Tuesday 17th - A Hive of Activity

 Another good productive day, particularly on the gala wagon front. Starting off with the Toad, the gang were already hard at work when I arrived in the morning, fitting the new floor in the cabin:

Maurice had plenty of painting to do:

The Bubblecar was another focus for today, Richard steadily worked along and did the vast majority of the taping up today:

Ian did a little more patch undercoating in green where required, before moving on to undercoat cream for the inside of the door window frames:

With his Broadway hat on Ian also inspected the wooden lettering cut by Ainsley for a sign on the approach road:

Very neat! Ainsley was in with Robert on doors for CK 16221:

Up until lunchtime apparently all was mostly going to plan, but unfortunately after that it all started to fall apart, with several things not lining up that are quite difficult to adjust without redoing a lot. The trials of standard Mk1 coaches!

I'm not sure if Rod had much better luck, he was on door pillar adjustment, checking for contact points with paint then out with the planer to remove any high spots:

Keith had plenty to keep him busy on the trestles today, scotches into red, priming the newly cast number plates for the Toad, and later on more RBr chair varnishing:

Speaking of, Dave was making good progress on the next one in the production line:

Apparently the first chair they did, which they used to make templates for the rest, turned out to be a bit of an odd one out, so lots of adjustment is still required for each subsequent one!

Adjustment wasn't necessary in the RBr, it's still lots of (controlled) destruction for Bryan:

A rumble and a 'toot' outside, what's that then, it's not time for a train yet?

It turned out to be the Cl.47, come to collect BG813039 which is off to pastures new:

Clive had a very busy day, we started off going through the list of all the wagons we want to run for the gala, and then he set too with the paperwork and inspections, here inspecting the GPV:

It turns out that there is no tick box on the Fitness to Run exam form that says "Signwriting complete" but nonetheless, it is now, as I finished this off today with 'GUNPOWDER VAN' in white:

Having to do it on a ladder leaning against the van, it wasn't really possible to use a mahl stick, so I had to do it all with a floating arm - so again, don't look too closely at this side!

Back towards the end of the day to see the Toad again, Richard had supplied Maurice with yet more planks to paint:

While inside things are really beginning to look smart, the floor is nice and solid now:

Put your slippers on before entering please!

The veranda end cabin planking is beginning to come together too:

As are the doors:

Thanks to Paul for those 2 pics.

Finally I finished the day making a start on setting out the kinks in the lining as it goes round the corner on the bubble car:

Ok, now I've just got to match the other 3!...