Author: rloades109

Hello everyone! After the excitemnt of fitting the new doors to B763305 last week, we’ve started looking at the other vans to see which of those need new sheets. B777171 and B780282 have both been selected to have two panels each to be changed, both panels also being adjacent to each other.

Dave kicked off by continuing the signwriting on B854782, it being the only van that didn’t get signwritten last week. There is quite a lot on this van, with us having gone with the Later style BR-era livery when this vehiicle was painted.

Nick and I, assited by Eireni, checked the measurements for the panels we are about to change. Over the years we’ve got quite a few measurments jotted down for the van body panels, but like the age old expression goes measure twice, cut once! B784409 has also been selected to have another side sheet changed, but for this we had to dismantle it’s internal racking. This will initially be stored, but then redeployed.

With four sheets of ply retrieved from storage, we set to work cutting them to suit the aperture. Once cut, Dave sanded the sheets then Nick and I treated them to a coat of wood primer, coating the front faces and the edges.

I, unfortuantely, couldn’t be onsite Sunday but Nick continued on the side sheets by painting them into undercoat. Nick also straighten out some of the racking dismantled yesterday. Dave washed and polished Madge, ready for Railways at Work. Matt was also onsite and sorted some of the prop items for the gala. Nick and Dave also removed a piece of the Plate that was dangling off. This will be re-attached when we get round to doing this wagon.

Next weekend is our Railways at Work gala, come and see us and the railway come to life with a pick up goods and a Mixed freight. We’ll be re-enacting and Madge will be on static display.

Good evening all, and welcome to another update from Quorn. This week, being as the weather has been quite good we’ve go on an replaced some of the side sheets on some of the vans in the Van train. If you’ve been following our progress we cut, prepped and painted some plywood sheets some weeks ago for B779978, B850498, B784409 and B854782, all of which we deemed to be the most in need of replacement. Eddie has also spent the weekend continuing the prep on the internal surfaces of the Bogie Bolster which is really comming together, and I’m looking forward to painting.

Nick and I made a start on B854782 where we whipped out the side sheet with relative ease, the impact gun again make its usefulness apparent. In not too much time, we had the sheet out and Nick was scraping the frame of the old sealant and any other contamination. By this point Richard had arrived, and assisted me in drilling and attaching the new side sheet to the van.

Moving onto B779978, well in our stride. Again the side sheet was removed and the new one fitted. Both of these now needs signwriting to replace any markings lost.

We ended Saturday by undoing most of the bolts on the GW-designed Shock Van, and Sunday was more of the same. Having now done it, its probably the easiest van to have replaced a side sheet on. All the bolts undid with just the impact gun, no need to grind or split nuts and only bolts up the sides of the sheet.

Richard and I then made a start on the ex-VEA. We’ve not replaced a side sheet on one of those before, so it was a bit of a learning curve. In this case, the impact gun didn’t help, the coach bolts ended up spinning in the wood. Out came the grinder to slit the nuts and then the hammer to push the bolts through. Some of the bolts were hidden behind the top door runner and took a bit more work to remove.

By the end of the day, we had the new panel sat in the hole, and fastened to the van by 2 of the bolts behind the top runner. Next weekend, we’ll start with un bolting that, applying sealant and then bolting the panel in fully. After that we might be moving on to fitting some doors, exciting stuff! Thanks for reading, and see you next week!

Hello, and welcome to another update from us. We’ve got some admin to sort before we get into the meat of the update. Firstly, we’ve found out the we’ve been shortlisted for this year’s Heritage Railway Association Awards. We put in for the Morgan Award for Preservation for the completed 17 vehicle van train. Our friends over at Quorn Transport Films have also been shortlisted in the External Communications catergory. We wish them and all others that have been shortlisted good luck, and look forward to seeing you on the night.

You may have seen us in the latest issue of Trackside Magazine, we’re featured in a fantastic six page spread, resulting from a visit earlier in the year. If you haven’t already, pick up the latest issue from all good newagents.

Right on to business, this week we’ve contiued painting the replacement doors and side sheets. Last week we got them all cut and primed, so this week was the turn of undercoat and top coat. On Saturday, Nick and Richard took care of undercoating the edges and I covered the fronts. The shed really helped here, keeping the sheets and us nice and dry while we were applying the paint.

Once we’d got those painted, we cleaned out the brushes and put the paitn way, and picked up some odd jobs. I looked at the air system on the Test Car to fix a leak that had become apparent on the filter/oiler. Matt did some work on the generator room door where the frame had become dettached from the wallk of the coach. Nick and Richard continued the tidy up in the Tool Van, resuting in a much improved Woodworking drawer.

Sunday saw Nick and I apply the bauxite top coat to both doors and side sheets, and then continued the odd jobs. I sorted out the workbench in the Yellow Coach, attaching the magnifying light to the bench kindly donated by Richard. Nick continued the tidy up in the tool van. I fired up the Test Car’s generator and tested the air system tweaks I’d done for leaks. There is one small one to sort out, but nothing major.

That’s it from us for another week, Dave will be back again next week to tell what we’ve been up to, join us then!

Good evening and welcome to another update from Quorn. This weekend has been the railway’s Winter Gala, and a busy one it was too! Both the van train and the minerals have been out to play, along with several passenger trains. We’ve been holding off on undertaking work on the van train whilst they’ve been wanted at photo charters and galas throughout January, so we’ve been spending some time as you’ve seen wokring on other things.

This weekend has seen most of the team finish building ‘the garage’, our temporary building. Last weekend we had most of the roof on and all of the north end and side cladding, so we picked up where we left off, by finishing the roof. The wind on Saturday didn’t help with this!

The roof was finished, then Dave concentrated on getting the cladding for the eaves rivetted to the structure. Firstly on the North end, and then the South. Matt, meanwhile started Madge up, and we tried her through the shed door to see if she fits.

We also shifted our wooden shed everso slighty, to turn it 90 degrees and to line it up with the back of the steel shed. After this we generally pottered around the shed until dark.

With fewer of us on Sunday, we concentrated on sorting out the last few bits fo cladding, including cutting some steel to fill in where a few panels have been lost. Thomas and I rivetting the bottm of the west side panels, and then went round and rivetted where holes where. Nick cut the replacement panelsfor the south end in the eaves and above the personell door. Nick and Thomas rovetted the south end panelling to the structure.

Eddie was also onsite, and carried on the prep work on the Bogie Bolster.

Next weekend, we’ll be making a start on the bodywork repairs on the van train now that they are free of commitments until March. We’ll either be manufacturing doors, or starting to cut some bodyside sheets. Join us then and see where we get too!

This weekend has been the railway’s East Coast weekend, bringing together visitors Tornado, Deltic 55019 and some of the home fleet. Both the Deltic and Tornado have been hauling the van train up and down which has been a pleasure to behold, and something I’d been looking forward to since the A1 arrived at the GC.

We’ve been spent our weekend putting up our temporary building, alluded to last week. You may remember that we tidied and cleared an area of the yard for this purpose.

Saturday saw Dave, Richard and I gathering the pieces of framework together and starting to make sense of the jigsaw puzzle before us. A second hand building with no instructions, and no idea if all the pieces were present it quite the challenge!

It wasn’t long before we got the first frame together, that being those with the doors. We then attached the side frames, using the perlins clamped to the GUV to steady the structure while it was built up. By the end of the day the frame work was completed, bar a couple of the roof perlins. Using my new impact wrench made everything very easy, how did we manage before these modern tools?

Sunday saw more of the gang in attendance, so we moved the cladding and roof sheets closer to the framework and continued the last few bits of the frame. The roller shutter got mounted using the Volvo while the van train was on the line, and we got one roof sheet fitted and bolted down.

Next week, we shall continue by getting the roof cladded and then making a start on the sides. Thanks, and see you then!

Hello everyone and happy new year to you all. Over the past few days, we’ve been sorting out our workshop and tool vans, but we’ve covered enough of that over the past few months so I’ll use the opportunity to review what we’ve done over the past year.

We started last year off with completing 1408, the ex-China Clay Slurry tank wagon and then making a start on the Esso tank, 3436. Then news of the 3rd National Lockdown came to us and prevented site access for a couple of months.

We were allowed back on to site initially to carry out routine maintenance on the wagon fleet. Starting with the Dogfish, then Grampus and then the rest of the wagons. All were brought down to Rothley for us to look at and carry out any work required.

Once April 12th came around, we were allowed to carry out non-essential work. Dave and Matt covered the signwriting on the Esso tank, completing that wagon. We continued work on what turned out to be one of our biggest projects, our Mess Coach.

At this time, we also quickly tackled the Creosote tank DB998926, adding that to the burgeoning tank wagon train.

Then the first of a few new acquisitions this year, the Ferry Tank, 500817. This cam with another 10ft wheelbase chassis destined for the Palshocvan body, B855667.

This time, we had begun the big push on the mess coach, getting that finished and back to Quorn in October.

The aforementioned Palshocvan was welded to its chassis, got a new roof covering, painted and released into the van train, though made its debut for a photo charter with the tank train.

Most of our vehicles, including the road vehicle fleet, were in use for Railways at Work Gala, with most of us dressing the part as well. We all really enjoyed this weekend and hope it will be as good next year.

Our 99th vehicle arrived soon after this gala, being 3711. This arrived from Meldon at the Dartmoor Railway. This vehicle arrived in quite a state and has had the braking rigging rebuilt just to get it able to be moved.

The Bogie Bolster was sat at Quorn waiting for us while we were working on the Mess Coach at Rothley. We eventually got around to working on this, starting by cleaning the chassis down and replacing a bolster timber. We also looked at the braking system, overhauling the vacuum cylinders and getting the slack adjusters sent away. This vehicle is now waiting for paint.

We also saw the team at Rothley overhaul the CCT, which was previously in use with us as a store. It has been emptied, welded and painted for use in the Winter Wonderlights. Both Matt and Dave assisted with the signwriting on that, which made it look a treat!

At this point, I’ll cover some of the other things that have happened. We’ve pulled together 6 BRUTEs, ready for a BRUTe train.

We’ve visited the Bluebell Railway and brought back a van full of spares. Dave and Matt have also been to the Chasewater Railway to assist in the signwriting of a VEA of theirs.

Despite the continuing pandemic, we’ve had a good year. We’ve completed 7 vehicles this year, with one of those being SC21202 which I think in terms of work equals around 3 or 4 vehicles! We’ve made more contacts with other railways and firms in the industry that have helped us out immensely. We’re looking forward to seeing what 2022 has to offer for us and will get some more wagons completed.

Next week, we’ll be somewhat back to normality, with most of us being back to work. I’ll wrap up this update by wishing you all a happy and healthy year ahead. I also want to thank you for your continued support. Join us again next week to see what we get up to.

I hope you all had a good Christmas Day and got all the presents you were wanting from Santa. Before Christmas, we had a delivery of some presents of our own, courtesy of Rail Vehicle Components Ltd. We are, again, very grateful to Neil for getting these slack adjusters sorted for us, and know where to turn when it comes to getting anything else of that ilk sorted.

I went to Leek to collect the slack adjusters on 22/12. Not wanting to have them sitting in my car over Christmas, Nick and I were at the railway on the 23rd to fit them back to the Bogie Bolster. Once the obligatory tea was consumed, the Slack Adjusters were removed from my car and laid next to the wagon.

Starting at the North end, the slack adjuster was carefully lifted underneath and slotted into its safety loop and connected to the cross shaft. this was pinned up and the slack adjuster rotated to extend it to meet up with the correct linkage on the bogie. This was back together and pinned up within half an hour. Time for another cuppa, then to tackle the south end.

The south end was a little bit trickier. This was the end that we identified a few issues with, and thought we had rectified them. As per the opposite end, I slotted the slack adjuster into its safety loop but found the cross shaft and the hole in the eye of the slack adjuster were half a hole out.

In the end, I had to use the hot spanner to persuade the “A Gap” setting bracket that it wanted to undo. This meant I could reset the A Gap to allow the slack adjuster to be fitted and pinned up. We think the A Gap was modified by BR, probably due to a brake issue to get it “home”, an adjustment the wagon has lived with ever since.

With both slack adjusters fitted, we could now prove the vacuum system that we’d overhauled a few months prior. With our exhauster started and connected, the vacuum was created, but nowhere near high enough to be functioning correctly. We diagnosed a faulty DA valve, which got bypassed and the test re-done. This time the test was satisfactory for both cylinders and the wagon left to see how long the brakes held for.

Today, in between rain showers, we sorted out 2 replacement floor planks for the south end of the wagon. Cut from an old workbench top, the two ‘planks’ were adjusted to suit their positions and fitted to the wagon.

The list of jobs on the bolster is now running a bit shorter, nearly to the point where it just needs paint, which we need to wait for the warmer weather. There will be another update before the year is out, with our annual wrap up update. Join us again in a few days to find out what we got done in 2021.

Hello everyone and welcome to another update from us. Our main focus this weekend was the annual exam of the Grampus wagons (well 4 Grampus and 1 steel Tunny). These have recently been unloaded so became available to us.

Dave, Nick, Richard and myself set up on the wagons, undertaking axle box exams and oiling up the brake gear. As these had been left loaded with spoil we had expected the axle boxes to have some water content but were pleasantly surprised.

An axle box exam consists of the following: cleaning around the box to make sure nothing can fall onto the pad or into the box. For divided boxes, the split pins are removed and the nuts are undone to lower the box bottom. For open-fronted boxes, the cover is just a case of levering the cover open with the special-shaped ‘Shark’ spanner. Once open or lowered, the pad is removed from the reservoir and placed on an empty paint tin. The contents of the tank are examined; mostly these were full of oil, but some did have some water in them. At this point, the exposed part of the journal is inspected for any damage or scoring.

The water gets emptied out of the tank and then they are topped up with fresh oil. The pad is examined, the tails are teased out and if the top and tails are satisfactory, it is placed back into the reservoir. After this, it is just a case of reassembling the axle box.

Richard was guided through undertaking a vehicle inspection by Dave and I oiled the brake gear on the push braked wagons which is accessible from each side of the wagon, so no need to go underneath. All doors chains were inspected, and besides one door securing lug being broken off, all is well.

Sunday started with more of the same, finishing off the exams by oiling up the only vac braked Grampus we have, DB991408. This is clasp braked so much more involved to oil up with lots of brake linkage in the centre of the wagon. The wagon also has screw couplings, so these were oiled as well.

After the wagon work was completed, operation tidy up carried on and I also sorted out the remote on/off for the power supply installed last week. We sorted through the spanners and have categorised them into Metric, A/F and Whitworth.

In ‘crafty corner’ Richard and Dave prepared the labels for each crate containing each of our power tools, continuing the organisation of those.

That just about wraps up our work for this week. Next weekend is Christmas Day and Boxing Day, so for a somewhat rare occasion, there will be no real update from us. All of us here wish you a Merry Christmas and if we don’t post before, and very Happy New Year.

So it begins the run-up to Christmas, we’re still pressing on working on the wagons and sorting stuff out. The first thing to do was unload Nick’s van with a battery charger and some paint. The charger is intended for use on the GUV. We are now looking at getting the batteries working again in this vehicle, but a more permanent charger is a good addition. It was heavy though and took Jake, Nick and me to carry it from the van to the GUV.

The batteries on the GUV were inspected with an endoscope to check the electrolyte level and topped up where necessary. Unfortunately on one cell, the de-ionised water came out just as quickly as it was put in which stopped progress somewhat.

Nick was called out to the dining train to sort out an interior steam leak, which he sorted out with Jamie; or at least attempted to. Word is that a 5p is too small to temporarily seal the steam piping and a 1p is slightly too big.

On Sunday, Nick and I were on-site and began by sorting out a replacement cell for the GUV and fitting it. The ‘new’ charger was energised in the hope of charging the batteries. Initially, nothing happened, so we’ve left the batteries to charge and will check on those later this week. Once we’d done this Nick again had to disappear to finalise the steam leak from Saturday, thankfully this time all sorted. I finished off the heater control panel from last week, having found the other fuse holders.

Eddie continued to clean down the Bogie Bolster. He’s nearly finished this task, so which will only leave the bolster timber to finish and paint,which will wait for when the weather allows.

Dave was also on-site, though went to assist C&W with the signwriting on the FO. The vehicle is needed soon, so an all hands to the pumps request. I’m sure Dave’s assistance is very much appreciated.

As the light was fading, Nick and I sorted out our power tools and filed them away to prevent tangles. Each tool will get a brief functional test over the coming weekends and will be identified and its condition noted on its crate so it can be seen at a glance whether the tool is in a fit state to be used. There is still some work to do on this, but we made a good start. We both called it a night just as the Winter Wonderlights train went past.

We eagerly anticipate the return of the slack adjusters from their overhaul, so that the Bogie Bolster brakes can be re-assembled and tested. I had a phone call from Neil at Rail Vehicle Components last week to give me an update and shall be in touch this coming week to sort out getting them back to us. Join us next time and see what we manage!