Friday 15th/Saturday 16th - Great progress all round

Another brilliant two days with tremendous progress with the Queen Mary brake van, a lot of shunting in preparation for future work, and our usual mix of jobs.

So initially over to Alex to report on Friday's activities with the Queen Mary.

Friday 15th

A bit of overtime to make sure we're on track to meet our ambitious deadline, we achieved far more than I'd hoped! Task number 1 was to paint the roof, which Stu powered through so quickly I didn't get a photo! Flushed with success the SR Freight brown was cracked open to see how it went on, here's the first bit going on:

Meanwhile I painted over all the pink on the North end and top inner end in red:

The central planked section complete we could stand back and appreciate the colour:

A bit darker than we were expecting, but it's definitely grown on me. It reminded us of a red wine sauce for a beef stew!

Meanwhile on the other side Maurice was doing the same thing:

The other challenge for today was to have the drawgear out for inspection. Access was not ideal; to get to the rear nut you had to lay on your back and wiggle yourself underneath the outer axle and various bits of brake rigging until there was just about enough room to almost sit up! After a bit of bashing away (of split pins, not our heads thankfully!) here's the whole assembly out:

It was all given a good clean up, inspected and given a clean bill of health, then greased up and put back together. Mark and I were rather pleased with ourselves managing to do both ends in an afternoon. While we were under there we also found a NDT tag on an axle from 2003, apparently it was registered at Toton depot at the time, so is a relatively recent retiree from mainline service by our rolling stock standards!

The state of play at the end of the day, all hooks back in place, both ends top-coated in red thanks to Greg for doing the south end whilst we were underneath, and both sides having most of their topcoat too:

Saturday 16th

Saturday was very busy with a large number attending and a lot going on.

A frustrating start to today's posting with Andy wrestling with a very large nut holding the draw hook of Dogfish 983239. The grimmace on his face says it all and despite numerous attempts he had to give up. 

A cross in red oxide marks the rogue hook. The wagon will end up at Toddington where they have more powerful equipment to do the job.

There was a lot of shunting for much of the day with various movements around the yard in preparation for a number of things. I didn't capture all the moves but the following few photos will give an impression of what was involved.

Two coaches had been temporarily placed down the far end of the headshunt and were now on their way across the yard to the far siding.

These bogies were being returned to their home by the signalbox, having been temporarily moved with respect to extracting the Fruit C van, which is now in the Barn to have roof leak problems dealt with.

Tony watches as Clive guides Ian with the reassembly of the ballast train. This ended up alongside the Barn, the location being its new permanent home when not in use. Further shunting extracted RBr 1675 ready for when it is brought into the Works for a full refurbishment.

Temporarily jobless while the early part of the shunt was taking place, Dennis and Paul await the moves to be completed before they can return to their tasks for the day with the spare coaches.

Robert captures the second train of the day with P&O in charge. The sunlight on the steam made for a great effect as the train approached from its stop at the signal.

Quickly swinging round to capture Foremarke Hall waiting with the first return trip while P&O glides by. Our trains were once again nicely filled with many waving hands greeting us in return to our own waving. It was nice to see Eddie (our former Head of Woodwork) and Val waving to us on a later train.

Robert was back on the infamous Door 10 (Cotswold side north end) on BSK 34929, securing the top panel.

 Then it was back to sorting out the sticking problem that seems to plague this door.

In the Woodwork shop Ainsley was fettling a new door pillar for Door 9.

Then with Robert's assistance, Ainsley carefully marks out the important positions along the new pillar.

Then it's back to the Woodwork shop for some planing down to ensure the correct fit in the doorway.

Ainsley has just become Head of the Door Team, taking over from Trevor who has done an excellent job and now wishes to stand down.

Now upstairs to Upholstery to find Dave stripping down one of the longer seat bases from Bubblecar 55003. 

Jenny and John were working with one of the partially rebuilt seat backs.

They were in the process of setting up some templates for the side segments.

Pam began her day with some signwriting, marking both sides of each of the new scotches - four are for BSK 34929, with the remaining two going into the general pool for C&W.

It was then back to another round of painting and varnishing, a second coat of black gloss for 34929's table legs and more varnish on the various items from TK 24006. 

Progress on 24006 continues steadily, with all seating now in storage and thus making available the north end compartments for refurbishing as far as possible. The one at the north end has some leakage problems which will only be able to be resolved properly when the coach is eventually brought into the Works. 

Kevin, our tireless store keeper, assists Ainsley with the search for items for 34929. This racking is used to store various items from the coaches undergoing refurbishment within the Works.

Meanwhile Kevin was sorting out the racks which had become a bit cluttered. Much of this is from CK 16221. 

************************************************

By now you will probably be jumping up and down and asking what's the progress with the Queen Mary. 

Simple answer - it's brilliant!

With yesterday's top coating now dried and looking great, the veranda planking is steadily going on.

Inside the cabin Maurice (one of the Tuesday team who has come in specially to help with the progress) was finishing off the general sanding down of the inner walls.

Paul, who throughout the day has been busy with more priming and undercoating of the replacement planking and wood sections, undercoats the cleaned and primed area under the inspection plate.

Meanwhile, with sanding down finished, Maurice had made a start on the undercoating inside the cabin. The bottom 3' 3.5" will be Dark Grey undercoat. with Cream undercoat up to the ceiling. 

 The freshly coated veranda door precludes exit that way.

The sole bar receives its first coat of the Southern Freight Brown. This really is a gorgeous colour. Milk crates are the perfect height and very handy for this type of job.

Other work today involved sorting out the roof leak (hence the scaffold tower nearby) and undercoating more of the steps. Alex will be producing another listing for the Tuesday painting team. It's not long to the 40th Anniversary Gala and we need to crack on as fast as we can.

The End Of The Day Club and time to relax in the Mess Room after another brilliant day before our long journeys home.