Week 5

Week 5 already, but we're doing OK. We're all raring to go back, but the patient has been given another dose of 3 weeks in bed. Sigh!

The Pway gang has set up a WhatsApp group to do virtual work, and of course then rest in virtual tea breaks.

We send each other virtual doughnuts.

Here, try one! They're lovely.

Of course, not quite as good as the real thing, but certainly a lot less sticky. One thing we've had to learn (in the real world, remember that) was that you couldn't just lay into a doughnut, as that would end up with jam down your sleeve. You wouldn't notice it straight away, but only once the sleeve had touched something else. Arghhhhh!

So take our advice, start by eating the hole where the jam comes out. Stay neat!


The railway is still OK, no news apparent, so that is good news. It sleepeth, perchance. We have had the weedkiller trolley round, as that has got to happen, weeds don't do self isolation. Some of you noticed it filling up with water on the Broadway webcam. That is another cost though, our costs are way down, but they don't stand still. We have staff too, maybe fewer than some, but they still cost money out.

Our appeal is doing OK, we're up to £175.000 now, but one gets the idea that the curve is flattening. At the moment we are still £75.000 short. Have you made your donation to help yet? We need you.

Here is the link to our appeal page:

https://www.gwsr.com/Emergency_Embankment_Appeal.html

No doubt when the appeal amount was decided we had to make a guess how long services would be stopped, so pray that the government agrees with our guess, otherwise we could be in a mess. So do try and help.



Small bits of heritage.

Our GWR Trust has, as part of the fund raising appeal, made a plea that when we use Amazon to order stuff we use Amazon Smile. If you do that, they donate a small percentage of the turnover to a charity of our choice (er, the GWR Trust!). Yours truly did this, 16 purchases ago already. It's exactly the same Amazon, just a slightly different link:

https://smile.amazon.co.uk/ref=smi_se_dshb_bk_smi

So far, Amazon Smile has donated £3,022,499.43 to charities. We checked just now how much the GWRT got out of this from those that signed up, and it was - £19! Oh. Hardly anybody seems to have done it, yet it is free money and costs you nothing. So do try the link and generate some funds out of the behemoth.

In the little heritage workshop near the railway an enormous sheet of 18mm marine plywood has arrived. It's 2.4m long and weighs a ton, according to Mrs. Blogger who was roped in to move it. It took 3 weeks to arrive, but stuff is getting through, so be patient.

(Part of-) the marine plywood sheet will be used to make a replica timetable board for Broadway. This will have a standard text, with the actual timings on little tablets which can easily be changed according to the timings of the day.

Six further cast aluminium replica letters have arrived for one of the suspended canopy boards at Broadway.

Unfortunately we have forgotten what they were for, can you help?

The board itself is already made, with T&G panels and replica double sided mouldings all the way round.

In the picture the letters have been lined up with a piece of timber, and are having the holes drilled for the screws.

Notice the chamfer on the edges of the letters, which allows them to pop easily out of the mould and which distinguishes them from laser cut steel or - the horror of it - plywood examples.

This shows the little kit we are using. The pointing hand is from a brass rubbing of an original given to us by the heritage dept of a friendly neighbouring railway. The letters sit on SS washers, which just lift them a little bit off the backing woodwork. This makes them stand out a bit more, and makes repainting in the future a little easier, as if you are careful you can avoid painting the woodwork underneath white. We noticed this idea on some originals we dismantled.







Here is one side of an almost finished board, the longer one for P2 at Broadway.

Of course we can't put the board up yet as there is no P2 canopy. But we need to order the materials in one lot, and happily this coincided with the virus crisis, so there is something to do while we stay at home. Every cloud has a silver lining!

A detail of Broadway in 1904

If you're really fussy you're going to say that the finger is in the wrong place, it should be on the end of the bottom line on the board under the P2 canopy.

We had a think about that. It meant either a longer board, or smaller letters, all squashed up. On the other hand the P2 board is already quite substantial.

Then we had a look at Winchcombe, the only other station along our line with a similar set up. There it looked like this:

The same detail of Winchcombe in BR days.

Slightly different! But it is more logical to have the finger next to the larger letters, where there is the space, so that is what we did. Keeping 'FOOT' and 'BRIDGE' separate as at Broadway.

 -------------------- 000 * 000 --------------------

Last week's quiz answers:

Got your answers ready? Here is what they should look like:

CHRISTMAS QUIZ 2016

1.       Which region of British Railways did not have water troughs?           Southern Region 

2.      What was the width between the rails on Brunel’s broad gauge?                           7’0¼”…….

3.      Which of our locos has an 81A, Old Oak Common, shed plate?  7903 Foremarke Hall

   

4.      Who, during 2016, was offered training on how to use a shovel?     John, aka The Duke            

(In joke, OK)                 

5.      The Pritchard Patent Product Company is better known as what?                 PECO

         

6.      What’s the locomotive number used by Flying Scotsman during 2016?       60103

    

7.      Where was Dinmore Manor this last summer?   (NB We are in 2016) Dartmouth Steam Railway

         

       8.       How wide, in inches, is a standard wooden sleeper?                                    10''

9.      What type of dogs travel for free on the GWR?                                    Well Behaved

                                 

10.   Where is the shed coded 14E?                                                                     Bedford

        

11.   According to a volunteer's’ profound analytic mind, what is the main

difference between the Swanage Railway’s Derby built lightweight

Class 108 DMUs and their Pressed Steel Company built Class 117

DMUs?    (In joke, funny ha-ha)                                                                       Nine

                                                                                                 

        12.  Where is the shed coded 14E?                                            Bedford, again (yes, we know.....)                                                                               

13.   At 22.75 miles, which is the longest standard gauge heritage railway

        in the UK?                                                                                                             WSR                                                                                                                                  

14.   What, demolished in December 1961, will be reinstated by HS2?         The Doric Arch             

15.   What’s the BR TOPS class number for our loco 5343?                                        26

16.    If you need to slow a train to 5mph though PWay work, what colour flag is the first to be

 displayed?                                                                                                                  Yellow  

17.   How is the flag held?                                                                                    Gently waved




And now a new quiz for this week:

MISSING WORDS IN LOCO NAMES

                        NAME                                                                                                  NUMBER

1.     Evening    ………………………………………………                              92220

2.     Hong  …….………….………………………………                                  45611

3.     ……………………………………………    John                                        6026

4.     ………………………………… ………    Ho                                           34036

5.     …………………………………………..     Enterprise                               D1000

6.     ………………………………………….      of Canada                               60010

7.     The ……………………………………..      Howards                                 46133

            8.     Resolven   …………………………………………………….                      6869 

9.     …………………………………………..     of Gloucester                          46225

10.  …………………………………………..     Royal                                       D601

11.  Green   ………………………………………………..                                60800

12.  ……………………………………….…      Nelson                                     30850

13.  Sir  ………………………………………… Pole                                         5066

14.  Home  ……..………………………………………...                                 45543

15.  Great  ……..……………………………………………                                   D4

16.  ………………………………………………   Margaret Hall                         7911

17.  …………………………………………….  Fraser                                      72003

18.  Winston  ….…………………………………………..                                 34051

19.  Burton  ……..……………………………    Hall                                          6998

20.   ………………………………………………of India                                   70040

Once again, thanks (yours and mine) go to Robert who not only made up the quizzes to amuse the munching Christmas diners, but also let us borrow them to entertain you once a week during the Corona crisis.

So sharpen your pencils, no conferring, and write down your answers and see next week how many you have got right.

You'll notice that there are 20 questions this week. This is because there was nothing rude about this quiz at all. Bit disappointing really...

(Apologies for the red colour, but due to some kink or other in Blogger it will not change from red. Except this last bit. 
Weird.

Post Scriptum:

Nearly forgot, but John Lees' pictures of early PWay work on the GWSR have been updated with another, large, batch of photographs, this time from the 2010 era.

Here is his album:

John Lees Early GWSR on Flickr 

The first new picture is this one:

 https://www.flickr.com/photos/73536293@N02/49788654758/in/dateposted-public/