Hello everyone, and welcome to another weekend update from Quorn. Saturday was a bit of a cold one, with the below 0 temperatures precluding any meaningful external work, though I did design a part for the cut off saw to accept the commercially available abrasive wheels. We laid some more carpet inside the cage area of the mess coach. At least the tank train looked very picturesque in the Down Lie-by!
With my newly designed and 3d printed parts, I got the cut off saw working and ready to work. Dan and I used it to prepare some of the pipework found last week, cutting away the flame cut ends to square up them up.
Mark, Tom and Nick did some more work on the south end of the GUV, re-fixing some of the hinge strapping back to the doors, and scrapping the iron and woodwork.
Danny was uncovered and started for the first time this year to take some items to the vans in the yard. His sheet was unfolded and measured and found to be suitable for a van roof, so this was stripped of components and folded for storage.
Lastly, we also assembled some pallet racking in the fish van to increase storage space.
Thanks for reading, and join us next week where we should be starting to fit vacuum pipework to the TTAs.
Hello, and welcome to another update from Quorn. Now that the Catfish have departed Quorn destined for the Mixed Freight set, we’ve received the two TTAs, and the TEA has been brought down from the top of the yard. We’ll be looking at vacuum through piping these over the coming weeks and months. We’ve also been preparing for a short spell at Rothley to give the roofs of four of the vans some attention.
First off, the team set about locating our 21″ vacuum cylinder spares, which were spread across a few locations. During this, the yard area was tidied up to release a complete (but not very well cylinder) from inside the Volvo’s bucket.
This cylinder was removed from 3711 when it arrived, for obvious reasons. Now we are restoring a handful of engineer’s vehicles, which usually all have a 21″ cylinder, we felt that we’d need to check the condition of all available parts, which includes that cylinder…
With a lot of brute force and occasional ignorance but without heat (surprisingly), the cylinder was dismantled. It remains to be seen if this cylinder will resurrect, but we can only try. Plus it gives us a chance to try soda blasting it!
Dave removed the cylinder head from the de greaser and gave it a rinse off with the pressure washer. This was left to dry out in the heated mess coach. We’ll begin to assess the rest of the parts as time and other projects allow.
As the light was falling, Dave and I took a brief look at the through pipe route for the three green tanks, the two TTAs having a well defined route in a bit of a contrast to the TEA.
All that leaves us to say is Merry Christmas from us. We’ll have another update for you before the New Year with a bit of a wrap up and to cover what we’ve done over the Christmas and New Year period, do join us then!
Hello everyone, and welcome to another update from Quorn. We’ve been able to progress a few jobs this week, with mechanical work culminating on the Catfish, the GUV has had another coat of paint and the coaches have been cleaned.
Continuing the progress on the GUV, the last few patches of GUV were cleared back to bare metal, then sanded and primed. Dan, Ernie and Tom concentrated on fixing the loose body side rubbing strips.
Reflecting the fact that the Catfish are cosmetically finished, Nick got them ready for a vacuum test by fitting vacuum hoses. We had also made a start extracting two sheared bolts in the hopper door on DB983393, which need to be extracted to refit one of the door mounting saddles.
I continued looking at the generator and replaced the starter solenoid and double checked the timing, hoping I’d find the cause of it not running, sadly at the end of Saturday this was not the case, but I put the battery on charge for the night.
The rest of the team made good progress and got the west side of the GUV covered in undercoat, ready for a coat of maroon gloss when the weather allows.
Sunday’s weather started on the wet side. Mark and Tom did the usual gutter clearing, after noticing the water running down the side of the two coaches. After the worst of the rain, the pressure washer was used to jet the gutters, after which the coaches were cleaned using a bit of snow foam. On the west side a look out was used to ensure the group were away from the running line.
I did a little bit more on the generator and got it running, which is a huge step given were we were with it some time ago. There is some fettling to do with the idle speed and fine tuning of the timing before we can put this back into use.We are starting to look at some improvements to the generator like an electric lift pump and maybe an alternator instead of a dynamo.
We’ve ended the weekend with two clean coaches, a running generator and the GUV in undercoat on the west side. We’ll see what the weather brings next week, but we should are looking at completing the mechanical work on the two Catfish and hand paperwork over the Carriage & Wagon to begin their acceptance. Thanks for reading!
Good evening all, and welcome to another update. With the Catfish finished, and the weather taken a turn for the worst we’ve looked at inside work, though the GUV did get a bit more attention.
I concentrated on re-assembling the genset in the Test Car, bleeding the fuel system, replacing the coolant and of course trying to start it. Sadly, still no joy with getting it running so still more work to do on this.
In a gap in the weather on Sunday, the Baldwins managed to get some more of the west side of the GUV stripped back and prepared.
Thanks for reading! Fingers crossed for better weather next week, join us there and see what we get up to.
Hello everyone and welcome to another update from Quorn.We’re doing a little bit of work behind the scenes on the website, so things may change in the near future but for now we’re using what we’ve got. This week, signwiriting has continued on the Catfish and with some help, we’ve continued cleaning up the GUV.
Firstly, to Mark we wish a happy birthday, and thank you Alison very much for the tasty cake in the shape of our very own 3711.
Dan, Dave and I have pushed on with the signwriting, getting stuck in with the Straw letting, and Dan the white on the solebars.
A team of volunteers from the Young Rail Professionals applied a coat of Maroon gloss to the east side of the GUV. Thank you to those who gave their time!
Mark, Nick, Oliver, Tom and Ernie all started work on the West side of the GUV. Due to the condition of the west side, we’re having to bare metal a fair portion of the vehicle, which got a coat of primer once cleaned of all paint.
By the end of the day, the south-west side of the GUV had been bared and primed, along with parts of the panel the other side of the door. The west side of the Catfish are now complete, with just some signwriting to do on the dock side.
Thanks for reading, next week we should have finished the Catfish and made a good progress on the GUV. Join us then!
Hello everyone, and welcome to another update from Quorn. Thankfully, the weather has been such that the Catfish have both been able to have been painted in top coat. While we did that the rest of the team made the dock a bit more habitable and tidier. We’ll start with the work done by the lads in the week on the LMS brake van.
Tom, Dan and Oliver joined Nick and finished off the last bits of painting and undertook a pad exam as the last jobs on the brake van. This should be heading back into traffic very soon.
We rocked up on Saturday morning to two very wet Catfish, both having a coating of dew on them. Everyone was out giving the wagons a wipe down with dry rag to aid the drying process, with some last bits of cleaning down also taking place. The vacuum hoses and Instanter couplings were removed to limit over spray clean up.
Nick, Ernie, Tom Oliver, Mark and Charlie made a start tidying up the dock, making 8 trips with the dumper to move all the wood we’ve removed from wagons to the bonfire pile.
I started talking Dan and Dave through the equipment we used for spray painting to start teaching them how to use it. We thinned down the paint to the right viscosity and got everything ready to start painting. With Dave and Dan on the gun, they started spraying from inside to out. We had some issue with the paint not flowing evenly, but they persevered and got DB983393 painted, barring the east side panels at the top of the hopper.
The other team sorted out the garden area, making a parking space for Danny, and sorting out some extra steps for both the GUV and the Tool Van.
The van train was taken away to Swithland for a few weeks while the Railway holds Bonfire Night in Quorn Yard. This allowed us a bit more room and more light around the wagons.
With Dan being unwell on Sunday, it left it to Dave and I to finish the wagons, starting with DB983393 which in the cold light of a new day was looking a bit patchy.
While Dave and I got cracking, Oliver and Tom cleaned out some of our paint kettles, getting them ready for future usage. Nick and Mark started the process of following Dave and I around touching in bits where the spray gun couldn’t quite get. Tom and Oliver join in with this. Tom hung up the 4 removed couplings ready to be sprayed.
Oliver went round the top of the hopper edge to paint the upper flat face.
After all that, we gently shunted the wagons back down, and stood back to admire two smart looking Catfish, in Satin Black.
We’ve got the sign writing left to do, gloss paint the white areas and to pick out the roller bearings on DB993560; all of which we’ll get to next weekend. We’re also popping by the NVR to meet up with their wagon group, so if you are there do say hello. Thanks for reading!
Hello everyone, and thanks for joining us for another update from Quorn. The autumn weather is definitely settling in, so we’ve been ticking jobs off the back burner list. During the week, Dan finished the signwriting on the LMS brakevan, which now leaves some underframe painting to finish.
With rain predicted on Saturday, I started looking at re-assembling the genset in the Test Car. Naturally, I started by taking it apart more… To re-attach the fuel pump, I wanted to check the timing on the geartrain, so ended up draining the coolant from the system and removed the radiator and water pump to gain access to the timing case. As I was removing components, Charlie took them outside and cleaned them with the pressure washer.
Nick and Ernie took a look at the drawer in the kitchen on the coach, which has been broken for a few months. The drawer was re-assembled with additional L brackets to re-attach the front of the drawer. Back in the generator room, I found broken wires on the magnetic pickup and the dynamo, which may have contributed to the issues with the generator.
On Sunday,we started by moving the barrels from E281882 back into B765272 to put them back into covered storage after Railways At Work.
We then moved onto some light landscaping, to clear an access ramp to get Danny up onto the dock to help in clearing that up.
I went back into the Test Car and finished piping up the fuel system, which leaves just the control actuators and the cooling system left to re-assemble. I also repaired the intermediate cover which had some loose rivets.
The light landscaping turned into heavy landscaping to fill in some of the ramp way to make it less steep for Danny, who eventually made it onto the dock.
Dan and I went to test the air brakes on the TEA tank, however part way through the test, it was found that one bow girder was not moving when the brakes were applied. We stopped the test and sent Dan under to lubricate and tap the linkages to free them. This didn’t remedy the seizing this weekend, so we’ll look at it again another time.
Thanks for reading! we should be back on the Catfish next weekend, weather permitting, to apply the black paint. Joins us then!
Good evening all, this week the gang have applied more paint to DB993560, the steps into the tool van have been repaired, and being the Autumn Steam Gala some train spotting may have taken place.
During the week, Dan has been down at Rothley making a good go at the sign writing on the LMS brakevan. He only has the number, region and tare weight left to apply on the east side.
At the weekend the gang applied red oxide to the W irons, the north end headstock and platform. This also extended to the insides of the frames and the underside of the wagon.
Mark and Dan applied white undercoat to the hand rails and hand wheels, getting them ready for gloss.
Last week, somebody (at the moment remaining nameless..) managed to crack one of the steps on the main steps up to the tool van. The rotten boards were removed with replacements cut and strengthening battens added to other steps. The team also secured the loose handrail.
Lastly, being the Autumn Steam Gala the vans and the tanks have been out on the line which is always a pleasant sight to see.
Thank you for reading and see you next week where we might even get to applying some gloss to the Catfish(es?).
Hello everyone and thanks for joining us for this week’s update from Quorn. The Catfish have been the sole focus of attentions, with DB983393 having is priming finished and DB993560 getting primer applied.
Ernie started grinding back the welding I’d done on the outside of the hopper while I continued doing the last bit of welding on the big panel, up each side of the patch and a small amount on the inside of the hopper.
The platform that was cleaned down last week had primer applied by Nick, who then moved onto the other hopper. The dock side of the hopper bar the w-irons got a coat of primer. He then started to scrape the more restrictive areas of the hopper that haven’t been finished, joined by Oliver who used the needle gun to clean down the south end walkway.
Dan and Oliver made a start on cleaning the inside of the hopper with the pressure washer, more on this in future weeks.
Mark joined Ernie on the grinder, and tidied up the welds on the big panel, lastly Ernie got to applying paint to the panels the have been ground back
Nick continued applying paint around the hopper, moving round the West side. Charlie continued his mission to keep the dock tidy by cutting the grass.
Thanks for joining us for this week’s update. Join us next week where is will likely be the last bit of cleaning and priming on the hopper.
Hello everyone and welcome to another update from Quorn. This week we’ve carried on painting the LMS Brake van and done the last bit of paint removal on the Catfish. During the week Nick and Tom got the LMS brake van into its bauxite gloss coat, this now awaits signwriting.
Using the Hydrovane last time, I noticed the the starter motor was loose so Oliver, Dan and I disassembled the side panel and removed the starter motor to tighten up its mount adapter.
Oliver set to work needle-gunning the the operating platform on DB983393, which is the last bit of this wagon that needs to be primed.
Dan and I investigated a new acquisition, a petrol pressure washer. It was bought as a non-runner with no spark. Dan fitted a new spark plug and we borrowed an ignition coil from a generator, which got the little Honda engine running. There are some leaks in the water side on the hose, so we’ll see how this ends up working.
