Saturday 27th - Lots done again

Another day, another good few winter maintenance jobs ticked off. 

First thing and unusually both rakes had been left in the yard/running line rather than in the platforms, as yesterday rake 1 had its annual buckeye exam. So there had to be a bit of shimmying to do the first job...

Which was to move the CK back over to the jack road...

And lift it up to put its bogies back underneath, now with newly turned tyres on the wheels.

Someone asked about bogie adjustment last week, here's one form of adjustment.

A pneumatic clamp squeezes up the leaf spring, then you adjust the nut on the spring hanger bolt.

While it was up in the air again a spot of new lagging around the steam heat system where it was repaired a couple of weeks ago.

The chocolate & cream set was still in pieces from yesterday, so that needed putting back together. Easy does it...

Clonk! Now crawl around and connect all the hoses and cables up.

The RBr's north end Buckeye failed its exam (obviously didn't study hard enough...) so that needed swapping out.

I managed to miss the moment the white tank escaped from the workshop and had to go looking for it temporarily stabled in a back siding. Still the second set of end timber infills to fit, but aside from that it was largely finished and we needed the space so out it went.

The room was needed so Ken could lay out the North end corridor connection bits to start doing the prep for fitting.

All the corridor end woods are well on the way on the painting trestles, Jeff did the honours today, also priming the second pair of wood end infills for the tank wagon.

Inside the serving area of the RBr with the shelving unit done Simon moves onto ceiling joists.

Dave went round marking a few small areas that still need spot welding.

After a few years away, I finally persuaded Dad to come back and join the team, we joined together almost exactly 11 years ago. After the customary Dave tour to refamiliarise himself, he got straight into it working on flatting back the South end.

Meanwhile at the North end Dave put the first bit of livery undercoat on towards the end of the day.

It was a very busy and productive day in the woodwork shop, with lots of large sheets of ply needing lifting and cutting. First up was battery box bits

All taking shape quite nicely.

Then measuring up for the floor of the GW/SR van.

Chris and Alan were here and there with bits for the refitting of the cafe at Toddington.

On the next workbench Ben was cutting and shaping a replacement door panel for one of the running coaches.

The production line in upholstery continues apace with DFR Mk2 seats at various stages.

The next set ready for recovering. The team are over half way now on this contract.

As I seem to do all too frequently, I completely forgot to take a photo of what I was doing, some more sanding and painting on the SR van, so I'll slip in some pictures of our Wednesday evening working instead where we were on the same project.

Mark went round with the primer on patches of bare metal.

Rich (and Dan behind the door) cracked open the undercoat.

While Greg (yes he is in there) and I finished off the underframe with a good coating of black bitumastic paint.