Tuesday 27th - 1675 as usual and other things

Another busy Tuesday. I began the day with a few photos for the blog and then drove to Toddington to complete the varnishing and oiling of the new bar counter in the Cotswold Halt restaurant, which had been completed by Alan and Chris. Both were now busy building another unit on the back wall behind the counter.

Roger and Alan with the broken luggage rack from NYMR SK 24804. It had been replaced with one from store. They had also free'd up some sticking droplights and doors on NYMR SK 25488. With the new season almost upon us, they had come in specially to get these jobs done.

Alan updates the records for the Winter Shutdown season. This was their last day for any work on the two main rakes as they are to be returned to Toddington on Thursday ready for the new season start on Saturday. There will still be time for anything further on the 3rd Rake, which is not due to be used until the Cheltenham Races in mid March.
 

 Maurice was back on the GW/SR van top coating the repaired door.

 The next job was top coating the angle irons from the van.

 A good day's efforts - well done Maurice!

Derek was back working in the south vestibule of FK 13326, applying creocote to the new floor supports.

It was very heartening to see Bob back doing his usual job and now getting over his health issue, even if it was just cleaning up a bit of the roof of SO 4798 in the Barn.

Alan was back after a health-related spell away, here adding silver Hammerite to some more compartment door runners.

No surprise that the rest of the day's efforts revolved around RBr 1675. Beginning with some essential work in the kitchen area where Richard was cleaning up the final area of laminate prior to the new hygenic covering to be fitted.

Then on to ceiling painting throughout the kitchen and counter area, beginning with priming. I carried on with the job after Richard had left for the day.

 David continued constructing and fitting the oak woodwork surrounding the windows.

Ainsley has started fitting the new backs to the doors where needed, here the Malvern side emergency door.

Now back to the filling and sanding along the sides of 1675, with Stu and Roger easing out the "lumps and bumps". Here they are working on the Malvern side.

 

 Another load of sanding completed, so on with another coat of green primer.

 A lot of effort has gone into this, but hopefully it won't be needed for much longer.

Saturday 24th - Time's up

 Well that's it, effectively the end of winter maintenance. On Thursday the rakes go up to Toddington ready for the new operating season to begin next Saturday.

It was a bright but cold day for the final bit of shunting.

The last couple of coaches get added.

That was all done before lunch, so the shunting team got some wagons out for a little play with the train set. :-) Not really, but putting them in the order we want them for when they go up to Toddington, probably early April now. The opportunity was taken for a picture of all four wagons in bright sunlight.

Inside it was another noisy day in the paintshop with bad sanders buzzing away most of the day. Tony focused on the Cotswold side in a few areas...

Pam and Bob were on the Malvern side. I joined in too.

David continued the production line of window frame bits, here gluing and clamping curved sections to shape.

Phil and Simon continued the fitting of wiring and woodwork respectively in the kitchen area.

Upstairs it was all systems go in upholstery

Just 10 more seats to go for this Mk2 job for the DFR.

Nick was in doing some overtime welding up the South end of the FK.

And Robert spent the morning making some new door thresholds for the coach.

James and Andy were on pipework fitting on the North end.

Ben was de-gunging door lock bits for spares.

And John was back making door receiver plates as we don't have any spares of those.

The SR/GW van is coming on well, Maurice undercoated the renewed door.

By the afternoon we'd put most of the floor in position. They're quite heavy boards, and Robert captured me testing the floor after some heavy lifting!

It didn't take Maurice and I long to drill some holes and bolt it all down. Just one small section to fit behind me now which Robert measured up and cut.

Finally for today Dave sent in this picture of the bar at Toddington which he spent the morning varnishing - it's looking good now!

Thursday 22nd - Wet, very!

Another busy Thursday with a wide spread of activities.

As I was at Toddington for the morning, both Paul and Gerry took some photos, so many thanks both.

It was another day of "yellow warning of rain", and did it ever! Despite all this there was an occasional dry spell when our outdoor team today (Paul, Alan, Geoff and Roger) could get on with essential pre-season maintenance both on and inside the rakes.

[Photo : Paul]  The interior of RBr 1672. Paul washed windows and all the floors in Rake 1.

[Photo : Paul]   Hello, where's Roger off to? Back to the Works for more tools?

[Photo : Paul]  Geoff and Alan fixing a set of window sliders in BSO 9000.

[Photo : Paul]  Geoff advised me that one of the sliders needs painting. I hope we get the chance with the contrary weather and, with the new season almost upon us, Rakes 1 and 2 will soon be taken back to Toddington.

Geoff and Alan arriving back after a walk up to Rake 2 - the rain was back.

I think Paul escaped it having not had to walk so far.

Steven appeared just before I headed off to Toddington. When I got back I discovered he had repaired the Malvern side door off the GW/SR van. Maurice cleans up a plank that had been under one of the door hinges.

Later Maurice added more Flexacryl to the new section of roof canvas.

[Photo : Gerry]  Some more photos of the new frame for the lithium batteries for RBr 1675 that has been designed and fabricated by Rex. An excellent job!

 [Photo : Gerry]

 [Photo : Gerry]

 [Photo : Gerry]

 [Photo : Gerry]

 Phil wiring up the normal battery box under 1675.

Jeff continues the lengthy job of sanding down the many bits of filler covering the window frame rivets.

On the opposite side Phil is etch priming the window frames where the filler sanding has been completed.

Moving into the Workshop to find Gerry cleaning up the metalwork inside the south vestibule of FK 13326.

Derek continues fitting the floor supports to the new top hat cross members in the south vestibule.

A rush job for me later in the day to get the north end of 13326 re-greened ready for Ken to fit the vertical supports for the corridor connection.

Jeff abandoned his sanding to get the  supports repainted.

Finally up at Toddington I spent the morning with Chris and Alan who were fitting a door to the new bar counter. The first coat of varnish was applied to the main section, initially the front and then a complete coating inside. The entire bar top, including the lift up section, was then treated with Danish oil (after the photo was taken). The remaining part where they were working will be varnished on Saturday, along with a second coat for the main part, and of course more Danish oil for the top sections.