Tuesday 30th - A cracking good day

The last day of November and what a superb effort by the Tuesday team, with the jobs disappearing one by one. Unlike last week when job allocation was awkward, today everything fell into place.

As always, Stu and Maurice were first in and, after the early cuppa, it was on with the BSK. The lining out on the north end door and corner on the Cotswold side was completed by Stu, and later the demarcation tape between the maroon side and the black end removed, and the black completed.

Phil meanwhile was busy reinstating the guards door grab rails and passenger door handle on the Malvern side.

We could also line out the central section and right hand vestibule door. While Richard applies the yellow tape which we use for all our lining out, Maurice adds the second top coat to the left hand vestibule door - somehow this was missed when all the second top coating was done at the south end of the Cotswold side.

Stu had done some tiny touching up on the Malvern side north end door, and then returned to the Cotswold side, and with the lining out tape removed, completed the job there with a little tidying up.

No work was being done with the central passenger door today, which in turn enabled us to get the first top coat on the guards door.

Returning to 34929 later in the morning, Richard had taped up the lines for the central section and was now applying the Goldcup yellow.

With much of the upper level painting either completed or well in progress, we can begin to concentrate on more of the lower level areas that can be painted or given further coatings. Phil tackled the Malvern side, adding black to the steps and visible parts of the vacuum cylinder.

Maurice was similarly engaged with the Cotswold side. The fuse box cover has been removed and the old paint being taken off. It now sits on the paintshop trestles with a coating of red oxide.

The plate had been sitting around on the end step for ages, but thanks to Phil is now back in its rightful place.

BSK 34929 seems to have been with us forever. It's quite a shock when we look back to when it first entered the Works. In trawling though our original C&W blog that had been set up by Peter Bennett, I came across two photos that confirm just how long it has been.

Both pictures were taken by Peter on the day our regular grit-blasting contractor cleaned up and primed the underneath of 34929. Although some work has been done on the coach, the south end double doors are still in place, so this had to be before we started our reconstruction of the south end into a new seating area for wheelchaired passengers and their families

The date of the photos? September 2017.

 

Let's aim for the Christmas/New Year period to get it finished!

We are continually reviewing and updating our record keeping. One of the aspects now started is to number all our doors permanently to enable us to better keep track of location and maintenance/repair work. 

Ainsley, our new head of the Door Team, began the job today with the doors for CK 16221. That's good signwriting Ainsley!

 The droplight for door CW012 was also given a thorough clean.

Dave and Robert inspect the latest batch of light fittings to appear on our paint trestles for cleaning up and painting. These are from their coach TK 24006, whereas the batch mentioned in last Tuesday's posting were spares to go back into storage. 

Keith's first job of the day was top coating the recovered scotches in red. These will be used inside the Works freeing up more of our newer yellow painted ones for outside use.

Keith once again had a stack of things to clean up and paint, including half of the light fittings from 24006. The other half will be done next week.

Over to 24006 to see more progress. Phil B.was in again and helping Dave and Robert. More panelling strips were being removed, this time in the north vestibule, and will end up in the Works for sanding and revarnishing.

Dave was dismantling various wall fittings from the toilet compartments.The two small corner shelves had already been taken down but had in the past been painted and looked somewhat woebegone. As luck would have it I found two far better ones in our spares area which will be cleaned up and fitted instead.

 In one of the north end compartments Robert is filling the edges of the ceiling.

Alan was back on sanding panels from 24006. He was later joined by Bob M. cleaning up the door top and beading in front of Alan.

With the recent restrictions with available work on 34929, it's good to have another option available in the form of TSO 4763 in the Barn. Thankfully with the weather warmer after the past very cold spell, jobs involving filling and painting are once again possible in the Barn.

First to get going in here was Bob M, adding sealant to the north end of the roof where we suspect there may be a leak.

4763 will be with us for as long as it takes to do some essential repairs. As such with respect to repairing bodyside painting, we have to progress a bit at a time in case the coach has to be whisked back out again. Thankfully what Stu and Roger were able to do went well. The above was the first area tackled by Stu  - dug out, sanded and coated in oxide. Next stage is filler and finally painting.

Thankfully with both oxide and filler going off quickly in the warmer air, Stu was able to get the crteam and brown top coat on, leaving just the line repainting. Great job! The coach was one of the ones where we had repainted the brown panels earlier in the year, in effect a quick fix improving the overall appearance, so the paint patching should blend in fairly well.

Roger had quite a large area to sort out.

The cleaned up patches are now coated in oxide, which dried relatively quickly, so Roger was able add the filler. Towards the end of the day I sanded this down - a touch more filler and this area can also be painted. Meanwhile Bob had progressed to the south end of the roof to add more sealant where required.

Stu in the end managed to do four or five different places where paintwork and the underlying filler had cracked. This is all good work and provides a holding action, helping to prevent these areas getting any worse until the coach is one day brought in for a full refurb.

John was back in again and working on the bogies that had been taken from under the former Loco Dept Mess Coach "Tina". Basically they are in good overall condition and will replace those under 4763.

It was certainly a more pleasant day to be outside.