Saturday 28th - Too much of a good thing? Never!

 Lots of activity today despite several on holiday or otherwise engaged. Once again 34929 was the main focus. Ainsley and Chris carried on with the seemingly never-ending door work. Ainsley is on one of the last door pillars, while Chris was fitting the lock on door 10:

Robert was the third member of the team out, but somehow I managed to miss him. Dave was also on doors, tidying up the rough edges of one with some sandpaper:

While on the end corridor door Dave and Steve were fettling:

In the workshop Ben and Kevin were sorting out vacuum cylinders and cleaning them up:

While Andy was servicing a DA valve taken off 'Tina', it not being required for its new static use in, I believe, Lyme Regis:

The Mink was moving forward too, Paul and Richard first had to make a few adjustments to square up the floor, before more Cotswold side planking rose up:

 

The upholstery team were out and about today with another batch of bits for 5042, but started off in their workshop:

Then down with the hoist, and out into the yard to fit them straight in:

24006 saw more progress, Robert was sanding the ceiling beading in the corridor, while Pam was given some more panels to varnish and bring out that lovely colour:

I did go out to take a photo of Paul and Dennis looking after the third rake, but I'm afraid I missed them as it was tea time, Dennis had gone and Paul was sat chatting with Derek who popped in to see what was happening:

I paced myself with bits and pieces here and there as it was day 5 of 6 on the railway for me what with one thing and another, finishing off with a whole day guarding on Sunday. P'way came in asking for a quick painting service with some extra TSR boards, and a couple of A-frame boards for Toddington in the background:

Thursday 25th - A very quiet day

Well, very quiet except for a bout of sanding, but with no engineering and holidays underway, there weren't many of us in and the day was mainly one of cleaning, preparation and painting.

 

However, first a catch-up with a bit of Wednesday's efforts with much of Saturday's filling on both ends of CK 16221 sanded down by Bob M. This is the north corner on the Cotswold side.

Our Upholstery team have done wonders in TSO 5042, with the new Bournemouth Blue moquette now enhancing about two-thirds of the coach. Paul and Dennis take a rest from cleaning.

Paul posing in sleep mode!

On the other side of the yard in the 3rd Rake, it was just Geoff making repairs in one of the toilet compartments.

Visiting TK 24006 found Bob K. top coating the ceilings in the south half of the coach.

Owner Dave H. was sanding more parts from 24006 ready for varnishing. Much of this has now been completed and stored back in the coach.

Inside BSK 34929 Phil was taping up more skirting board ready for top coating in black gloss, in effect continuing what had been done by David A. the day before. Phil then repainted a ceiling in one of the 3rd Rake coachs, and then returned to 34929 to do the glossing.

Other progress on the coach was made with the second top coating of the window frames being completed by Alex and a number of other minor jobs being done by myself.

The Paintshop trestles were somewhat covered with various items for preparation and painting. In a clockwise direction, Alex was sanding down more station notice boards ready for upgrading, the grab handles on the battery box cover had been attached and were in the process of being painted (the cover was later completely black glossed), in the far corner two more footboards for the Dogfish in the Barn were greyed up and later black glossed, and finally some new containers had been given an identification colour.

It is easy to mix up the containers being used for the different types of oil used on our coaches, hence the colour identification which will be painted on the relevant oil drum. As for the new tin of paint, the old large tin holding the yellow paint (Goldcup) was gradually losing the use of its lid, which was steadily being bashed out of shape (poor fitting lids = loss of paint). Sadly some of our tins suffer badly from over-zealous closing.

Alex sanding down another station notice board ready for the upgrade.

With both boards cleaned up, Alex cut new lengths of beading and glued them down. Paint pots make very handy weights! The boards will now be painted up ready for the new signwritten notices. 

Potted plants free to a good home. This is half the number that were present when I opened up the Works, so some very gratefully received plants will be on their way to new homes. Thank you Ken! 😀

Another fine day over and a last look at the Works, outer yard, and the lovely Cotswold escarpment before heading home.

Tuesday 24th - A day with a difference

With several from the Painting and Prep team away, as was Dave in Upholstery, we would have had just a small attendance. However Nick and Eve are unable to do either Wednesday or Thursday this week, and so, with Gerry attending as well, our number was boosted. 

Beginning with BSK 34929, which is very much the priority as we so want this to be available for the 40th Anniversary Gala at the end of October. More info here, tickets now on sale! -Ed. (Wearing one of his other hats)

 Maurice undercoated the central passenger door / guards door area on the Malvern side (the guards door itself was left as we wanted to access the corridor).

We moved back inside the coach to get back to painting the skirting boards, which were a mixture of unpainted, primer, undercoat and gloss black. It just goes to show how you have to work around other activities to end up with a mix like this. As such Richard's work comprised painting in all three types of coating. With the day being warm it all dried fairly quickly enabling him to get on with the next coating for some of the skirting.

Maurice, having completed the external undercoating, joined in at the north end. In this particular case he went straight in with the gloss black, not bothering with the undercoating.

Later on Richard worked on more of the thresholds. With a lot of the structural work now either completed or nearing completion, there is a lot to catch up on with the painting and varnishing.

Having had a turn as TTI on Train 1 for the morning, Alex was back in for the afternoon and resumed his second top coating of the windows on the Cotswold side. He then moved to the Malvern side and wasn't that far from completing those windows as well when, with the clock nearing 6 pm, we decided to call it a day.

Nick had been contacted about the welding work required to reinstate the external grab handles surrounding the Cotswold side guards door. Not all the captive bolts were present so new holes had to be drilled where new panelling had gone in and the new bolts then welded in.

Gerry assisted Nick with the various jobs. All three rails put back were cleaned to bare metal to remove all the old cracked paint.

The mount for the French key chain for the south end sliding door also needed welding back on. Gerry cleaned the area of paint to give bright metal ready for the welding. The chain and key had also been cleaned to bare metal.

The new store box for our safety wire harnesses was being given its first top coat of the purple Carmine Lake paint. We had two tins of this that had been bought by mistake, so it's good to be able to make use of it.

 Eve was working on more of our records in the office.

(Photo: Gerry)

With the work on 34929 completed, Nick and Gerry got back to the Dogfish repairs. It has frequently been mentioned how awkward these are to work on, and the first photo clearly indicates this. Nick's feet are resting on the top of the small steps purely for comfort.

 (Photo: Gerry)

With everything in the right position, Nick can at last do the small bit of welding required for this particular repair.

 (Photo: Gerry) 

I think this is Nick checking the result to see how well it has been done. 

From what Nick was saying it looks as though work on the Dogfish wagons may be nearing the end and they will soon be going back out.

Monday 23rd - Both Sides Now

 

10 for Carriage Cleaning today on what turned out to be a very nice day, weather-wise.

You've seen enough carriages being washed so I thought this might be more interesting!

The loco department have a posh new purpose built facility, but this was their former home. Named Tina after one of our lady firemen, in case you were wondering. Due to start a new life as a café in Lyme Regis. Hope they have plenty of welders down there!

Yes, the pictures are the same coach. The public facing side was painted some years ago to look the part. The side against the machine shop wall was untouched! For the carriage nerds (guilty) the number is 25646, originally a Corridor Second.

Saturday 21st - Making the most of things

Another busy Saturday with a good range of activities taking place. Even though spending nearly 3 hours away from the Works to do the complete round trip of the line, I was still able to capture much of what had been happening. However apologies to anyone I have missed.

With SK 25501 now sold to be converted and sited in a restored station for use as an 'Orangery'/lounge, we are able to remove many of the underframe parts for spares as well as swapping the bogies.

 Andy and John H. were busy with the Cotswold side vacuum cylinder and DA valve.

 Alan was removing parts of the brake rigging.

The two rescued DA valves.

Servicing one of our vacuum cylinders was new member Ben. Ben will actually be part of our Door team, but with limited work available with the doors, is helping out the Dirty Gang.

Another photo of Ben was taken and has been added to the Door Team part of the Meet The Teams menu in the blog's home page.

Ben was later joined by Richard, former Head of C&W, and now our Chairman and Company Secretary.

John S. was making metal brackets for more new vacuum cylinder gaiters.

Phil was back with his toilet cisterns, servicing more valve units.

A useful impromptu meeting for Ian, our Head of C&W, and John A. who is Head of our Friday Maintenance Team.

After an enjoyable holiday in Cornwall, George was back with the filling and sanding on the remaining parts of CK 16221. We are almost finished with this until missing capping strips have been reinstated.

Over to the 3rd Rake to find Dennis going through checking the toilet tanks.

One of the decorative repairs required - the unfortunate result of a leaking roof.

In another coach Paul was cleaning the ceiling. Spiders have been busy with their webs!

It was just John and Jenny in Upholstery today. The refurbishing of TSO 5042 continues with the lovely Bournemouth Blue moquette. Jenny is preparing another piece for what looks to be a side pad.

John removes the old crumbling foam from an arm rest with a grater plane.

Paul E. tackles another set of planking for the Mink A van with a second top coat of GW Grey.

Now back to BSK 34929 with the undercoated Malvern side double doors now ready for top coating in Maroon. However before Martin can begin, an adjustment is needed to the taped up line on the adjacent bodyside. The latter fell away as it neared the capping strip and so failed to match with the tape on the door. The lining out gauge is used to correct the tape line, after sanding down the hard paint ridges from the original taping.

The completed first top coat. It's good to see more and more top coat going on. A long way to go yet though with the completion of the first coat, adding the second top coat, lining out, and finally two coats of varnish.

Just a few yards away the base coat of Light Grey is still going on as we catch up with the door preparation and painting.

Good progress on this was also made and by the end of the day Phil's efforts mean that another area can be undercoated in Madder and then top coated.

Alex was TTI on Train 2 during the morning, but came in for the afternoon and began second top coating the windows on the Cotswold side. By the end of the afternoon just three remained to be done.

Steve and Dave E. mounted the final compartment door and then reinstated the very heavy corridor connection door.

Door 10 (Cotswold side north end) unfortunately still wasn't quite right and both Ainsley (whom I missed) and Robert were once again working on it.

Dave H. was busy sanding down more bits from TK 24006 ready for varnishing.

Pam was back after missing a week attending the Friends of Toddington Station summer meet-up, so a fair amount of varnishing to do. She is still taking care of Max for some friends who are away, so once again his bed was placed nearby.

Max was restless while at the Works two weeks ago, so I suggested to Pam that we do a round trip of the line so he wasn't stuck in the Works all day. After all the work we do with our coaches, it's nice to be able to get out and actually enjoy travelling in them. This particular coach is one of the two with the lovely red chain-link moquette.

To end today's posting, Alex has added some interesting information on some new wagons

And finally, while 3 carriages are soon to be leaving us, on Friday 2 "new" wagons arrived for us to play with instead at Toddington. Both purchased by members of the steam loco department, firstly we have another GWR Starfish:

This came from the Pontypool Blaenavon Railway and requires a full restoration, the underframe is reasonably sound but the body has suffered considerable corrosion over the years.

And secondly is this GWR water tank, the tank itself has yet to be delivered:

There are only 2 others of this kind in preservation so is a bit of a rarity. The previous owner had already done a lot of work on this and the chassis is fully overhauled, so it just needs putting all back together. I believe it has already entered the shed at Toddington for that to happen so hopefully it won't be too long before it emerges fit to run.