Good evening everyone and thank you for joining us for this weekend’s work from Quorn. This week, we’ve given the Palvan a rest while we concentrate on getting A1610B stable and usable after its relocation.
We moved the container to use as storage on the dock for some of our access equipment. The container was felt to be too far gone at the moment for use being lifted and put on a wagon in a train, but could be shored up for use as a period appropriate shed.
Nick and I started by fitting the door flap which didn’t get finished last week. We then continued at the corner started last week and finished off drilling and putting bolts in.
We looked at the the corrugated end sides and found most of the bolts had gone, or were trying to tie together rotten wood. We cut some ply to replace the unhappy interior and exterior cladding and cut new supporting wood where requires.
The middle framework supporting the floor ended up not being attached to the rest of the container, so we replaces the bolts on both of these, and added new spreader plates on the outside to support the wood which is getting a bit on the fragile side.
Dave joined us on Sunday, where we concentrated on the wood across the back, and tying the end back to the sides of the container, which also supports the floor. We started by removing more floorboards, where I found some where to use more of our wood hardener.
Dave and I selected one of the last few bits of loco shed roof to act as the bottom support for the end, which was denailed and then cut down. Before fitting this we Dave and Nick cleared the way under the container.
We fixed one end to the corrugated end. Dave and Nick leveled the container using jacks and crowbars. The other end of the plank got fixed to the metalwork.
I started cutting a piece to graft into the side rail on the other side which had long disappeared having suffered from a prolonged water leak in that corner. I also manufactured two plates to sandwich and support the graft.
After this was bolted in, Nick and Dave added 2 large L shaped brackets between the sides and the end to fully tie them together. We moved to the other final corner to finish its repair. Nick and Dave added a right angled plate.
With all the lower framework shored up, Nick started to put the floor back down.
There’s still about a mornings work left to do on the container, putting more bolts in and such like. At some point the door flap could probably do we being remade, but that was definitely a job for another day! As nice as these containers are, you can really see why Freightliner and ISO type containers quickly became adopted!
Next week, we’ll have the Test Car open in the yard at the Road Rail so do come and see us! Depending on who we have with us we may also have the sales stand up and running, or more work on the container will take place.
Quorn Wagon & Wagon 