Friday 23rd - Maintenance

The usual suspects had a visit to Winchcombe this week, and a Type A external and internal exams on the maroon buffet car…

Lots of the things described before for the Type C exams with some extras like buckeye coupling exams, which are checked for correct operation and wear. The jaw openings are checked for min/max clearance using a sheet metal gauge which either does/doesn’t fit through the open jaws if they are within spec…

…the first narrower bit should fit through, but the wider bit shouldn’t. The picture above also shows the knuckle pin which should rotate…

These are just two of the 19 things that we have to check on every buckeye every year. Once the exam has been done and passed the buffer beam is marked in chalk to show when the exam was last done…

The gangway end doors are checked for operation and that they can be secured to prevent opening. The north end was ok, but the south end door had lifted with the damp floor swelling up. The lock was failing to hook into the plate in the door pillar. Normally this is not a problem as there are a couple of brackets on the outside that can be secured together with a keyed lever, but because the swollen floor was pushing up the door these did not align…

…all we could do in time available was secure the door with a wooden baton wedged behind it and leave it to the main team to address over subsequent days. The door was originally locked, but after unlocking it to check the operation we couldn’t relock it! One of the hose seals was found to be split and was replaced…

One of the sliding quarter light windows had a broken frame so cable ties were secured around the catches/handles to prevent it being opened. Another slid past the closed stop but was otherwise usable. Both will need attention from the main team to rectify. During the morning a frog was given a helping hand from the Winchcombe swimming pool by Ian…

and potentially re-helped from it in the afternoon, it was difficult to tell if it was the same one or not. We are claiming two frogs helped!