Weds 14th / Thurs 15th - Two contrasting days

Wednesday

Thanks to Nick and Gerry for the day's photos. Nick took the ones in Upholstery, while Gerry took the rest.

Beginning today in Upholstery with Eve, Laura, Ceri and Chris preparing foam for the NYMR's DMU seats.

Simon continues his rebuild of RMB 1876's toilet compartments.

Ben is making a bracket for one of the door locks - for one of the access doors for the toilet compartments?

Jim is setting up the Wadkin saw ready for some wood cutting.

Now on to progress with the weed spraying wagon.

Nick is making a post to fix the pump between the tanks.

Stu is cutting rail for the wagon's door stops.

Rex is cutting and fixing rails, and later priming them.

Nick is welding on brackets for the spraying unit.

Bryan and Bob are setting up the pipes between the tanks.

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Thursday

A smaller group in today.

The Weed wagon group had been very busy the previous day judging by all the top coated parts spread about. The above is just part of what was done. More parts were behind me and at the other end of the Workshop. The wagon itself is still in the Barn which is not good for painting in the winter months, especially with the frequent changes in the weather causing condensation (more on that later).

The Barn jack road will be featuring rapid changes as various vehicles are being brought in from our main running rakes for essential winter maintenance.

John is busy checking the ride height of the bogies to see if any adjustments will be required.

All readings are listed. Later on John transferred the information to the formal record sheet, which will subsequently be stored in the office box file for 25488.

As previously mentioned the Barn suffers a lot from condensation during the winter months, which is not good news for the Painting and Prep team. As the day started to warm up the very cold bodyside of SO 4798 began to be coated in condensation. This meant that Ainsley had to give up his filling job. The very wet weather was also adding to the problem as this was making the air inside the Barn feel damp.

There is still a lot to do both inside and outside 4798. We need to get it back in the Workshop as soon as possible.

Phil was also out here working on the breather pipe for the toilet tank.

In the balmy warmth of the Paintshop Martin went round more of the doors on RMB 1876, adding extra top coat to the edges, bases and frames, generally tidying up where needed. When lining out it's easy to miss doing the tiny bit of yellow/gold or black on door edges and frames, so occasionally these bits need fixing too.

All the door backs will receive a fresh coat of varnish, which really brings back the smart appearance.

The toilet compartments being reconstructed by Simon are coming along very well. There will be a lot of varnishing to do in this part of the coach.

Bob top coated the front of the servery counter and other bits in this area. He then added further varnish in the south vestibule.

David took on the sanding and further filling at the north end of the coach.

Ainsley black glossed the north connection entrance and then moved to the south entrance to repeat the job. First clean up the chequerplate area. The entrance had already been undercoated, so a quick wipe over with thinners and then on with the paint

Time to clean up the loose threshold strips. A further two were located in the Workshop storage racks.

Stu had obtained a set of new chargeable battery powered lamps specially for use in coaches in the Paintshop. Alan and Geoff installed a shelf just above the central socket on the Cotswold side. 

Perfect!

The forecast was spot on with the heaviest rain during the central part of the day.