Tag: 3854

Hello and welcome to an August Bank Holiday weekend update from Quorn as we make progress despite the showers. We’ve also had a couple of celebrations; Ernie and Ross received their GCR Long Service Awards from Malcolm Holmes during the very enjoyable Summer Party evening at Ruddington; Ernie achieving 50 years, and Ross 16 years.
Oliver shared his belated 17^th Birthday cake for earlier in the month.

Nick had dug out an 18″ vac cylinder that had been stored for many years. It needed quite a bit of crowbar persuasion to extract the piston rod, split off the dome and get the piston out. Inside it was clear that it had seen some water ingress over the years.

Charlie jet washed the cylinder dome whilst Ross, Nick and myself extracted the piston rod gland, which needed a little heat to un-seize the nuts and studs.

Ernie made a start drawing up and machining some of the door furniture parts that are needed to repair / replace items for Palshoc van B855568.

I finished off the signwriting on the last of the four Esso barrel plates for tanks 3854 and 3689.

Ross varnished two of the Esso plates, making use of the space in the kitchen area on Test Car 2.

Mark, Tom, Oliver, Dan and myself continued work on Shoc-High B724570, completing the needle gunning of the north body end, then starting on the underframe.

In between the showers work continued on the underframe, the bare metal areas were dried off and some Red Oxide was applied.

On Sunday Nick, Ross, Charlie and myself took the two Esso plates that had been varnished down to Swithland sidings and fitted them to tank 3854. A touch of blue was applied to the bolt heads.

This now completes the restoration of tank 3854, here’s the before and after (August 2025 and August 2026).

Back at Quorn we continued with stud removal, brass bush removal, hole tapping and cleaning up of the vac cylinder. Unusually the brass bush had a thin rubber gasket fitted to its underside which we’ve not encountered before on other cylinders.

I applied a coat of varnish to the last two Esso plates in readiness for fitting to tank 3689 at some point.

Ross and I took a look at the Lobo Scaffolding to assess what parts we have. We also swapped two of the feet units and assembled the structure which confirms now what additional parts we need to complete two towers.

Ross sanded the north end of Shock-High B724570 and Nick applied some red oxide primer to the cleaned up metal areas.

Bank Holiday Monday, and Ernie started cutting down the locking bars for the Palshoc door. Whilst Ross removed the door furniture from the door panels, and measured up for new bearings on the door runners and the wooden panels.

We’d left the vac cylinder piston rod nut retaining plate in a penetrating oil soak overnight; despite this the plate took some removing with one of the bolts giving up, so this will need drilling out and re-tapping at some point. Nick then continued cleaning up the piston.

Mark, Tom, Dan, Oliver and Charlie continued on the Shoc-High with needle gunning, priming the underframe.

They then carried on undercoating the east side body and both ends.

Nick and Oliver put some primer on the west side wood .

All-in-all a very enjoyable and productive weekend. Join us again next week for the Diesel Gala, all the best, Dave

Hello everyone, and I start with apologies for last week. We weren’t able to get onto the hosting portal to write a post, so have made this one a bumper update.

Four vehicles left Quorn for Swithland, these being 3689, 3854 B452718 and B507489. In their place we have received the Palshoc, Shock high and the LNER Tube for us to work on.

Dave did some more work on the Esso Plates, getting the blue ring round and the red letters on another.

Dan, Daniel, Nick and I started work on B777171, removing the rotten door and constructing a new door.

Dan and Charlie took to removing the stickers from 1802.

Ernie and Dave got the gloss paint out and painted all the undercoated panels down the van train.

Dave and I started to look at B855568 to see what it needs for its restoration. With Ernie we also measured out for our tent and see what we need to do to fix it down

Okay so onto this week!

We’re waiting for some screws to be able to manufacture more doors for B763305, so we’ve opted to take a look at B724570, with Charlie and Ernie leading the charge on wire brushing and needle gunning the metal work. They also started sanding the wood work.

Nick and I looked at the sealed door on B855568. The door bars were seized into position so we released them from the woodwork and lowered the door out of the hole and over onto some trestles for stripping down. Nick got the hot spanner out and un-seized the door bars. Some of the door bogies fell apart so these will need some parts ordering.

I made some improvements to my profile measuring device and trialed in on some of the smallest wheels in fleet (these being the Salmon, the Sturgeon and the Lowmac) which it was able to clear.

Charlie, Ernie and Mark carried on with the cleaning down and priming the metal and wood work. Nick and I went round and spot replaced planks on the shock high.

That wraps us up here for the past two weeks, and thank you for your patience. We’ll get back on the vans next week as we are hoping that the screws will be sat waiting for us at Rothley. Join us next week to see what we get up to!

Hello and welcome to this weeks news from the team at Quorn, as work continues on Tanks 3854 & 3689.

Ernie & Nick also fettled, cleaned up and painted some more lamps.

I finished off the signwriting on tank 3689, completing the barrel end & East side numbers.

The commuted charge logos and the East side solebar letteing.

Charlie went round both tanks with some black doing any touching-up required. He then did a spot of vehicle washing.

Nick, Charlie, Mark, Tom and Oliver continued with assessment of the repairs required to the van train. Identifying the most urgent ones to attend to.

With the yard full of some very presentable Ford RS cars on Sunday, access was limited; however Van B786181 that was in the goods dock was accessible, and subsequently some of its bulk load removed to allow us to get to the bodyside panel bolts.

In preparation for the panel replacement planned for next week most of the panel bolts were removed.

Oliver measured, and with some help from Mark, Charlie and Tom cut some play to affect a Tool Van access step repair.

Nick replaced some of the vacuum hose clips on tank 3689.

Using the space in Test Car 2, I made some progress with the Esso barrel plate signwriting; completing the blue on the plate I had previously applied the Esso letters. This plate was then put aside to dry ready for varnishing.

I then added the Esso lettering to a second plate.

And then a 3rd plate.

Apart from the Esso barrel plates the two tanks are now finished.

Thanks for the kind comments received a couple of weeks ago when my old Triumph Stag had a few problems; you’ll be pleased to know after some fettling and new ignition system parts, it’s back up and running.

All the best, Dave

Hello all, and thank you for joining us for this week’s update from Quorn. The focus for us has been on the signwriting on both 3854 and 3689.

Dave took the lead on the signwriting, tackling the ‘Esso Petroleum Company Limited’ wording on both tank barrels. The wording doesn’t quite do the task justice!

During the week, and with help from Eireni I’ve now designed and 3D printed era appropriate OLE warning flashes to replace those on the tanks. I coated them with 2 coats of varnish which yellows the white PETG a treat and should protect them a little bit more. I went round both tanks and fitted the three I’d printed, thankfully we got a new old stock flash which had already been fitted to 3854.

Nick fitted the 3D printed registration to 3854, then Charlie went round and painted the black plastic with container black and then painted the bolts heads with white paint.

I tackled the barrel end numbers on both 3854 and 3689, getting both sorted on 3854 and one end on 3689

Tom and Oliver oiled the brakes on both 3854 and 3689, then Dave got them both doing the fast traffic stars, getting both stars on both tanks on the east side.

Dave got some of the solebar details done across both tanks

I snuck in a well overdue car clean for my Volvo , but then got onto a project Dave and I have been talking about to improve the use of the Test Car’s generator and air compressors. Nick and James painted two lamps repaired by Ernie in the hot weather last week.

Thanks for reading! I’ll leave you with a picture of the two tanks together from the west side, looking nearly finished, with just the plates left to fit on that side. Next week it will be more of the same with the last few details, and then onto the Esso plates to get them fitted before the tanks are released to traffic.

Hello everyone, and thanks for joining us for this week’s happenings from Quorn South Yard. Some more signwriting has taken place on 3854 and we’re getting ready for starting the work on the van train.

I started off by putting the number on the dockside of 3854, I had every intention of doing some more but got a little distracted!

Ernie and Nick started sorting through some recently donated hand tools to file them, and then moved onto sorting out our spanner collection and segregating the Whitworth and the metric spanners.

Ernie and I got to making some more label clip mounting blocks for stock, with Ernie cutting the board downs down to shape. I then put each block through the planer/thicknesser a few times to get them to the correct thickness.

Nick and Charlie went to collect 8 sheets of plywood for us to use in the repairs of the box vans, Ernie, Daniel and I went to assist with unloading them to store until required in the Palshocvan.

After tea, we got to clearing room in B852838 and B854782 moving the parcels out of the way. We then started undoing the bolts from the side sheet in B854782. Fortunately we’ve been here before and all but a few bolts undid.

For B852838, the panel we are replacing hasn’t been out before so is believed to be original fitment. We had to split each bolt and nut to be able to loosen the board sufficiently. the final act in this van was to use a small circular saw to cut the side sheet which was originally made the full length of the side. Easy for construction, however makes replacement a bit trickier!

That wraps up this weekends activities. One last reminder that next weekend is the Reunification Weekend where you can take trips on both halves of the railway linked by heritage rail replacement bus. We’ll have Test Car 2 open for you to visit, and we’ll be replacing the sides on the two vans some people can see what we do. Do stop us and ask question about the wagons or indeed the Test Car! See you then

Hello and a very warm welcome from the team at Quorn as we make a little more progress with the tanks.

Saturday we had good intentions, however after I failed to make it to site in the Stag (even with the help of Nick & Charlie), due to some rather warm electrical gremlins; and the oppressive heat at Quorn making things very uncomfortable for the rest of the team, for safety we took a break until Sunday when things had cooled down a bit.

On Sunday, Ernie sorted out fitting new vacuum release chords on both tanks 3854 and 3689.

Mark and Tom did some black touching up on the wheels and underframes of both tanks.

I fitted the Esso company text template to the West side of tank 3689, then traced on the chalk.

Nick and Ernie used some of the offcuts of wood from the Lowfit wagon floor we recently fitted to make a batch of wagon label clip blocks, three of which were required to complete tanks 3854 and 3689.

We must give a shout of thanks to Mark for another excellent BBQ, helped by chefs Charlie, Oliver and Tom !

Nick and Oliver fitted the new label clip blocks and recovered label clips, one on 3854 and two onto tank 3689.

I completed the signwriting of the Esso Petroleum Company Limited barrel text on 3689.

Thanks for reading, join us again next week; all the best, Dave

p.s. yes I did manage to limp the Stag back home by mid Saturday afternoon, thanks to a very patient and helpful RAC man. It’s now sulking in the garage……

Evening all, and thank you for joining us lot from Quorn for another update. This week 3689 has received its second coat of gloss and both tanks have started being detailed. We’ve also got the Lowfit and the Conflat ready to re-enter traffic which should be some point this week.

Saturday wasn’t the day for painting, however we had another mission after an accident last week. Charlie had a go at testing gravity last week and fell between the dock and the toolvan. Charlie is, thankfully, okay with a dent to his pride and a sore shoulder. Its a sobering reminder of the environment we work in however and as such we’ve taken another look at the high traffic doorways onto the dock and made some changes to ensure that this can’t happen again for the high traffic doorways. Nick constructed an extended step for the toolvan which sits on the dock and the van’s chassis. We may look to make a more permanent solution in due course.

Looking at the GUV, we decided to weld the stepboard brackets back onto the vehicle to put a stepboard on. The stepboards and brackets were removed by BR when the GUVs went into BRUTE traffic. Ernie prepared some brackets ready to weld into position from a scrap brakevan step bracket.

I took a decent look over both the Lowfit and the Conflat to sort out the paperwork to release them to traffic. All was well aside from an aged vacuum hose on the Conflat. These wagons can now enter traffic and clear some space in the yard for us to bring a few more vehicle up in need of our care.

Sunday was the better day weather wise so Oliver and I set about painting the second coat on 3689. The painting went well however the radiator on the Test Car’s generator has sprung a leak from one of the cores so we’ll have to sort that out before using it again. I suspect its the same leak that we had when we first fired up the generator back in 2018, so might just be a case of more Rad-Weld. Thankfully we were able to fire up Edward for a short stint to finish painting the tank.

Ernie got the welder out and welded the stepboard brackets back onto the GUV and Nick sorted out a step board and bolted it down.

Charlie (on light duties) washed Hector, looked at the defective horn button and then fitted him with a two tone air horn. We also took Danny to sort out some rubbish and recover some barrels from the yard.

Mark and Tom made light work of detailing the two tanks, removing the overspray from the buffer shanks then painting the axle end caps, the white bits (handbrake ends, lamp brackets etc) and the red on the vacuum swan necks. They also went up to the Conflat and Lowfit and repainted the swan necks on them after not being happy with the shade of red used.

With the paint on the tanks now sat hardening, we can now look at starting the signwriting on the tanks and make a start on working down refreshing the east side of the van train, plus the endless work on the plant which seems to keep us on our toes! Join us again next week to see what we get up to! Cheers, Ross