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.