparing for the day ahead:

Driver Steve oils up.....

.... Firing instrutcor Clive cleaned 5542.....

.... and trainee fireman Ed scoffed mini apple pies

 Ed did rather more than scoff apple pies, he drank tea too for instance:

Ed drinking tea.

 Ok, alright, Ed did do some proper work too, he even took my bin load of smoke box ash to the ash dock along with his own.

Ed shifting 2 bins of smoke box ash.

 I have no idea how Ed got on during the day, but at least he had everything under control each time we passed him at Winchcombe.  One of the golden rules of firing, is that if you're going to have the loco blowing off at all, for heaven's sake, don't do it where anybody else in the steam loco dept will see you.  Pulling out of Toddington or at Winchcombe are the two places that you really need to avoid.

2807 & 5542 getting ready for the day's duties.

 It's a while now since the gala, but 34092, Wells has only just left.  She has just gone to the East Lancs Railway for an event there before returning on the mainline to her home on the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway.

34092, Wells at Toddington on Saturday.

I've already mentioned the Broadway blog and the fact that it is soon to return, but there are many other means of disseminating information in the digital age than a blog.  Andy Protherough of the lineside drainage management team uses the photo sharing site Flickr to keep us informed of their activities.

Andy at work in culvert 33A at Dixton on Saturday

 Before you ask, no, I had no idea that it was culvert 33A that Andy was in when I passed him on Saturday, I found that out from his Flickr site.

Ian in the office

Eleanor

 It was a fabulously warm day on Saturday, perfect for a spending on 2807.  5542 of course, with its small and fully enclosed cab would have been unbearably hot,  I defintely had the better choice of loco for the day.

Crossing 5542 at Winchcombe

 I have no idea who the crews were on Sunday, but given that it was raining heavily pretty much all day, I can probably say without too much fear of contradiction that the crew of 5542 were more than a little grateful that they were aboard the PFP, whilst 2807's crew would have gladly swapped.

Not unusually, there was a slight water overflow issue when we stopped to fill up the tender for the first time.  Curiously this always seems to happen when I have my camera handy,  you'd be forgiven for thinking that there was some kind of conspiracy going on.

Eleanor tries to keep her feet dry.

 One of our carriages had a fairly new vac bag on it, the connectors being set about 90 degrees apart from the ones on 2807  Not the easiest of things to couple them up at all, definitely like wrestling with a couple of elephant trunks.

Eleanor doing battle with the pugnacious pachyderm proboscises

Eleanor had a go at firing a round trip and made a pretty good job of it.  She managed to keep the pressure and water levels where I wanted them to be, though I was amused to note that she after firing, she would watch the pressure gauge like a hawk, to see if what she had done had achieved the desired effect.  Certain people used to complain that I did that when I first started.

Eleanor feeding the fire.

 I noticed that platform 2 at CRC was receiving some attention

"Quick lads, run away, he's got his camera out"

As I write this, no news of their activities has appeared on their blog, but I'm sure it will in the fullness of time.

It seems like we're struggling to find enough crews for the DMU, not for the first time I received a message from Jeff during the week asking if I was free to help out as second man.  Already being rostered to fire during the day, I couldn't assist, but Tina stepped in to cover at least some of the trips.  Clearly she's not a second man and as there were no other women crewing the DMU, I suppose that made her the first woman.

Jeff & Tina relax on a bench at Toddington before setting off to Winchcombe on the DMU.

 At one point during the proceedings, whilst waiting to depart Toddington platform1, a lady on platform 2 pointed at 2807 and said "You're on fire".  Fearing another burning lamp incident like the one that one of our crews experienced last week, I glanced along the running board at the spare lamp, but there was nothing amiss with it.  The lady pointed underneath the loco, so I got down to investigate.  Sure enough, some tar on one of the wooden sleepers had been ignited by a bit of hot ash falling out of the ash pan. 

Fire on the tracks

 I threw the contents of the water bucket from the footplate over it, which did the trick. 

Whilst we had experienced no difficulty at all in setting fire to a sleeper, the gauge frame lamp on the other hand kept going out and needed relighting several times.

Ian relighting the gauge frame lamp.

 Last trip saw the 47 take over train 2 from 5542.

Crossing 47376 at Winchcombe

There are three items of news.  First, it has been agreed that Collett, 2884 class, 2-8-0, number 3850, owned by Dinmore Manor Locomotve LTD (DMLL) will come to Toddington for her 10 year overhual.  3850 has spent the last 10 years based on the West Somerset Railway, with few excursions elsewhere, though as you may remember, she was one of our guest locos for the 2014 "Back to Black" steam gala.

3850 at work on the West Somerset Railway

As a bonus, the West Somerset Railway have very kindly agreed to allow her to move to the GWSR in mid September so that she can see out the last couple of weeks of her boiler ticket running here.  Aside from a DMLL owners group evening and running some of our scheduled timetable services, she will also star in a 30742 charters photo charter on Monday 28th September using our freight train.  For the photo charter only, she will be specially weathered to look as she would have done at the end of steam on the western region of British Railways.  At this point in time, it is believed that the photo charter will be her last day in service.

The second piece of news that I can bring you is that another milestone in the return of 35006 to steam has taken place, one of her con rods has been trial fitted for the first time. 

Fireman's side con rod in place.

35006 sat in the David Page shed, one down, two to go

Finally, the third piece of news is that 35006 successfully passed her steam test today.  She has had a few trial steamings of her boiler over the last few months, enabling a number of minor niggles to be identified and corrected.  I'm afraid that the cosmetic restoratoin for display at Winchcombe during the "Speed to the West" steam gala at the end of May caused some delay in the process, but she has finally got there, her 10 year boiler ticket is now ticking away.  I have been hoarding photos from a number of sources of the trial steamings, which the 35006 group didn't want publishing until the official steam test had been passed.  Here are just a few of them:

The first warming fire was on 19th April and light steam on the 20th, these photos all courtesy of Steve Parker:

Ian putting in the first fire since BR

Evidence of combustion at the chimney

The cylinder drain cocks appear to be working ok

A bit of oresssure on the gauge

The following few came to me from Ian Chilton at a later date:

Getting pressure up

Ok, perhaps a lot of pressure now

Dan Wigg provided the following from other steam tests in June:

Getting the fire going

Off the mark

Evidence of steam

At the red line

 And finally, from today's official steam test, all photos courtesy of Dan Wigg:

Hitting the red line

Blowing off

Being inspected by the boiler inspector

Smiles all round, she's passed

Thank you to Steve, Ian and Dan for providing photos of 35006 during her various steam tests.  There are still a number of things that will need to be finished off before 35006 can enter traffic, not least of which are the remiining two con rods, and these things may take a while yet to complete however the owning group and the volunteers who work on her are to be congratulated on achieving this significant milestone in the resurection of their magnificent steam locomotive.

A Tale of Two Tenders

I received an interesting photo from Andy during the week.   He had experienced a slight mishap on Wednesday on a turn out on the PFP with Chris.

Photo courtesy of Andy Beale

It seems that one of the lamps had spontaneously combusted whilst being transported on the running board.  Fortunately, Chris is our fireman who used to be a fireman.  A fireman of the kind that slides down poles and rescues fair maidens from burning buildings.  He soon had the situation under control, though the lamp has suffered third degree burns and will require extensive reconstructive surgery.  I am assured that no fair maidens were injured in the making of this photo.

Saturday's rostered locos were the PFP (5542) and 4270, 2807 also seen in the photo below getting time off for good behaviour.

(L-R) 5542, 4270, 2807.

 Out in the yard, Andy was inducting John into the dark arts of the mechanical inspection of locos, in this instance how to check the tyres, using 35006 as a guinea pig.

John (L) and Andy

Meanwhile, elsewhere on 35006, the steam operated cylinder drain cock mechanism was receiving some attention.

Fettling the cylinder drain cock mechanism

 The track in the road 7 with the pit apparently needs a bit of work, John, Aaron and Tina attend to it, Sean provides the bunny rabbit ears.

Track on the new pit.

 Road 8 was also receiving some attention in the lead up to concreting it in.

Road 8

 Most people present seemed to spend at least some of the day working on Foremarke Hall's tender.  Although much of the main body work has been painted, there is still some work to be done beneath that level.

Sean painting on a coat of primer

Dan took over for a while

Tea break time for us, 5542 sets off with the first train

 On the other side of Foremarke Hall's tender, Andy busied himself with a needle gun chipping away any old flaky paint and rust.  It was LOUD!

Andy needle gunning

A fact that I had hitherto been unaware of is that the Hawksworth 4000 gallon tenders were only fitted to "Gran Turismo Injection" steam locos such as the Modified Halls.

Somewhere a Peugeot 205 GTi is bereft of its insignia

 Once Andy had nearly completed his needle gunning, John followed him with the primer:

Andy at the far end, John priming from where Andy had started

 Once Andy had finished the needle gunning, Paul worked back in the other direction with the primer.

Paul painting

He tried to paint my phone too.

Yes, I was reduced to using my phone for taking photos with this weekend.  I have a "ruggedised" camera on order, capable of surviving being dropped from over 7' onto a hard surface, crush proof, dust proof, freeze proof (-10 degrees C) and water proof to 50' (which is far more than I am). Absolutely ideal for taking photos in the camera hostile environment that is the GWSR's Steam Loco Dept.  Unfortunately rapid delivery isn't one of its features and it failed to arrive in time for the weekend.

The other tender alluded to in this blog's title was that of Dinmore Manor.  Ian appeared from time to time with components of the water scoop mechanism.  The water scoop won't be operational of course and will be locked up so that it can't be inadvertently lowered, but it will still be fitted.  In spite of whatever I may say come April 1st, there are no plans to install water troughs on the flat bit of line now being built between Laverton and Broadway.

Various water scoop mechanism components

 My task for the day was to get some black top coat onto the already undercoated wheels for Dinmore Manor's tender. 

One wheel already done, five more to go

 I was ably assisted in the task by Eleanor

Bespoke painting

 Apparently Tim had done much of the priming and undercoating of the wheels that Eleanor and I were painting and he came over every now and then to inspect them and make sure that there were no drips and that we hadn't missed any bits.  John had put him up to it.  I popped by to inspect his handiwork on Foremarke Hall a bit later.

Tim painting Foremarke Hall's tender

 The light was a little bit subdued in our corner of the shed, so when we finished we spent a while inspecting our work for any bits that we might have missed

I like to think that we painted everything that should have been, without creating any drips.

 Parts are sill being fabricated for Dinmore Manor's tender of course, DMLL's chairman, Kenneth spent a while working on one of the last pieces of plate work that will need to be fitted.  Apparently it was a case of do this or go to a fancy dress party at a friends house.  He chose wisely.

Kenneth with plenty on his plate

34092, Wells is still with is waiting for her move back to the Keighley and Worth Valley Railway.  We have a lot of upheaval at the moment inside the David Page shed and in the yard area outside, so she has been relocated onto the approach to the bay platform at Toddington where she has been drawing admiring glances.  It isn't anticipated that she will run on our line again while she is here, but Ben decided that is would be a nice thing to do to give her a clean and make her look even more presentable anyway.

Ben demoted himself from driver to cleaner and buffed up Wells

He was joined later on by Mike and Dan, Wells was looking very smart again by the end of the day.

And finally, anybody who has been privileged to crew 4270 since she entered traffic early last year will know that she has had a minor shortcoming in that she hadn't been fitted with a pep pipe.  This of course made no difference at all to the operation of the loco, but it made keeping the cab floor clean and getting the coal damped down a bit tricky.  Cleaning the cab floor never really presented too much of a problem, there was always a brush to do that with, but damping down the coal on a hot day to minimise the coal dust swirling around in the cab was more challenging.  Various techniques were tried by crews to get around this, pausing alongside the ash pit on the run around at Toddington to use the hose was popular, but the coal had usually dried out by the time you had reached CRC and were ready to come back bunker first.  Tipping the contents of the footplate bucket into the bunker at CRC was the better choice, the bucket then being replenished from an injector over flow pipe.  One crew (who will remain anonymous purely to protect the guilty) even tried to use the water column at CRC to damp down the coal in the bunker.  It can be done, if you're careful, position the delivery pipe in the bunker and give it a quick squirt of water.  Unfortunately the water column at CRC has an on/off lever inside the hut.  On being the rough equivalent of Niagara Falls.  The crew concerned over did it and ended up with a deluge of water washing half the coal out of the bunker and onto the footplate.  Anyway, such antics are a thing of the past as 4270 now has a fully functioning pep pipe installed.  

4270's pep pipe dangling from the cab